Yes! Nasi Kukus Review: Fragrant Lemak Rice With Crispy Fried Chicken And Curry Fish At $5.50

Standing in its shadow is nasi kukus, a lesser-known but equally tasty sister. Fragrant Lemak Rice With Crispy Fried Chicken And Curry Fish At $5.50 Food at Yes!

Cooked in a special metal steamer, with each portion steamed individually in an aluminium bowl, this might seem like a lot of extra effort just for rice, but this process purportedly makes the rice grains extra fluffy. For just $0.50 more, their nasi dagang comes with mixed white and red rice.

That said, instead of being individually steamed, the rice is cooked in coconut milk, resulting in drier grains brimming with lemak taste. Proudly emblazoned on the storefront, their signature dish Nasi Dagang With Fried Chicken ($5.50) was chock-full of vibrant colour.

With golden-brown fried chicken, crimson sambal, white and red rice, yellow-green achar and orangey curry, my stomach rumbled just looking at the dish. Clumpy and mushy rice is one of my greatest bugbears, so I enjoyed the dry and loose grains of the nasi dagang.

The red rice added a nice bite, and each grain was utterly crammed with coconut flavour. It’s like nasi lemak without the pandan fragrance, but with the coconut knob cranked up to a 100.

The combination of nasi dagang and curry was a revelation. On the curry savour spectrum, this was firmly on the earthy curry powder side, with a mild spicy kick backing it up.

Together with the coconut flavour from the nasi dagang filling in the lemak element, both flavour elements danced beautifully together on our palates. Nasi Kukus With Sambal Sotong ($5) was next on the agenda. This was neither, with the squid rings resting in a watery chilli sauce with touches of sweetness from pineapple and tomato.

To its credit, it was quite pleasant, but more assam taste and heat would have been welcomed accompaniments for the tasty squid. The curry in the Nasi Dagang With Curry Fish ($5.50) looked unassuming, lightly colouring the rice with a pale yellow tone. On the scale of coconut and curry savour, it was basically the opposite of the first curry, and was amazingly rich and coconutty.

Nasi Kukus Located at the foot of Woodlands Glen housing estate, this halal-certified joint is a little out of the way, taking 15 minutes to reach from Admiralty MRT by a combination of bus and foot. Nasi Kukus comes near the top of our list for a quality and affordable meal in the North.

Their signature fried chicken offers the most bang for your buck, and we highly recommend shelling out an extra $0.50 for their superb nasi dagang.