It all started with delivering eggs. Two years ago, Cody Tan, 31, stepped in to help out at his father’s poultry and egg delivery business when the latter fell ill. One of his dad’s customers was a famous fried kway teow stall at Old Airport Road Food Centre (he declines to name the stall), whose owner offered him a job as a stall assistant despite Cody’s inexperience in the kitchen.

“I think he saw that I was a responsible and diligent worker. I would deliver eggs to his stall punctually – rain or shine. When he heard that my father was well enough to return to the business, the owner offered me a job,” shares the soft-spoken millennial.

Today, after a year of learning the ropes at the char kway teow stall, Cody helms his own stall called Yong Xuan Fried Kway Teow at a kopitiam along Crawford Lane, a couple of blocks away from the Michelin-starred Tai Hwa Pork Noodle bak chor mee stall.

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So what made a self-confessed kitchen noob accept the job as a hawker helper? “Honestly, I didn’t think too much about it. It seemed like a good opportunity at the time, so I wanted to give it a shot,” says Cody.

The easy-going hawker, who used to work in sales, found his year of experience delivering eggs extremely helpful for the transition. “Otherwise, I think it would’ve been quite a shock for me to go from working in an air-conditioned office to becoming a hawker!”

Cody tells us that when he first started working at the stall, he could not even hold the knife properly. “My boss scolded me because I was not chopping the vegetables correctly,” he recalls with a laugh.

Just like many old-school hawkers and chefs, Cody’s boss was not the type to teach him everything step by step. “He would pinpoint some stuff that I was doing wrong, but I knew I had to pick up a lot of things on my own. I just kept observing and practising.”

At times, it can be demoralising. “He threw away a lot of my plates (of char kway teow). I’d feel really bad about it, partly because I wasn’t good enough yet and also because I was wasting food.”

Months of hard work finally paid off when he was allowed to helm the stall on Sundays. “I was so happy when my boss trusted me to fry [the noodles] on my own. This was also the time when I learned the most – I got a lot of practice frying kway teow, managing the portions and dealing with the stress of long queues.”

Cody, a father of two, decided to leave the job when his absence at home began to affect his children, aged ten and eight. “Their teachers informed me that they were not studying hard at school,” shares Cody. “I’m working hard for my kids’ future. If I didn’t have children, then the long hours wouldn’t have been an issue. Their studies are more important.”

When he quit, Cody had no plans of becoming a full-time hawker. “I wasn’t sure what to do next. I thought about returning to sales, which had fixed hours.”

A regular customer seeded the idea of opening his own stall. “I ran into him at a hawker centre and he told me that there were other customers who wondered if I started my own stall elsewhere,” says Cody. “He said it’d be a waste if I didn’t continue, as it’s becoming difficult to find good char kway teow in Singapore.”

Cody warmed up to the suggestion after realising that he would have full control of his working hours, which means more time for the family. “And if I do it well, this could be something I can pass to my kids or sell off in the future,” he says.

Five months ago, Cody opened Yong Xuan Fried Kway Teow at Wiseng Food Place, which is owned by an ex-schoolmate. The kopitiam is a popular haunt among elderly residents in the neighbourhood – Cody tells us he has been tweaking his recipes to suit their taste.

“When I first started, I was frying the noodles in the same way as at my previous workplace. Then I started noticing lots of leftovers, so I asked the customers for their feedback,” says the earnest hawker. “The older customers told me the char kway teow was too dry for them and hard to swallow.” So he started adding soup stock to the noodles to make them more moist.

Cody also tells us he enjoys the pace at the current stall. His wife, Tan Huiling (seen in previous pic), 31, helps out by taking orders and preparing ingredients. On a good day, he dishes out about 100 plates. “It’s not too crowded, so I can slowly develop my recipe. I want to be able to make sure all my fried kway teow is of good quality so I don’t disappoint the customers.”

Despite paying a price for his conscientiousness – Cody wears a wrist guard to prevent aggravating an old injury – the hawker insists on frying the char kway teow one plate at a time (the right way to do it, in our opinion). “I tried cooking it by batch, but by the second plate, the taste is off. This (frying plate by plate) is still the best way,” he shares.

Cody’s attention to details includes portioning as well. Small aluminum bowls with pre-portioned lup cheong (Chinese sausage), fish cake, beansprouts and cai xin line alongside his wok. “Another thing I disliked about cooking in batches – you get a different number of lup cheong in every plate!” Cody jokes.

It’s also worth noting that Cody gladly welcomes ‘customisation’ – “Yah, you can request whether you want more dry, more wok hei.”

The hallmark of a good plate of fried kway teow is the presence of wok hei, and we’re happy to report that Cody’s version faithfully delivers the sizzled scent of a blazing wok.

His kway-teow-mee mixture is blasted over high heat using pork lard, which gives the plate a richness that vegetable oil counterparts are unable to replicate. Cody carefully spreads the noodles so each strand gets enough heat from the wok and is evenly coated with the dark-soy-stock combination – and we love the resulting sweet-smoky flavour from the lightly charred noodles, which are a tad more moist compared to the Old Airport Road version thanks to an added splash of stock.

The thin slices of lup cheong are crisp around the edges – a ‘KPI’ from Cody’s days as a helper – while the cockles, though not big, remain plump and juicy. Both are a testament to the young hawker’s deft timing.

The absence of dark soy sauce is a double-edged sword for this version that’s apparently popular in Malaysia: while the smoky, charred taste is more prominent here (we can’t help but admire the slightly blackened edges of the noodles, lup cheong and bean sprouts), the alkaline notes from the yellow noodles are also stronger without the sweetness from dark soy sauce to temper them.

Hopefully, Cody will continue to tweak his “special sauce”, made from “a mix of premium fish sauce and other condiments” (also why the white version costs a dollar more) to create a better balance for this dish.

The black version is worth your calories. While it’s not quite comparable to the best hawker versions out there, the reasonable prices, competent wok hei and the young couple’s diligent and friendly service make Yong Xuan Fried Kway Teow worth a visit.

Photos: Kelvin Chia

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