Crab mentality

The Spanish have their paella, the Italians their pizza and pasta, while the Germans have their sausages.

The Japanese have their sushi, sashimi and tempura, while the Chinese have their Peking duck and suckling pig.

The Singaporeans would not have it any other way; that’s why in this year’s Singapore Food Festival 2006 the island-state’s popular chili crab is getting promoted as the country’s signature dish.

And what food savvy world traveler doesn‘t know Singapore’s chili crab? A succulent fat crab is cooked to perfection in a chili-spicy rich coconut sauce. With your bare hands, you crack open a claw and pick out the crab meat. When you‘re done with the crab, it’s time to slurp down the chili sauce with a spoon or, for a more rustic feel, wipe it off with a portion of fried bun.

Picture this: crabs cooked in all possible ways, but with chili crab as king. In fact, when the Singapore Food Festival 2006 opens with The Singapore Tiger Chili Crab Festival on July 1 at Civic Plaza at Ngee Ann City on Orchard Road, everything and anything about chili crab is the highlight of the opening celebration. It will be a foodie haven of booths offering crab dishes in their many incarnations. Besides chili crab, enjoy an immense range of crab dishes – grilled, baked, deep-fried, sautéed, stir-fried, and served with rice, noodles or bread. Other favorite ways with crab that will be available include crab cake, crabmeat salad, soft shell crab roll, and more.

If all that talk of crab has got you drooling, here’s more. There will be a search for the Fastest Claw in the East for those who can’t get enough of peeling crabs. There will also be crab dance shows, and a three-on-three crab football to get everybody reeling from the World Cup fever.

To complete the experience, tourists will also have a chance to try Singapore’s top 10 must-try local favorites, which shall be available at the day’s celebration. Apart from chili crab, Singapore’s other must-try dishes are Hainanese chicken rice, bak kut teh (pork ribs boiled until tender in a broth of garlic and herbs), fried carrot cake, char kway teow (stir-fried broad rice noodles), satay (chicken, beef or mutton barbecue), laksa (spicy noodles in a rich and creamy soup), fish head curry, roti prata (light, fluffy Indian pastry served with curry sauce and often accompanied by stretched milk tea, or teh tarik), rojak (savory vegetable and fruit salad), and black pepper crab, the other national crab dish.

And that’s just the first day. For the duration of the Singapore Food Festival, every visitor to Singapore this July will get a complimentary Singapore chili crab treat voucher as part of the Chili Crab Chase, which is now in its third year. The voucher, to be claimed at Singapore Visitors Centers at the Transit and Arrival Halls of Singapore Changi Airport, Orchard Road and the Singapore Cruise Center, entitles a diner to a free order of chili crab at participating restaurants and seafood establishments.

Wait. There are still more crabs. There will be a Super 101 Crab Buffet at Ngee Ann City on July 2, which will feature still more crab dishes.

There’s also the Tiger Chili Crab Championship Series, an inaugural competition initiated by Tiger beer, which will identify Singapore’s best chili crab chefs. The contest will feature the top 10 most popular chili crab restaurants as voted by Singaporeans. The top chefs will present their version of chili crab that pairs best with Tiger beer, with the winner presenting his dish in Tiger Chili Crab events abroad.

Why all this focus on food, you may ask? Why not? When you speak of Singapore, three things come to mind: security, shopping and food.

"Dining is one of the key strategies that will bolster Singapore’s tourism vision of welcoming 17 million visitors and recording $30 billion in tourism receipts by the year 2015," says Singapore Tourism Board leisure marketing and events management deputy director Joycelyn Ng during the press preview at the Orchard Hotel last week. "We estimate that on the average, food and beverage account for approximately 12 percent of the expenditure of tourists holidaying in Singapore, which worked out to a significant $880 million in 2004. Evidently, the tourism industry represents big business for Singapore’s national pastime."

An annual lifestyle event in the country’s calendar, the Singapore Food Festival distinguishes and positions Singapore as a dining destination with a distinctive food culture and colorful food heritage.

"Singapore is already recognized internationally as a food paradise, and its diverse dining alternatives are key draws for both leisure and business visitors. Enhancing such a standing is the Singapore Food Festival, which highlights our ‘Uniquely Singapore’ destination personality through home-grown delights," Ng adds.

In its early years, the Singapore Food Festival featured carnival-style food events, cooking workshops, food tours and food-related record-breaking feats. It has since evolved to showcase unique, never-seen- before dining experiences, such as this year’s Singapore Tiger Chili Crab Festival, as well as a chance to test new F&B ideas, like BreadTalk’s CraBlog series, which includes new flavors like chili crab, black pepper crab, carlee crab, chicken rice chicken crab, and hairy crab buns.

Other highlights of this year’s Singapore Food Festival are:

• Singapore Food Ball Festival

To be held from July 6 to 9, and coinciding with the World Cup finals, 40 food stalls at Parco Bugis Junction will be decked out in international flags to serve food specials themed on the symmetrical shape of the soccer ball. Some planned offerings include Hainanese chicken rice balls, glutinous rice balls, onde onde (a Malay dessert), as well as ice balls.

• Dining in a Garden City

To be held from July 12 to 16 at Plaza Singapura, the event is a romantic affair with dishes incorporating flowers served in a lush and luxuriant tropical garden setting.

• Unique Flavors of Chinatown

Local and visiting restaurant chefs step out of their kitchens to man hawker stalls at Smith St. and dish out Singapore’s most celebrated street food on July 22 and 23.

• Wedding Feast on the Bay

Local marriage customs and the food that is associated with them will be showcased at this event at Marina Square and Millennia Walk from July 28 to 30. Visitors will have a rare chance to witness and taste the longest multi-cultural wedding cake, as well as other tempting matrimonial treats.

• Hawker Food Passport

Foodies will be lured to Maxwell Food Center and the newly renovated Newton Food Center to try the country’s inexpensive hawker food. Besides enjoying the local cuisine, diners can also redeem gifts and premiums when they accumulate food stamps each time they make a food or drink purchase.

• Culinary workshops and themed events

This July, there will be a line of activities ranging from learning how to harvest, cook and dine on an organic farm, to dining with wild animals at the Night Safari.

The Singapore Food Festival 2006 is co-organized by the Singapore Tourism Board and Reed Exhibitions, and presented by Network for Electronic Transfers (Singapore) Pte. Ltd. (NETS). This annual celebration of food that is "Uniquely Singapore" will see the city’s best homegrown chefs as well as local culinary personalities and celebrities share their skills and creations.

For details on the Singapore Food Festival 2006, visit www.singaporefoodfestival.com.