DEC 27 — I've always had this thing about those television clips that portray just how sinful and even wasteful it is when fishermen catch a seemingly endangered shark, trim its fins off and dump that poor creature back into the deep abyss without that in-built steering rudder. It will be left to rot, drift about aimlessly, lose its "sharkhood" and be cannibalised. So drama.
Sadly, it does make many in Asia think twice about their next bowl of sharksfin soup (I am at times guilty too). But my usual reaction is really, what about those Teochew eateries that offer steamed shark's meat (much like skate), kway teow soup in a thick milky broth made from boiling sharks bones over a low fire for what seems like forever and, most interestingly, steamed sharks head (way more interesting than eating a lucky bowl of sharksfin).
Ever since I came across Ah Heng's offerings, I can't help but enjoy it once in a while for two reasons: the novelty factor and the flavour, plus the many testimonials and claims by regulars who swear that it aids their diabetic conditions. The third does not apply to me, as yet, I pray. When I took Anthony Bourdain for a go at the heads, he gushed in his typical makan explorer-who-had-a-makan-ephiphany manner, "This is fantastic", "best seafood" and "I recommend this to anyone", etc.
Ah Heng runs Tian Jin Hai Seafood Restaurant and he has a place in makanan laut history in Singapore. His rags to riches to rags story began when he moved from his boring seafood supplier days to set up a little hawker stall under the now defunct Whitley flyover hawker centre in the ‘70s and ‘80s.
He always believed that one must have an edge in whatever business you do. His gilt-edge offering then was to take sea snails (siput), not very popular with the masses in Singapore then, and toss it in his stinging sambal concoction. It was a smash hit and together with his repertoire of the usual chilli and pepper crabs, he found his niche in local seafood culture.
When the Whitley closed, Ah Heng moved on and bravely took over an insignificant but large bus terminal eatery in the west at Ulu Pandan. It could seat a few hundred and what took his business into the stratosphere was a brand new offering there: giant conch shellfish (much like abalone) sliced thin and tossed Teochew style with celery, ginger, chilli, scallions and coriander with soy and sesame oil, served in its own shell.
Some Indonesian fisherman could not unload his daily catch and found an adventurous ready buyer in Ah Heng. A few hundred orders flew out of his kitchen daily at about S$80 a pop (you do the maths, at a cost price of S$5) and this brought him success and a high, beyond his wildest dreams.
One fine evening, a few marine biologists from the nearby National University of Singapore popped by for dinner, like they usually do. Except this time they had with them a foreign guest specialising in endangered marine life. One glance at the shellfish and Ah Heng's fate was sealed. He reported to the authorities about the destruction of this newly endangered species.
Like ikan bilis finning away from a hungry mackerel, his customers disappeared and business dwindled. He had problems meeting rentals and the mortgages on his few houses were in jeopardy. He succumbed, went for broke, closed his restaurant and resurfaced, sans his high flying ego, in a humble hawker stall.
So this time, like he always did, he came up with another edge — the steamed sharks head. He saw that most sharks offered at the fisheries came headless and realised that it was the poor fisherman who ate them as nobody wanted the sharks. They cleaned, scraped and steamed the soft cartilaginous insides (very much like soft sea cucumbers).
Ah Heng did just that and offered it at his humble stall and today, that dish, although sold at many seafood eateries, is synonymous with him. It does overwhelm his other stunning offerings like his superb Sri Lanka chilli crabs, Punggol-style seafood mee goreng, herbal clams soup and my all-time favourite salted baked and grilled tilapia fish and his soulful Teochew style crab beehoon in milky stock.
Tian Jin Hai Seafood Restaurant, #01-09, Zion Riverside Hawker Centre, off Zion Road. Lunch and dinner daily.
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