Controversial House of Seafood Spent “Close To $500K” To Create Instant White Bee Hoon
It’s now available for purchase as a frozen pack, and we do a taste test.
Some folks may remember local seafood restaurant House of Seafood, an eatery which drew flak for introducing a claw machine for catching crabs in 2019 and, most recently, took its leashed crabs out on a walk outside its Punggol Settlement eatery as “exercise”.
In January this year, it opened an offshoot eatery called House of White Bee Hoon, which is also located at The Punggol Settlement and specialises in seafood vermicelli. Other than its Signature White Bee Hoon ($6.90), they also serve other twists on the dish like Mala White Bee Hoon ($8.90) or atas Lobster White Bee Hoon (seasonal price), along with zi char-style dishes like Crispy Chicken Wings with Shrimp Paste ($13.90).
It also offers a take-home instant version of white bee hoon called Ready-To-Eat White Bee Hoon, which comes in a frozen microwave-safe box and costs $7.90.
The brand’s PR rep says they have “spent close to $500,000 and two years of R&D in frozen and vacuum technology” for their frozen white bee hoon, which requires just a quick heat-up in a microwave oven.
The bulk of the $500,000 cost went into “investing in new machines and technology” like isochoric freezing, which preserves food at sub-zero temperatures to maintain quality. Despite being preservatives-free, the bee hoon has a “shelf life of one year” due to the freezing technology.
The rep also claims that “our instant white bee hoon is 99 per cent restaurant standard”. 8days.sg gives the frozen white bee hoon – which requires just a quick heat-up in the microwave oven – a try and tell you if it lives up to the claim.
We peel open the plastic film on the box, which contains seafood like prawns and lala, dry bee hoon and fried omelette bits as well as a packet of frozen broth. We pop the frozen broth and ingredients in the box (which doubles as a bowl) and heat it up in the microwave for eight minutes. If you’ve defrosted the meal beforehand, you need only reheat it for five minutes.
The ready-to-eat white bee hoon doesn’t make the best visual impression. Veggies and the usual whole lime for squeezing aren’t included (these ingredients would shorten the dish’s shelf life, says House of Seafood’s rep), leaving the dish a little drab. Squid, which the rep also tells us doesn’t microwave well, has been left out. Instead, we get around three smallish prawns and lala.
On the flip side, the broth (which House of White Bee Hoon says is extracted after boiling fresh kampong chickens and seafood like prawn shells and lala for ten hours) has a promising orange tinge and tantalising seafood aroma, with a fairly strong briny kick. Not bad.
The prawns taste a little unnaturally springy, though the lala is clean-tasting and free of grit. The piquant belacan chilli is suffused with enough lime to make up for the lack of a squeezable fresh lime on the side, with a spicy-savoury hit that perks up the dish.
Unfortunately, the rice vermicelli remains rather hard after heating up and doesn’t soak up enough of the decently tasty broth, though the omelette bits have decent wok hei flavour. But we find that an eight-minute stint in the microwave can’t meld everything together like a toss in the wok over roaring flames could.
Not bad… for a quick convenient meal, but it doesn’t beat a freshly-cooked plate now we can dine in again. This ready-to-eat version does the job in a pinch with its robust-enough broth and feisty sambal belacan if you don’t feel like going out, but at $7.90 a box, it’s even pricier than the $6.90 seafood vermicelli served at House of White Bee Hoon.
Available for takeaway and delivery. House of White Bee Hoon is at #01-10 The Punggol Settlement, 500 New Punggol Rd, S828617. Tel: 6746-9000. Open Mon–Fri, 10am–2pm & 5pm–10pm; Sat–Sun, 10am–10pm. Delivery via Foodpanda and Deliveroo. More info via Facebook and Instagram.
