Lek Lim Nonya Cake Confectionery located in Bedok is a traditional shop selling kuehs. It first started its business in 1967, serving customers through their home kitchen before setting up their own shop (at its current location) in 1987 as business picked up.
Through out the years since their inception, they have survived mainly through customers' word of mouth (WOM), no advertising on their part is required. This is not an easy feat as I notice that their location is not exactly ideal. To get to
Lek Lim Nonya Cake Confectionery, one would need to take a bus from Bedok MRT station. It is not located in a crowded area near an attraction or shopping mall. They are located just next to Fengshan Food Centre where many people frequent at night for supper for the famous Minced Pork Noodles and Chicken Wings, but well... they are closed by evening time. Hence, to have operated for so long with just WOM, I am sure they did something, if not a few things right!
So what are
Lek Lim Nonya Cake Confectionery's USP (Unique Selling Points) that have allowed them to operate for so long? From my perspective the USPs are:
1)
Hand made Kuehs and other products. The Kuehs and fried stuff such as Yam Cake, Curry Puffs, Spring Rolls are all hand made! From pastry to the fillings, they are all hand made from the raw ingredients. Not made from factories! I feel that this is the most important USP. Despite it being a labourious task with such a wide product range, they still take the effort to make everything from scratch. Kudos to them.
2)
Freshly made daily. Every thing is freshly made on the spot daily. To do this, they have to start working at 4am in the wee hours of the morning daily!
3)
No/Minimum preservatives. If you are a regular customer here, you will know that most of the kuehs and fried snacks cannot be kept for long. This is because no preservatives are added. It is best to eat it on the spot or within the same day.
4)
Vegetarian. Suitable for vegetarian.
5)
Halal Certified. Suitable for our Muslim friends (important point..especially in the light of Amy Cheong facebook post).
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| Part of the product range |
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| Kuehs |
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| Pulut Int and Fried Snacks |
6)
Wide variety of product range. They sell a comprehensive range of kuehs (from Nonya Kuehs to Ang Koo Kuehs to Soon Kuehs) and fried snacks (from Curry Puffs, Spring Rolls to Fried Yam Cakes) which are all hand made by them.
During this visit, the partner and I had the opportunity to view and learn (hands on experience) how some of the kuehs are made. First up, Ang Ku Kuehs.
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| Filling for Ang Ku Kuehs (Peanut, Bean, Gula Melaka Coconut) |
These are the Peanut, Bean and Gula Mekala Coconut fillings used for the
Ang Ku Kuehs 红龟糕 aka Red Tortoise Cakes. This is a traditional kueh with a tortoise shell shape with a soft sticky glutinous rice flour skin and sweet filings inside. Back then, Chinese believe that eating tortoise will promote longevity, bringing prosperity and good luck to people. Hence, the tortoise shell shape. The Ang Ku Kueh is an auspicious kueh that is often eaten during important Chinese festivals such as Chinese New Year and also during birthday celebrations.
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| Left to Right: Mould, Ang Ku Kueh - making in process |
This is the mould used to make Ang Ku Kuehs.
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| Ang Ku Kuehs before steaming |
It was not an easy making the Ang Ku Kuehs. There are not supposed to be any cracks on the kuehs, but well, this is our first time making it. A hands on session that allows us to appreciate the effort gone into making this. This excludes the effort and man hours required for making the pastry and fillings as these were already prepared for us.
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| Ang Ku Kuehs |
I liked the
Ang Ku Kueh ($0.50 each, $2.30 for 5) with peanut fillings in it. Because the peanut fillings were thick, moist and crunchy. Providing a nice contrast to the glutinous rice flour skin which was soft, sticky and chewy. Moreover, I must say that they were generous with the fillings.
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| Pulut Int |
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| Pulut Int |
Also had the opportunity to learn how to wrap the
Pulut Int ($0.50). The Malay Auntie was able to wrap it so fast and quickly. It seems easy, but upon attempting it, I realised that it was harder than it seems. Well, I guess I am better at eating. The Pulut Int consisted of sweet blue (clitoria flower) glutinous rice topped with gula melaka coconut toppings and wrapped banana leaf.
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| Soon Kueh |
The red mould as seems above is the mould used to make
Soon Kueh ($0.70) and
Ku Cai Kueh ($0.70). I believe that this mould can be used to make curry puffs too.
The filling that is used in the Soon Kueh.
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| Soon Kueh |
Each piece of Soon Kuehs are handmade. A labour intensive process and as seen in the above photo, each piece looks exactly the same as if they were made by machines.
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| Mould |
This is the mould used to make
Rice Kueh ($0.80).
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| Kueh Salat |
Freshly made Kueh Salat!
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| Kueh Salat |
The
Kueh Salat ($1.20 per packet) with the top layer consisting of a pandan crust with sticky glutinous rice at the bottom.
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| Kueh Lapi |
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| Kueh Lapis |
Kueh Lapis 九层糕 ($1.20 per packet) aka 9 layer cake / Jiu Cheng Gao, one of my favourite childhood snack which I peeled off layer by layer.
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| Yam Cake |
Customers can choose between their Fried or non-fried Yam Cakes. I enjoyed both versions and though that this was one of the better yam cakes I have had. Because, their
Yam Cakes ($0.80 per piece) were full of yam chunks along with mushrooms and other ingredients. In addition, it was soft and fragrant. Yam lovers will like this.
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| Tapioca Kuehs; Kotoh Ubi |
Keeping the best for the last..
Both kuehs above are Tapioca Kuehs -
Kotoh Ubi ($1.20 per packet). The one on the left is mashed tapioca with gula melaka mixed in it. While the one on the right is mashed tapioca topped with gula melaka coconut (This is my
favourite among all the kuehs I tried). The tapioca at the bottom was soft and fragrant with generous chunks of tapioca in it. On top, the gula melaka coconut enhanced the flavour making this incredibly delectable.
I can't help but emphasis on the quality and freshness of the kuehs and snacks that
Lek Lim Nonya Cake Confectionery sells. In addition, these are hand made with manual labour at such an affordable price. I must say, I really admire the spirit of
Lek Lim Nonya Cake Confectionary, for taking such effort to bring these delish kuehs to consumers in the traditional way (hard way). They could have easily just purchase a few machines to do the work (less staffing issues to handle, higher throughput). With our developing society modernising and as quality of life improves, who knows if kuehs will still continue to play a role in our daily life. From my own personal observation, it seems to be going on a down trend,
people we now prefer to eat fanciful buns/bread, cupcakes, pancakes, swiss rolls, bubble tea, beancurd, ice cream, crepe and more. Hopefully, I am wrong. Hence, if you are wondering where to get kuehs, this could be one of your options.
Thanks Gavan for the invite.
ps: the
Spring Rolls are quite good too. Big and full of ingredients such as turnip, carrot, beansprouts. No photo as we well... ate it while on the way home.
