Chai Chuan Tou Mutton Soup – This Michelin Bib Gourmand Awardee Deserves Special Mention!

The Michelin Bib Gourmand list broke on the morning of 18th July. By 1045am, I was already at Bukit Merah View Food Centre, ready to be amongst the first to try the newly crowned Bib Gourmand award recipient — Chai Chuan Tou Mutton Soup. However, with only fifteen minutes to opening, the shutters of the stall were still down. This cannot be the case, I thought. Makansutra reported that preparation at Chai Chuan Tou starts as early as 8 am. I later found out that the stall will be closed that day as the owners had some urgent matters to attend to.

Two days later, I returned to Chai Chuan Tou, wholly determined to have that Bib Gourmand worthy bowl of mutton soup. I confidently walked to the stall at 11 am and, lo and behold, a queue of at least ten customers has already formed! This happened only one minute after opening. I guess their mutton soup must really be something else!

The service was quick and efficient and soon, it was my turn to order. I attempted to strike up a conversation with the lady who took my order. “So how long have you guys been opened?” I asked. “Thirty over years,” the lady replied patiently as she busied around, scooping bowls of rice, taking orders and arranging bowls of mutton soup simultaneously. I continued with my next question: “Do you know that you got onto the Michelin Bib Gourmand list? Any thoughts on that?” She smiled and said : “Yes it is an honour. We are very happy and would like to thank our customers for their unwavering support.” She then briskly handed me my tray of food, and turned to serve the next customer. With the unending hordes of patrons, it was near impossible to probe further.

We ordered the Mutton Ribs Soup ($6) and Mixed Mutton Soup ($6). Both bowls had generous chunks of meat basking in a clear looking broth. On the first sip, the mutton soup tasted quite bland. But, wait for it! The distinct, yet subtle, taste of the mutton comes at the end. I must say, the gaminess of mutton was not overpowering at all. Instead, the mutton had a light fragrance and its sweetness was well infused into the soup. Of the two, I preferred the bowl of mutton ribs soup. The meat was really fall-off-the-bone tender. If you want a sense of how skilful the owners of Chai Chuan Tou are in cooking mutton, this bowl of mutton ribs soup will give you a pretty good idea.

The Mixed Mutton Soup came with strips of mutton, mutton stomach and mutton meatballs. Due to the nature of the various parts, the texture of the items were understandably more chewy. Once again, the mutton was well cooked, with none of them tasting rubbery at all. Make full use of the chili sauce by dipping the mutton strips in! The thick and tangy chili helped to cut through the gaminess of the mutton. Although my friend commented that the chili tasted rather ordinary, I think that it served its main purpose, which is to complement the mutton!

From the insane queue, I gather that Chai Chuan Tou’s mutton soup is really popular, especially with the older generation!

MissTamChiak.com made an anonymous visit and paid its own meal at the stall featured here.

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