Singapore Foodie Guide

Singapore today has more culinary confidence than ever. Yet if boldface-name restaurants have put the Lion City squarely on the fine-dining map, it will be their local counterparts that keep it there.

Perhaps only in Singapore can you eat your way across Asia in a day. Check into your cheap Singapore budget hotel, and head out in style. Armed with a good appetite, you can start with a flaky Pakistani murtabak, swoop down to Little India for masala dosa, devour a lunchtime bowl of piping-hot Hokkien noodles with a side order of dim sum, and save space for a dinner of Indonesian nasi padang or beef rendang. There is also the Glutton's Bay, located at the Marina Bay Sands Pier next to the Singapore River. In it, you can try out various great food from all over the region, all at within your fingertips.

But for all the multicultural flavors of this food-mad city-state's hawker centers and coffee shops, it's fine dining that is grabbing all the attention these days. Invigorated by a handful of international star chefs who have opened outposts at Singapore's massive, casino-driven "integrated resorts," the culinary landscape here is changing fast, with a lineup of establishments that is nothing less than extraordinary. Some of these establishment partners up with various Singapore hotels, while some other humbly chooses various shop-houses or even hawker stalls to ply their trade.

Singaporean cuisine has been promoted as an attraction for tourists by the Singapore Tourism Board, as a major attraction alongside its shopping. The government organises the Singapore Food Festival in July to celebrate Singapore's cuisine. The multiculturalism of local food, the ready availability of international cuisine and styles, and their wide range in prices to fit all budgets at all times of the day and year helps create a "food paradise". The dish "Singapore noodles" does not exist in Singapore, as it was invented by chefs who worked and lived in Hong Kong.