In the spirit of celebrating the Little Red Dot, there’s a new survey on iconic Singaporean foods that ranks local favorites according to their popularity. Market research agency YouGov recently polled the public on 50 traditional dishes and found that 96 percent of Singaporeans “enjoy their own national cuisine.” (Uh, what’s up with the other four percent?)
With the results, it charted out a table of best-liked local classics separated into savory and sweet categories. To no one’s surprise at all, Hainanese chicken rice topped the list with 89 percent of people giving it their likes, followed by satay (87 percent) and popiah (86 percent). Dishes like char kuay teow, nasi lemak, chai tow kway (carrot cake), roti prata, wanton mee, laksa, and otah came in tops as well, with more than 80 percent of people giving them their likes.
Hokkien prawn mee, curry mee, sambal stingray, curry puff, fish head curry, chilli crab, and fish soup also received some love, with 75 to 79 percent of those surveyed voting for them. Still in the 70 percent category, fish ball soup, oyster omelette, chwee kueh, mee rebus, and briyani took their place in the mid-tier.
Nearing the bottom were foods such as claypot rice, mee goreng, ban mian, bak chor mee, bak kut teh, duck rice, and mee soto. With less than 65 percent voting for them, kway chap and lor mee weren’t too popular, but frog porridge took last place with only 50 percent agreeing with its flavor profile. The dish turned out to be popular among those aged 45 to 54, but not so much with the younger crowd.
On the sweet side, tau huay (soya bean curd) was most favored, followed by rojak and kaya toast (although it’s debatable whether these two are actually desserts.)
Strangely enough, chee cheong fun also appeared in the sweet section in the 70 percent category, along with min jiang kueh, chendol, pineapple tart, and ondeh ondeh.
In the next tier, tutu kueh, kueh lapis, ice kachang, cheng tng, goreng pisang, and bubur cha cha proved to be rather unpopular, but not as lowly-ranked as the likes of muah chee, kueh sapit, kueh seri muka, and ang ku kueh.
However, YouGov didn’t reveal the number of people polled or the demographics of the survey, so there’s no need to get too fired up over the results if your favorites appeared at the bottom of the barrel.
Reader Interactions