At 6pm every night, a small little coffee shop hidden away in the heart of Ang Mo Kio roars to life as its residents flock towards it in anticipation for their dinner. The place is a secret location which the residents here guard closely, with only their loved ones and closest friends let known into the secret of the neighbourhood's best food hideout.

Hidden away from the public eye, this coffee shop has seen a revival in recent months, thanks to new food stalls that have revived the estate's reputation for good food. (Ask any Ang Mo Kio resident and they'll tell you there's no food better than this hometown.) With mouth-watering dishes for every budget, anyone eating here for the first time would be easily spoilt for choice.



For food this good, you'll have to wait (of course!). On weekend nights, empty tables are a rarity, and you'll usually have to wait (the Singaporean way) by standing next to a table of patrons who are just about finishing their meal, if you hope to get any seats at all.

This is a favourite dating spot for teenage sweethearts wanting to impress their other halfs. Married couples come here for good food on a budget when they're otherwise not cooking at home. Fans of local Singaporeans food indulge in bak kut teh and what could possibly be the best claypot in the nation (even better than Chinatown!). The elderly folks sip their curry with rice while bantering in Hokkien alongside families bonding over the flavourful zi char and steamboat. Even for the young children, deliciously rich chocolate brownies and apple pies are available to satisfy their sweet tooth.

But for the carnivores, this is where the real deal is:

Chops! Grill & Sides

Chops! is a western cuisine hawker stall serving up grilled meats, pasta, and side snacks. When we arrived at 7pm, there was already a queue with a waiting time of 60 minutes - that's how popular the place is!

We tried the Chops! XXL Platter for $59.90, which comes served on 2 large trays with a generous heaping of food that is surely enough to feed 6 to 8 hungry people. The whole platter consists of 6 slabs of delightful meats and 10 sides for your feasting.That's less than $10 per meat, and we haven't even counted in the tasty sides yet!



The meats: Grilled Cajun Chicken, Fried Breaded Fish, Grilled Garlic Pork Collar, Panfry Samon, Australian Grain-fed Ribeye Steak and half a rack of Spiced BBQ Babyback Ribs.



The sides: Cherry Tomatoes, Potato & Egg Salad, Tuna Salad, Romaine Lettuce, Coleslaw, Garlic Fried Rice, Mashed Potato, Aglio Olio, Mac & Cheese and Shoestring Fries

Broadway Claypot Rice

Otherwise known as "that famous claypot rice in Ang Mo Kio", these hawkers have been around for about 3 decades but were formerly located next to Broadway Plaza (a couple of blocks away from its current location).

The smell of the claypot rice will hit you even before your dish arrives. While waiting, we decided to order a bowl of Bak Kut Teh to share, and the soup was peppery and full of flavour - just the way we liked it - without having too much oil. It came with 5 pieces of pork ribs, and we managed to top up the soup without additional cost after.



There was the $8 and $15 option to choose from, so we went for the latter since we were both feeling quite hungry. As you can see from the picture, the serving size was so generous that we could not even finish it! My girlfriend who usually shuns carbohydrates couldn't resist having THREE bowls of rice because it was so flavourful (without being burnt).




These 2 stalls are the obvious crowd favourites every night, but if you're looking to check out the other hawkers while you're here as well, here are some other great choices:

Curry House

(Naming this as Curry House because my Chinese isn't good enough to read it :P )
Another favourite that we spotted, especially among the elderly folk, were the curry dishes from this corner stall. You can order any dishes that you would like to accompany your rice with, and ask for a generous serving of curry to top it off. This is another must-try!

Chai Chee Noodle Village

Yi Chuan Japanese Cuisine

Pancake King

 
 



Address: 
Broadway Coffee Shop
Blk 727 Ang Mo Kio Avenue 6 
Singapore 560727 

Getting Here:
Alight at Ang Mo Kio MRT station and take a 7-minute walk. The coffeeshop is located in between Singapore Post and Courts.

Otherwise, take bus 851 / 852 / 853 / 13 from Yio Chu Kang MRT and alight after 3 stops.

Transport

Already well served by two MRT stations, two bus interchanges, two expressways and a good road network, Ang Mo Kio will see further improvements to public transport services and roads that will make travelling within the town and to other parts of Singapore even faster and more convenient, including:

• Two new MRT stations (Lentor and Mayflower) on the Thomson Line will allow for faster travel between the town and the city by 2021

• The Cross Island Line, which will pass through Ang Mo Kio when it starts operations by 2030, will serve as an alternative east-west MRT route

• The North-South Expressway, to be completed around 2020, which will shorten travel times between the city and Ang Mo Kio, as well as northern parts of Singapore

• A widened Ang Mo Kio Street 13


Parks

• An extended park connector along Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5
• A cycling network within Ang Mo Kio




Housing / Elderly Care

As a mature housing estate, Ang Mo Kio remains an attractive location for potential home owners because of its abundance of amenities and shopping facilities, ease of transport and enviable proximity to recreation spaces and employment clusters. It is also popular with young families who wish to live near their parents. Besides providing new homes in new areas, additional facilities will be built and existing amenities upgraded to create a high-quality living environment tailored to the needs of residents:

• A redeveloped Ang Mo Kio Polyclinic at Ang Mo Kio Central 2

• A redeveloped Kebun Baru CC at Ang Mo Kio Avenue 4

• A nursing home at Ang Mo Kio Avenue 1/Avenue 8 junction

• Estate Upgrading Programme for Mayflower Estate and Yio Chu Kang Gardens Estate

Notice: (February 2017) Blocks 246 - 249 along Ang Mo Kio Avenue 2 and 3, which are about 40 years old, will soon be demolished. The open-air carpark between these yellow-and-white 12-storey blocks will also be taken down to make way for new homes.

Did you know?

Aside from being one of Singapore's oldest satellite towns, Ang Mo Kio was the first town to be designed in a metric system, which was later adapted for other towns. The design of the town even won the Singapore Institute of Architects' Outstanding Buildings Award in 1993. Development of AMK began in 1973 and was completed in 1980, although current developments continue to make AMK one of the best and most accessible hometowns in Singapore to live in.

Fun fact: AMK has 10 avenues, but Ave 7 is missing. 


Another reason why residents love it so much here is because it is a self-contained town centre - you do not need to ever leave this town as it has almost everything. Commercial offices, cultural and community facilities, healthcare, and of course great food. Few other towns can boast of the same.

The name Ang Mo Kio literally translates into "red-haired man's bridge", with ang mo being a term used to describe the Caucasians. Until today, the history of the town's name remains debatable. Many of the older folk say it was named after John Turnbull's bridge, which is now the junction of Upper Thomson and Ang Mo Kio Ave 1. No one really knows.

Working in AMK during the olden days

Many of the immigrant Chinese who came to AMK in the early years were involved in rubber production, as Cheng San Village used to be a large rubber plantation. The slump in rubber prices during 1922 - 1932 caused many to turn to farming instead. During World War II, many people moved to AMK to take up poultry farming or market gardening.

You can read more about AMK's history at this link!

Ask any resident living in AMK what they love most about the town and they'll probably say "the food!"

It is an open secret that there are TONS of great food places in Ang Mo Kio. Many famed hawkers, unique cafes and established restaurants have chosen to settle in this area, which guarantees that you'll always have a happy tummy, any time of the day!

(I've always been extremely grateful to my parents for choosing to make AMK our home because I wouldn't have had the chance to eat so well otherwise.)

Ang Mo Kio's ten avenues are home to several wet markets and hawker centres, which house plenty of hidden food gems. Growing up in Ang Mo Kio, I've had the fortune of trying many of the food places it has to offer, so I've compiled a list of some of my favourites here.




Cheng San Market & Cooked Food Centre








Teck Ghee Square Market And food Centre
Address: 409 Ang Mo Kio Avenue 10 560409


Must-try stalls:

• Hokkien Mee
• Fish Ball & Bak Chor Noodles
• Mee Siam, Mee Rebus