A Singapore Chef Lightens Up

In Singapore, Chinese faces seem to outnumber Indians, Malays, and all others. I ask our taxi driver about the country’s Chinese residents. Our talkative driver opens up. “I’m Cantonese,” he says. “The Chinese make up about 75 percent of the population here, with Hokkiens being the biggest group.” “What about Hakka?” I ask. “The fourth largest,” he responds. “The government wants everyone to speak Mandarin rather than dialects. Our first president, Lee Kwan Kee, a Hakka, started that.”

He drops us off at Moi Kong Hakka Restaurant. This family restaurant goes back to the 1950s, with the last twenty-plus years at this Maxwell Street location (which has since closed). Rick Wong (Wong Chee Leong), the chef and owner, tells us that his father originally came from Meixian in China. He went to Ipoh in Malaysia, and then settled in Singapore, where Rick was born.