Jennifer Vayding spent half of her life in Iowa, and the other half in Singapore. Just as the pandemic started, Vayding — who was born in Laos, moved to Iowa at age 10, and graduated from the University of Iowa before moving to Singapore — decided to return to Iowa. It felt safer in the United States, and she had ties to Ankeny.
She worked at Principal Financial Group. She retired. And when her son, Zach Tan, who studied at culinary school in Taiwan, moved to Iowa, she decided she missed some of her favorite dishes from Singapore and Malaysia.
The duo opened Hawker’s Kitchen, an ode to Singaporean hawker stands serving street food. Hawker stands in this island country at the southern tip of Malaysia tend to be open air and serve street foods. In Ankeny, Vayding and Tan focus on their favorite dishes from Singapore.
“This is my first time in this industry,” Vayding said from inside her counter-service restaurant. Diners order and dishes come to their tables in the dining room or on the patio in front of the restaurant.
“My son came two years ago, and he started cooking, and he loves cooking, so we just opened this in August,” she said. “There’s a lot of people from Singapore and Malaysia here… We have to drive to somewhere like Kansas City or somewhere else to get this food.”
Vayding found that some customers discover her food when they stop in for a sandwich, such as the new HK brisket sandwich, a dish from Hong Kong she just added to the menu. A woman and her son ordered brisket sandwiches for lunch, and they told their husband and father about it. “My wife said, ‘I have to get this,’” she said. “So it was kind of nice.”
Soy chicken rice, an Asian sausage with sticky rice, and pork belly bites are just some of the other newest dishes added to the menu.
How spicy is Singaporean food?
Vayding and Tan don’t add spice to her dishes to accommodate the palates of Ankeny residents. Some items come with a sambal chili that customers can add to their dishes.
Is chicken rice on the Hawker’s Kitchen menu?
This national dish of Singapore to the menu is a must-order. Chicken is cooked and then dunked in ice water and served room temperature. Tan cuts the chicken into bites with the bones inside. It’s a simple yet flavorful dish.
For now, Vayding and Tan added a soy chicken rice to the menu. This dish uses a Hainanese recipe adapted in Singapore and found in most hawker stands. The poached chicken comes with a chili-garlic sauce and a sweet soy sauce.
What to order at Hawker’s Kitchen
Chicken satay, $8.95: This skewered appetizer can be an entrée as well as a sandwich. Savory chicken bites marinated in turmeric, galangal, and lemongrass come with a peanut sauce. Chicken satay in Singapore comes on tinier skewers at the hawker stands. It’s also cooked over charcoal, but Vayding and Tan use a grill in the restaurant.
Shrimp pancakes, $7.95: These savory and crisp pancakes are cooked with shrimp and served with green onions and carrots. Dip each portion of the pancake into a soy dipping sauce served on the side.
Laksa, $15.95: This shrimp noodle soup comes in a spicy coconut broth along with fish balls, dried tofu, bean curds, and a boiled egg. In Malaysia, the dish can be sour, but in Singapore, the dish comes with the coconut broth, served with a chili on a spoon that diners can stir in to get their level of heat in the dish.
Nasi lemak, $14.95: The coconut rice is the star of this show. Fried chicken comes with roasted peanuts, cucumber, sambal chili paste and dried anchovies on the side. In Singapore, diners stir in the anchovies with the chili paste to get a crunchy texture. Vayding recommends that diners should experiment with the sides to get a consistency they like. “Everybody makes it differently and the intensity of spice is different for us,” Vayding said. “We intentionally hold it down so that a majority can enjoy it.”
Roti John, $13.95: This sandwich, popular in Singapore and Malaysia, combines a western idea, the sandwich, with south Asian ingredients. “Roti” means bread, and John is a tip of the hat to British colonizers. The roti John comes with curried beef, eggs, mozzarella cheese, shredded cabbage and carrots with mayo and sweet chili sauce inside the unleavened bread. Think of it as a Singaporean omelet wrapped in bread.
Where to find Hawker’s Kitchen
Location: 1975 N. Ankeny Blvd., Ankeny
Contact: 515-901-5268 or hawkers-kitchen.com
Hours: Open Monday through Saturday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Susan Stapleton is the entertainment editor and dining reporter at The Des Moines Register. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, or drop her a line at [email protected].
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