Johore Bahru Bau & Tim Sum

Almost all Singaporeans are familiar with the Malaysian's tim sum and especially their version of bao or pau. 

 So I was excited when I chanced upon this shop in Changi Village that proudly proclaimed "Johor Bahru Pau" one evening. Will it taste like those in Malaysia? As it was about 5pm in the afternoon, there were no customers in the shop but at that time I didn't feel like eating what to me is "breakfast" food. So I left it for another time which came just the week after.

A closer look at the various signages at the shop and it was rather promising.

There was the Amy Yip bau. Amy Yip or 葉子楣 for the uninitiated was an Hongkong Actress in the late eighties and early nineties who was more well known for her pau errr I mean bosom than her acting. So the pau are obviously named after a certain part of her anatomy.

Then there was a Chinese paper article with the famous Bruce Lee tucking into what presumably was from the parent shop in Malaysia?

So the pau and tim sum must be good? 3 of us sat down to eat. But I had these nagging feeling that something must be wrong. It was about 10am prime breakfast time and yet there was no other customer. The mainland Chinese manning the store seems very disinterested even when we were peering at the posters and ads. In the end, we ordered 1 Amy Yip pau, 1 tray of siew mai and 1 har kow just to try. When the sidekick bought back the food from the counter, I knew straightaway it was a dud . There were no proper fork for us, just toothpick and the chilli sauce were those packet type. Bad sign. True enough, the siew mai and har kow were too salty. The pau was too soft and the whole skin just gave way when we picked it up. Certainly it was nowhere close to the Johore Bahru pau that I tasted at those pit stops in Malaysia. And if I were to compare it with our own Gozilla or even the Red Star pau, this Amy Yipc could have been totally flattened by Gozilla!

No wonder the shop was empty both time I was there. At this rate, I think the next time I go back to the area, the shop should have close down by then. And good riddance to bad rubbish food.