For almost 40 years, former interior designer Patrick Tay designed hotels and shopping malls in Beijing.
Today, you’ll find the 61-year-old behind the counter of Tuan Tuan Yuan Yuan, the one-man dessert stall he opened at Chinatown Complex Food Centre in February, carefully putting together bowls of cheng tng and mango sago.
Situated in the hawker centre’s Yellow Zone, his stall has been drawing healthy queues after a video posted by Patrick’s older daughter Nichole, 28, went viral last month.
Hawker stall meant to be a family affair
After decades in the design industry, Patrick decided he wanted to do something “small, manageable and fun”. The Singaporean put in bids for a couple of hawker stalls and unexpectedly landed the unit at Chinatown Complex.
F&B isn’t completely new territory for the self-professed foodie. While based in Beijing, Patrick was involved in several eateries and even ran a dessert shop with his wife for about two years.
This time, he wanted the business to be something he could run with his family, hence the name Tuan Tuan Yuan Yuan (团团圆圆), which translates to “reunion”. Even the stall’s logo reflects that sentiment: its four circles represent Patrick, his wife and their two daughters.
Daughters initially felt becoming a hawker was “a step down”
Ironically, when Patrick first announced he wanted to swap his decades-long interior design career for life as a hawker, his family wasn’t exactly on board.
Patrick had been running his own design firm in Beijing for some 30 years before moving back to Singapore in 2021, after the pandemic and visa restrictions kept him apart from his family for about a year. He continued working in design, including helping Chinese EV giant BYD set up showrooms around Asia, but eventually tired of the constant travelling and decided to scale back.
“My daughters were like, ‘Dad, why?'” he tells 8days.sg.
Patrick reckons his daughters initially felt becoming a hawker was “a step down” after years spent designing restaurants and malls like Fraser Suites and Hard Rock Café Beijing’s revamp, even serving as design director for retail giant Beijing Hualian Group (BHG).
“Now you’re doing this? Running all the operations by yourself, doing all the cooking and washing,” he says, adding that his wife was also skeptical of whether he could handle the workload.
“But I don’t care. I get to spend time with my family. This stall is more like a family thing.”
While Tuan Tuan Yuan Yuan remains largely a one-man operation, his family pitches in when they can. His wife, who has a full-time job, helps on weekends, while his daughters have also taken turns helping out at the stall. Saturdays, Nichole tells us, have now become something of a “whole family activity”.
“We just felt it was a little bit of a waste of his talent”
Nichole, however, says it wasn’t that the family looked down on hawkers.
“We just felt it was a little bit of a waste of his talent,” Nichole, founder of tech start-up Phases, explains. “We also knew how physically demanding hawker life is, and worried about his health… and maybe [all the hard work is] not that worth it.”
After spending more time at the stall, Nichole says she began to understand why her father enjoys the work so much. Watching customers return just to tell him how much they loved his cheng tng, and seeing the close-knit community among the hawkers, gave her a newfound appreciation for Singapore’s hawker culture.
These days, Patrick jokingly calls Nichole his “marketing director”. Besides helping out at the stall, the entrepreneur has also been documenting Patrick’s journey on social media.
80% pay cut but prefers the hawker life
Patrick sees his F&B venture as something of a retirement gig rather than a replacement for his former design career. He is open to taking on the occasional freelance design job if time permits, and says the extra income from the stall helps in pricey Singapore.
Despite taking an 80 per cent pay cut, Patrick says he prefers his current job.
“I’m doing my own thing now, not building other people’s houses,” he shares.
“Over here, I can experience the kampong life. Everyone is helping each other out. The auntie [from the neighbouring stall] helps me cut mangoes every morning,” he adds.
After decades of travelling for work, the former designer also appreciates having more time with his family.
As for anyone who thinks becoming a hawker is a “step down”?
“There’s nothing wrong with a step down,” he says. “As long as you enjoy your work and it brings you joy, it’s fine. Don’t worry about how people look at you. It’s how you view yourself.”
“I prepare my food through design. I draw it out first”
Patrick may have traded malls for desserts, but he insists design is still “in [his] blood”.
He designed Tuan Tuan Yuan Yuan’s signboard and logo himself, and even sketches his desserts before making them so he knows exactly how he wants to present each bowl.
“I prepare my food through design. I draw it out first — how I want to present it, how the bowl should look, how the longans should be placed to make it more appealing,” he says.
“I can do design any time I want. I don’t miss design.”
Daughter now helps with marketing his stall
Nichole is also finding ways to incorporate her father’s art into the business, with stickers and postcards featuring his hand-drawn illustrations available at the stall.
They’re also working on more merchandise based on his sketches and a series called Hawkers of Singapore featuring Patrick’s drawings of hawkers and their food.
House-made giant jelly balls
Despite the extra prep work involved, he also makes much of what goes into each bowl himself, from the syrup to his signature 20-cent coin-sized jelly balls.
“Customers say, ‘Wah so big ah! Some guys even say, ‘I want to try your balls!” he laughs.
“I like to put smiles on people’s faces. They are appreciative, I get my satisfaction from there.”
Cheng Tng, $3
We’ll admit we’re not usually drawn to cheng tng — perhaps because we’ve always associated it with older-generation desserts. But Patrick’s signature was surprisingly refreshing and won us over with its medley of flavours and textures.
The light, not-too-sweet soup comes loaded with ingredients including crunchy Thai dried longans, white fungus, barley, sweet dried persimmon and a cube of sweet potato. There’s also pang da hai, or malva nut, an old-school cheng tng ingredient that Patrick says helps to “cool down your system”.
He says it has become less commonly used as it is expensive and laborious to prepare. His wife spends up to two hours painstakingly removing the fibres from the soaked ingredient. Mild in flavour and very fine, the slightly gelatinous pang da hai almost disappears into the soup. We particularly like the longans, which retain a satisfying crunch after being soaked, unlike the softer ones we’re used to finding in cheng tng.
Available hot or cold, though we’d go for the latter on a sweltering afternoon.
Mango Sago, $4.50 (8 DAYS Pick!)
This isn’t the thin, watered-down mango sago you sometimes get at dessert stalls. Patrick’s rendition is thick and luscious, with a mango puree base, generously topped with fresh mango and pineapple cubes, pomelo and crunchy chestnut poppers for extra texture.
Patrick is particular about his fruit, too. He tells us he goes around Singapore sourcing it himself rather than leaving the job to suppliers as he prefers picking the produce himself. The result is fruity and substantial without being cloying. It’s also one of the stall’s bestsellers and can sell out by around 4pm.
Yuzu Ice, $3.50 (8 DAYS Pick!)
Our favourite of the lot. This icy number is sweet, tangy and especially refreshing, with fragrant yuzu peel giving the honeyed syrup an extra citrusy oomph. Pomelo bits provide little bursts of tartness, while the large house-made yuzu honey jelly balls add a fun, bouncy texture. Bright and refreshing, this is what will keep us coming back.
Red Bean Grass Jelly, $3.50
A more familiar combination of red bean and coconut milk gets a playful textural upgrade with big chewy grass jelly balls, sago, sweet potato chunks and crunchy chestnut poppers. The latter burst as you bite into them, providing a fun contrast against the milky base. Like the other desserts here, it’s restrained on the sugar, so you can taste the individual ingredients rather than just sweetness.
Orh Nee, $2.50
This special menu item has been gaining popularity at the stall. Patrick’s orh nee is notably different from the richer more traditional versions made with lard.
His is exceptionally smooth and only mildly sweet, finished with three gingko nuts on top. Its coconut milk flavour is subtle and doesn’t overpower the earthy yam. We like that it’s creamy without being greasy or heavy — we could comfortably polish off a portion even after a full meal.
Patrick uses a Thermomix to get the yam puree silky-smooth, allowing him to whip up small batches quickly. He makes only around 30 portions a day, and they are snapped up as soon as they are ready.
Bottom line
Tuan Tuan Yuan Yuan’s small but thoughtfully put-together menu stands out for its refreshing, not-too-sweet flavours, quality ingredients and the effort that goes into making many of its components from scratch. The cheng tng is a pleasant surprise even for non-fans of the old-school dessert, while the mango sago is a crowd-pleaser. But it’s the zesty yuzu ice, with its addictive bouncy jelly balls, that we’d return for on a hot day. Prices are wallet-friendly too, with desserts starting from $2.50.
Tuan Tuan Yuan Yuan 团团圆圆 is at #02-036 (Yellow Zone), Chinatown Complex Food Centre, 335 Smith St, S050335. Open Tue to Sat, 12pm to 5pm. More info via Instagram.
Photos: Dillon Tan, ttyy.dessert/Instagram
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