Maxwell Food Centre, Singapore What to Eat & Best Stalls

Eating at Maxwell Food Centre is one of the essential food experiences in Singapore. This honest guide covers what to eat, the best stalls and must try dishes including what Maxwell Hawker centre is known for including Hainanese chicken rice, fried oysters, laksa, cendol and giant curry puffs. Plus practical tips for navigating one of the Singapore's most iconic hawker centres.

It's the day after Chinese New Year and my mother, sister, Mr NQN and I head to Maxwell Food Centre. Maxwell is probably the best known hawker centre in Singapore and is a major tourist draw. Maxwell Food Centre is also where you want to head for certain dishes like Hainanese Chicken Rice or fried oysters. I've also marked the stall number next to each stall name so you can find them a bit easier.

Cendol #2

Cendol is a delicious shaved ice dessert. I saw a guy carrying some cendols and ran after him to ask him where he got them from and he points me towards stall #2. The gentleman behind the counter is friendly and there is no surcharge today (this is the only stall without a surcharge). There are four types of cendol: plain, red bean, sweet corn and durian. Usually there is also youtiou and rojak but they're not available today.

The cendol is fantastic with a bottom layer of coconut cream and red beans. On top of this is shaved ice, a viscous gula melaka syrup and strings of green tapioca pandan noodles. I love the classic with red bean but my mother and sister love the sweet corn version.

Old Nyonya #4

Head to Old Nyonya for delicious royal laksa with a whole Morton Bay bug split in half which is not a bad deal for S$17 when you consider the prices of Moreton bay bugs in Australia (although this is considered expensive at a hawker centre). This laksa is rich and full of flavour with an appealing coconut broth and the bug meat is well cooked.

Old Nyonya are also known for their rendang chicken nasi lemak although I found that the flavour didn't quite penetrate through to the chicken. It is served with butterfly pea flower coloured rice with anchovies, peanuts, boiled eggs and chilli sambal on the side.

Hong Lim Curry Puffs #9

I always love curry puffs and because I was ravenous when I arrived, I had to buy some of the curry puffs at Hong Lim. They come in 4 varieties: spicy mackerel, rendang chicken potato with egg, sardine, classic chicken curry potato egg and are $2.50 each. These curry puffs are enormous and full of filling. All of the fillings are savoury and well balanced but still distinct from each other.

It's hard to choose a favourite but perhaps it's the classic chicken curry one. I did slightly prefer the ones at the Old Airport Road Hawker Centre mainly because they were baking them fresh throughout the day and I also liked the taro curry puffs there. However these are more sizeable so better value.

Maxwell Coconut and Sugar Cane #34

While there are a few drinks stalls here, the line at Maxwell Coconut and Sugar cane is the longest. While the sugarcane drink was disappointing as it's mostly ice which melts quickly in this heat, the whole coconut was enormous, easily one of the largest I've had and it is full of coconut water.

I'm guessing the line is because of the value of the coconut which is normally $3 (or $4 for Chinese New Year).

Maxwell Hainanese Chicken Rice Stall #40

If you love chicken rice head to Maxwell because there are no shortage of chicken rice places. The most famous is Tian Tian Hainanese Chicken Rice made famous by visits from Anthony Bourdain and Gordon Ramsay. Sadly it is closed during Chinese New year instead we had to Maxwell Hainanese chicken rice.

While the lines are long and the portion is relatively small for the price, the chicken rice is excellent with the rice full of chicken flavour. I think the chicken is tender and nice although it doesn't quite reach the same celestial levels of truly great chicken rice.

Char Kway Teow, Fried Oyster and Carrot Cake #53

This is a stall without a name as such, just the headlining acts in the signage like char kway teow, oysters and carrot cake. The two things they're most known for here are the black carrot cake and fried oysters.

The carrot cakes comes in two varieties: white and black and the black one is the most popular. It's actually not really made with orange carrots (and indeed it is light years away from a Western carrot cake which is sweet). This is made with grated radish (aka "white carrot") and or turnip with rice flour steamed and then chopped up and fried in a kecap manis style sweet soy sauce. Make sure to get some of the dark chilli sambal and drizzle that all over the carrot cake just to bring out that delicious smokiness and caramel.

I left Mr NQN to order here as the line is quite long while I went to buy other food. He accidentally ordered the oyster omelette instead of the fried oysters which as the name suggests is a fried egg omelette studded with whole oysters. There are around half a dozen oysters in this omelette and it's not bad. But we really wanted to try the fried oysters so he went back to order them.

The fried oysters are fantastic and they're served with a rice flour noodles with much more oyster to them. I'm not sure why the omelette is the same price as the fried oysters appear to have more of the oysters but out of the two, the fried oysters are definitely the pick.

Stall #59

Some stalls have Chinese names and unless you can read Chinese they can be hard to find. One of my favourite stores is #59 that sells fishball beehoon soup.

Full disclosure Dear Reader, I don't usually love beehoon (super fine vermicelli noodles) but this dish is the exception. The sauce that the fine thread noodles are mixed with a light chilli sauce with a bowl of fish broth and two types of springy, tender fish balls.

Tips for visiting Maxwell Food Centre

Over Chinese New Year most of the stalls charge a surcharge of between $1-$2 per item until the end of Chinese New Year and many of the stalls are closed (I really wanted to try roti and popiah but sadly that stall was closed).

Don't forget to bring your wet wipes and napkins/tissues (cutlery is provided but napkins aren't) and wash your hands at the sinks provided and bus your trays in the halal vs non halal tray return areas!

So tell me Dear Reader, have you ever been to a hawker centre? Which dish do you like the look of the most?