This was supposed to be food review, which I started writing last Tues (Sep 10). Except that as I started writing, I knew the story I wanted to share couldn’t be mainly about the food, as it was only the third week of Belimbing Superstar’s operations, and my second try of the chai png spread. The kitchen under chef Ben Teo, working to owner Eng Su’s exacting standards, had yet to settle into its rhythm and find its groove.
But both times I had visited (on Aug 30 and Sep 10), Eng Su had taken the time and pains to elaborate on why he decided to venture into a cuisine he was not familiar with. He shared about how he wanted to support chef Ben, formerly of Peranakan Flavours on Tan Quee Lan Street, who had come to him with the idea of the collaboration.
One could tell how he saw the appeal of the inverse narrative: that with Coconut Club (CC), he’d made the effort to elevate the humble and ubiquitious nasi lemak — from sourcing for single-plantation coconuts for freshly-squeezed santan and using only organic free-range chickens for CC’s famous fried chicken; to taking an “atas” cuisine like Peranakan and serving it “economy rice” style.
It fired his imagination but to make it succeed as an F&B outlet, he shared, there’s still the roll-up-the-sleeves part where he and chef Ben had to work out recipes and ingredients, measurements and cooking methods to get the desired outcome. Chef Ben’s cooking seemed to be a tussle and tug of loyalties to his distant Teochew Peranakan father and beloved Cantonese ma che (nanny), who used to cook the entirely two different cuisines every single day for his father’s large family of four wives and numerous children. Then there’s another 60-something-year-old chef from Malacca who’d pop by to add his family recipes into Belimbing’s mix. Eng Su’s eyes seemed to light up at the culinary and business challenge of making that all work.
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Working with two chefs in their 60s, and wanting to deliver this new approach to Peranakan cooking and dining in Singapore frankly sounded a bit too idealistic, but then again, he’s succeeded in developing a cult following for The Coconut Club, not just for the S$12.80 nasi lemak but also for personable service, which can only happen when staff are valued and trained and REMAIN, with low turnover rates. For that, they were paid top dollar in the service industry, and he worked with them to help solve personal issues. It is that single mother he employed, the chefs he taught from scratch, and therapy sessions for some.
It was clear from the way Eng Su talked about the new restaurant, from its concept down to experimenting with dishes, to how he built a tight-knit family in The Coconut Club, that it was never just about making money per se. That was his little newsbite-worthy slice of the F&B pie in Singapore but a platform he uses to make that much of a difference to the lives of the staff who work there.
On Wednesday (Sep 11), I sent him a Whatsapp message, congratulating him on how Coconut Club was mentioned in The Mothership’s headline on their article about the Michelin Bib Gourmand even though it didn’t get listed. Eng Su replied: “Hahaha we removed ourselves in Feb when they asked for our new address and we decided not to give them. We are angling for the star with our new location.” (!!) And as for Belimbing which has a very unusual and excellently prepared spread of kerabu salads (more in the tradition of Penang rather than Malaccan/Singaporean Peranakan), he typed: “We’re gonna be changing our concept next week. Open Tue to Sat 11-3 & 6-930pm. A la carte at night and we do lunch deals to bring down the price for work crowd. Removing rendang and gonna try to do the proper Buak Keluak with nuts or banana leaf packages.”
By Fri night, when the news started percolating and was confirmed late at night, I knew that my belated post on Belimbing (I lost the original Instagram post lah as my mobile hung), even more so now, couldn’t be a food review but a tribute to Eng Su’s ideas and ideals,  energy and vision for culinary re-inventions for the journey that he had just started embarking on at Belimbing.
Singapore’s F&B scene has lost a superstar – not one in the ranks of celebrity chefdom reproducing classic French style cuisine, which is what Eng Su had trained in — but one with a real heart and know-how to re-invent and improve on Singapore’s own local culinary heritage. I pray that the staff can indeed continue to carry on his legacy and that diners would support that in every way they can. RIP, Eng Su. Thank you for brightening our palates and showing us that we can, and should, all try our best to do good in the little corners of our world (even though they may not be as pretty as Ann Siang Hill).
  The Singapore F&B scene has lost a superstar, Lee Eng Su, who reinvented nasi lemak and had just started to work his magic on Peranakan cuisine This was supposed to be food review, which I started writing last Tues (Sep 10). Except that as I started writing, I knew the story I wanted to share couldn't be mainly about the food, as it was only the third week of Belimbing Superstar's operations, and my second try of the chai png spread.
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