Charcoal Fish Head 炭香 @ Woodlands

We were all craving for Teochew heetaolou 鱼头炉 or fishhead hotspot. Like toadstools after the rain, a few stores have popped up in Woodlands. This was the first I am trying.

Opened by local celebrity and Teochew boy Ben Yeo and Chef Cao Yong, Charcoal Fish Head Steamboat Restaurant 炭香鱼头炉煮炒 at Woodlands Ave 12 is their second store of the same genre.

Signature Wu Xiang Fired Prawn 酥炸五香虾枣

The lunch went off a good start with a deep fried appetiser. We order ngoh hiang haezhor or Teochew five spice prawn roll, but didn’t expected it to be liberally coated with battered and deep fried. We didn’t expect this would be the only dish we enjoyed.

Red Grouper Charcoal Hotpot 招牌炭香红斑炉

This was the main attraction of the store, we had high expectation of their charcoal fishhead hotpot. It had a promising start with the fiery copper pot being brought to the table. They had only one size for hotpot, so it looked quite shallow because this was a portion for 4 persons. The hotpot can easily feed 8.

The red grouper fish slices was lougou which in the Teochew dialect refers to fish that is tough and leathery when cooked.

I don’t like the soup stock because they have detoured from the tradition by adding slices of angelica root 当归. They should have asked if we would like to have it added to the hotpot; seemed like it wasn’t an option.

Claypot Fragrant Drunken Clams 招牌沙煲酒香海瓜子

While the clams were very fresh, the yellow wine stock was very diluted.

Royal Chives with Bean Sprout 松菇青龙菜

I didn’t know that they added shimeiji mushrooms into the combination, but I was quite disappointed by this additional it reduced the crunchiness of the chives and bean sprouts. Haphazardly smashed together, it had not much wokhei and singularly salty.

Oyster Egg 蚝蛋

The omelette was not the Teochew-style orhluak, and had no potato starch in the mix. No wokhei too.

These were the only Teochew dishes available on the menu, which were mainly hit-and-miss. The rest of the menu were rojak Chinese dishes from different part of China, which Chef Cao most like learned from the culinary school. Not coming back anytime soon.

Charcoal Fish Head Steamboat Restaurant 炭香鱼头炉煮炒
101 Woodlands Avenue 12 #01-06 Polaris, Singapore 737719

Visited Jun 2024