The Best Ikan Bilis and Local Small Plates

There is a particular sound that precedes a good plate of ikan bilis: the dry rattle of anchovies and peanuts being tossed in a wok, followed by the hiss of chilli hitting hot oil. It is a small, unglamorous noise, and it announces one of the local table’s most quietly essential dishes. Ikan bilis — tiny, salted anchovies, dried and then fried until they shatter between the teeth — rarely gets its own moment in the spotlight. It plays a supporting role, scattered over nasi lemak or folded into sambal, and it is precisely this modesty that makes it worth seeking out on its own terms.

Done well, ikan bilis is a study in contrast: brittle and crisp on the outside, with a lingering savoury depth that outlasts the crunch. Done badly, it is either soggy with old oil or so aggressively salted that it overwhelms everything else on the table. The difference lies almost entirely in technique — the quality of the dried fish to begin with, the temperature of the oil, and the restraint (or lack of it) shown with the seasoning.

What separates a great plate from an ordinary one

The best kitchens buy their ikan bilis whole and clean it themselves, removing the heads and guts by hand rather than relying on the pre-cleaned bags sold in most wet markets. It is fiddly, unglamorous work, but it pays off in a cleaner, less bitter finish. The fish is then dried a second time before frying, which draws out excess moisture and guarantees the crispness that makes the dish worth eating in the first place.

Frying temperature matters more than most home cooks realise. Too cool, and the anchovies absorb oil and turn leathery. Too hot, and they scorch before the inside has had a chance to crisp through. The better hawker stalls and casual kitchens around the island fry in small batches, watching the colour shift from silver to pale gold, and pulling the anchovies out a beat before they look ready — carryover heat does the rest.

The sambal question

Ikan bilis is rarely served alone. It is almost always paired with roasted peanuts, and very often folded through a sambal that can range from a gentle, caramelised sweetness to something considerably more punishing. A composite counter along an eastern coastal stretch of the island — the kind of unmarked stall with a queue that forms an hour before opening — makes a version with a sambal built from three different chilli varieties, balanced with tamarind and a touch of gula melaka, that manages to be fiery without losing the anchovy’s own flavour underneath it. That balance, more than heat alone, is the mark of a kitchen that has thought carefully about the dish rather than simply reaching for more chilli.

Beyond ikan bilis: the small plates worth ordering

Once you start looking at the local table through the lens of small plates rather than a single hero dish, a whole category of quietly excellent cooking opens up. Achar, the tart, crunchy vegetable pickle, does for a meal what a good squeeze of lime does for a cocktail — it resets the palate between richer dishes. A well-made otah, the grilled fish paste parcel wrapped in banana leaf, rewards patience: the best versions are cooked slowly over charcoal, developing a faint smokiness that no gas flame can replicate.

For readers building out a proper spread, it is worth reading our guide to the best rojak and local salads, which covers the sweet-savoury-sour category that pairs beautifully alongside a plate of fried anchovies. The acidity and crunch of a good rojak cuts through the richness of fried snacks in exactly the way a considered host would want.

• Look for ikan bilis that has been double-fried in small batches, not left sitting under a heat lamp.
• A good sambal should taste of more than chilli alone — tamarind, palm sugar and shallot all have a part to play.
• Pair with something acidic, such as achar or a citrus-dressed salad, to balance the richness.
• Buy dried anchovies whole where possible, and clean them yourself for a noticeably cleaner finish at home.

Where the composite counters get it right

A handful of stalls scattered across the island’s older housing estates have quietly built reputations for their small plates without ever chasing attention. One family-run counter tucked into a market near the eastern coast has been frying its own ikan bilis daily for more than three decades, refusing to pre-prepare batches the night before because, as the owner puts it, “the crunch doesn’t survive till morning.” It is the kind of unfussy conviction that tends to produce the best food — not chasing trends, simply repeating a technique until it is close to perfect.

Elsewhere, a newer wave of casual kitchens has started reworking these small plates with a slightly more contemporary hand: ikan bilis tossed through a warm salad with segments of pomelo, or served alongside a soft-boiled egg and toasted brioche as an unlikely but genuinely successful breakfast plate. These reinventions work best when they respect the original technique rather than trying to disguise it — the crunch and salt-forward character of good ikan bilis is not something to be smoothed over, but something to be framed properly.

“You cannot rush the frying, and you cannot skip cleaning the fish properly. Everything else is seasoning,” says one hawker who has run the same stall for over twenty years.

Building a considered spread at home

For those keen to recreate the experience domestically, the equipment matters less than the discipline. A wide, heavy-based wok holds heat more evenly than a narrow pot, which helps avoid the temperature dips that lead to soggy results. Frying in genuinely small batches — no more than a handful of anchovies at a time — keeps the oil temperature stable throughout. If you are assembling a full local small-plates spread for guests, it is worth thinking about the meal in the same way you would think about the kopitiam egg ritual: simple components, executed with real attention, rather than an overwrought menu.

Readers looking for a wider survey of the island’s hawker landscape should also see our running list of the hawker stalls worth queuing for this year, which includes several counters doing exceptional work with fried snacks and small plates in this vein. For the fuller picture of where Singapore’s dining culture is heading, our Dining & Drinks section tracks both the heritage stalls and the newer kitchens reinterpreting them.

Ikan bilis will likely never command its own tasting menu, and that is rather the point. It belongs to a category of local cooking that rewards close attention precisely because it asks so little of you at first glance — a small, crisp, salty thing that, made properly, tells you almost everything you need to know about the kitchen behind it.