Lu Jia Fish Soup – Unique Fish Soup with Fried Fish Skin & Beancurd Sticks

Many of us associate fish soup with ‘old people food’ or ‘food for the sick’ because it is so healthy and, sometimes, bland. Everything in the bowl is either boiled or steamed, and there’s nothing fried (unless you order the fried fish version).

We stumbled upon Lu Jia Fish Soup (盧家鱼汤) in Yishun Industrial Estate. Yes, you can get your healthy version of fish soup here, but why not add their homemade fried fish skin and beancurd sticks for extra flavour? We wouldn’t say no!

We had the bitter gourd sliced fish soup ($4) with a bowl of hearty yam rice ($1). It definitely isn’t common to find yam rice sold together with fish soup, much less having the yam rice done well. We think its because of the extra effort that Uncle Sam, the stall owner, puts into the preparation of the yam. Instead of just adding it into the rice to boil, he fries the yam cubes first, so it has a charred and lightly caramelised exterior, which heavily flavour the rice when boiled together.

Other than having cubes of yam and hei-bi within, the rice had a nice mushroom flavour too. 

We added fried fish skin ($1) and fried beancurd sticks ($1) into our sliced fish soup. It isn’t common to find stalls selling homemade deep-fried fish skin. Although preparation is a tad more labourious, Uncle Sam shared with us that it is to give a variety to their current menu, and to offer something different as compared to other sliced fish soup stalls in Singapore.

The stall uses fresh Batang fish for their sliced fish soup, which we feel is of a much better grade than the common ‘sheng yu’, or Toman fish fillet. The meat is sweeter, firmer and has a slight chew to it. Dip the fish into their homemade chilli sauce, which is made according to a secret recipe that Uncle Sam has perfected over the years. The chilli sauce is sweet, sour, and definitely packs a spicy punch.

With the current craze over fish skin, it is great that Lu Jia Fish Soup has added this much sought after snack to their menu, as an extra ingredient for their fish soups and yam rice.

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