UNINESS

Video Series

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Upon walking into the laneway between Jalan Petaling and Jalan Sultan, the warm, comforting smell of delicious food makes one’s mouth water. Tucked beneath gray tarpaulin sheets is Sai Kee hawker stall, which serves cooked-to-order dishes eaten with rice, also known as “Dai Chow”. A makeshift eating area is set up in its immediate surroundings, right behind the shophouse of Kong Wooi Fong Tea Merchants. 

The setting may seem dingy, but the alleys in the Petaling Street neighbourhood were once packed with such “Dai Pai Dong”, laneway hawkers offering a myriad of affordable fare and also functioning as communal gathering places. However in recent years, hawker culture is gradually dying out, with only a handful of stalls remain in the same alley as Sai Kee. Even though restaurants and cafés flourish in the vicinity, laneway hawkers are the go-to for comfort food. 

Bright orange flames momentarily shoot up as Uncle Lai Seng Wai ladles oil into a hot wok, engulfing the ingredients upon their being added. Uncle Lai stirs deftly with a stainless steel spatula, then instead of tossing the wok, he covers it with a flat metal lid and let the flames lick around the wok. Within a matter of moments, he removes the lid – the food is thoroughly cooked and ready to be served. 

The fiery stir-fry is a technique that combines speed and precision, maintaining a high temperature throughout the cooking process. The intense heat elevates the flavors and imbues “wok hei” (breath of the wok), an enticing smoky savory aroma, to the food. The practice of covering the wok with a lid instead of tossing speeds up cooking, improving evaporation as well as flavor. 

The stall has always occupied the same spot since being established decades ago by Uncle Lai’s grandfather, who hailed from Panyu in Guangdong, China. At first it was an unnamed stall with no fixed menu, which served claypot chicken rice at one point, economy rice at another, and changed to serving Hokkien noodles when Uncle Lai’s father inherited the stall. Towards the end of 1969, the menu was revamped to serving stir-fry. Uncle Lai sees no reason for change when he took over the reins, therefore he retains his father’s cooking method and recipes. 

Day in and day out, they serve homely Cantonese cuisine such as braised fish with tofu, sweet and sour pork, french beans with roasted pork, fish paste soup etc. Everything is prepared fresh daily on the spot, without any pre-made or pre-cooked components involved. The fish paste, made from the flesh of wild-caught mackarel, is still beaten by hand instead of using a blender or food processor, lending a bouncy and springy texture. 

Among the Petaling Street community, the stall is verbally known as “Ah Sai” (scrawny lad), the nickname of Uncle Lai’s father due to his rake-thin physique. Later on, it was registered as the official name to be displayed on the stall’s signboard. Most of the customers are regulars whose families have been frequenting the stall over three generations as well, although lately the crowd consists of more office workers and tourists. 

Uncle Lai, who helms the wok at Sai Kee, displays his multitasking ability to handle four woks simultaneously during peak hours. He is also in charge of procuring goods from the wholesale market late at night after work, and picking up miscellaneous ingredients from the supermarket and wet market in the morning before heading to work. His younger brother Hoong Wye is in charge of taking orders, cutting ingredients and preparing steamed dishes, with the help of their aunt and a few workers. 

For Uncle Lai and his brother, helping their parents since a young age and taking over the family business in adulthood comes to them as something natural. They have been working together for more than 40 years, and as business partners in the past two decades, each taking care of their own duties. However, they share a common problem with their neighbours – lack of successors. Without any intention of developing into a full-fledged restaurant, they might just retire when they are no longer able to work.