The best food can often be found at the dirtiest alleys.

Still in Changping, there’s an an alley full of little eating outlets about 8 minutes’ walk from our hotel (Hui Hua Hotel).

We went to this outlet called Ah Sheng BBQ (阿胜烧烤 something – their shop names are always so long that I don’t have time to read everything before stepping into the shop).

The Goonfather had eaten there before and couldn’t stop thinking about it afterwards. This place was the reason we extended our stay in Changping for two nights. I had a sore throat our first two nights there and couldn’t eat throat-unfriendly food. =P

They cook the food right out in the open and bring it into the dining area for you. There’s a huge array of food for your consideration: All kinds of vegetables, meats and seafoods on skewers. All the food is spiced with interesting Chinese spices including peppercorn and something salty and herby.

You can get Chinese BBQ in Geylang. Lots of little shops there, usually called 羊肉串 (mutton skewers) because that’s probably the main attraction. The ones in Singapore, however, are limited to a few kinds of meat and no veges save for corn.

Check out the stuff we ordered in Ah Sheng!

Mushrooms and mid-joint chicken wings:

Eggplant:

(Look like fish, doesn’t it? Haha.)

Prawns:

(They have the giant ones, like three or four times this size but I didn’t dare order them.)

Enoki mushrooms:

Below the mushrooms are chives:

Shishamo and Taiwanese sausages:

Corn:

Buns:

Quail:

(The item on the menu said Little Bird (小鸟) so I ordered it out of curiosity. It wasn’t so nice, though, and it looked a bit scary.)

The meal was just amazing. It was the first time in my four days in Changping that I overate. You definitely have to try this if you go to China. It’s not only in Changping. Many other cities and towns have them. You’ll find hawkers on the streets (main roads as well as alleys) BBQing in the open.

There was a pretty female singer in Ah Sheng carrying a guitar in her arms and an amp on her back (like a backpack) walking from table to table asking if people wanted a song. Of course, she would put the amp down when singing, but once done, she’d hoist it upon her back again. It’s quite cute!

She has a menu of Chinese song titles and each song costs 10RMB (S$2).

It’s like a mobile jukebox!

There was a table with, like, gangster boss types, that ordered 10 songs in a row, so we got to enjoy lots of free songs, heh.

After she was done there and came to our table, we ordered one song. (Because we only had one 10RMB note among us. The rest of our cash was in big notes.)

After our table no one else ordered anything.

By the way, this was the night we got accosted by the little girls I mentioned in Star Blog this week. It was after dinner while we were walking back to the hotel from this place.

(It didn’t happen in an alleyway, though. It happened out in the open by the main road, which made it more remarkable.)

Anyway, I’m loving Changping despite the pollution and scary little girl predators. Definitely gonna pay another visit soon. =)