How Violet Oon and her children are narrating Singapore’s food story for a new generation

Violet Oon has long been described as the doyenne of Singapore’s heritage food and, more recently, a national treasure. The indomitable 76-year-old has spent decades documenting, cooking and championing Singapore’s culinary heritage, making her something of a living repository of our nation’s social history.

Her own life is full of film-worthy turns. As a young child, she spent a year and a half in the UK, which gave her a new appreciation for Singaporean food. “When I came back… it was like a reunion with a lover,” she said of missing the food of home in an interview in 2019. She nursed early ambitions of becoming an opera singer but decided not to pursue it because “I realised I would never be the best in the world.”

She stood on the picket line at the 1971 Straits Times strike, just months after she began working as a journalist – a moment immortalised in a photograph that now hangs on the wall of her restaurant in Ion Orchard. She has moved in social circles that would later inspire the larger-than-life characters in Crazy Rich Asians. “(The movie) is based on true stories! I actually know someone who went and bought the hotel,” she trilled, referring to the opening scene where Michelle Yeoh’s character buys the London hotel that refused her family service.

Her career trajectory is its own A-plot, winding from journalist to food critic, to celebrated chef and keeper of Singapore’s heritage dishes. She has rocked through a couple of restaurant failures, watched food fads come and go, and might have even co-opted a few to her repertoire. It’s not a stretch to say that her life and work are their own chronicle of The Singapore Story that unfolds through her food, restaurants and cookbooks. 

A FAMILY AFFAIR

Fifteen years ago, at 61, when most people begin thinking about retirement, Oon’s daughter, Tay Su-Lyn, and son, Tay Yiming, suggested they open a restaurant. “I had two restaurants in the 1990s, which failed gloriously,” Oon said with characteristic candour. “My children came to me in 2011 and said they wanted to do a business focusing on the heritage and legacy of Singapore food. I said okay. And now I tell people they’re my bosses, you know?” she said.

Their first restaurant, Violet Oon’s Kitchen, was a casual eatery along Bukit Timah Road serving Peranakan food with a few Western twists. It wasn’t until 2015, when the National Gallery Singapore invited them to set up a restaurant in its new premises, that the family were able to realise their goal of spotlighting Singapore’s culinary heritage. The historic venue, in what was once City Hall, was the perfect site and particularly meaningful to Oon. As a young music and arts journalist in the early 1970s, she had spent much of her time in the Ministry of Culture offices on the building's third floor. “That was exciting for me, but also a great responsibility, because how do you interpret national food?” she recalled. “Is it hawker food? Home food? Or restaurant food?” 

The short answer is, of course, all of the above. 

“So I went to learn to make idlis from scratch from Indian housewives. We made chilli crab, because that’s what’s national to us, and then we had fish head curry,” she said. “Food is not only food. We feel a responsibility to it, you know?”

COOKING THE NATION’S MEMORIES

In the decade since National Kitchen opened, the family has expanded their menus with dishes that trace the arc of Singapore’s culinary language. Their offerings have included rum balls (“remember the famous cafe in Ngee Ann City called Mont D’Or, which used to sell it?”), pineapple upside-down cake (served at the New Year’s Eve balls Oon attended at the grand Adelphi Hotel, which closed in 1973), and more recently, Hainanese pork chops, a nod to the Hainanese chefs “who dominated the 60s, 70s and 80s”.

The beauty of this fare, apart from how good the food tastes, is that it elicits dialogue at the table. Older diners might fondly recall the rum balls and pineapple upside-down cakes of their youth. Younger Singaporeans might think about their Aunty Beatrice, without whose shepherd’s pie the annual family Christmas dinner would be incomplete (something my dining companion remembered when we tucked into Oon’s version recently). We all have stories and memories about the food we ate growing up –sharing them over a meal is the simplest, most natural way of keeping our food culture alive.

Each Violet Oon restaurant concept is thus a different lens through which Singaporean food is viewed. National Kitchen, with its terrace overlooking the Padang, draws from across the island’s culinary traditions. Bibik Violet, by contrast, is “food you can eat every day” – kaya toast, nasi lemak and the like. “Violet Oon Singapore is tok panjang dining,” Oon explained, referring to the elaborate traditional “long-table” Peranakan feast.

“I’M A PRISONER OF MY GENERATION”

Oon sees herself as the curator of her family’s living gallery of heritage food. Her son and the company’s CEO, Yiming, ensures her recipes are recreated accurately and consistently across their restaurants by developing SOPs (standard operating procedures) for every step from start to finish. “His role is to make sure what my mum has created can be done the same way every time,” said his sister Su-Lyn. “It’s not just about taste, but preserving the integrity of those dishes.”

Su-Lyn brings the brand’s narrative to the dining room. Trained in fashion and design, she approaches each restaurant as a cultural experience. At National Kitchen, beaded chandeliers are a nod to kasut manek (Peranakan beaded slippers); tiles salvaged from old shophouses form a patchwork of memory at Bibik Violet.  “I see it as creating an identity rooted in stories,” she said. “Every detail, every touchpoint, should tell something about where this food comes from.”

Mother and daughter are refreshingly open and garrulous interviewees. They interrupt one another and finish each other’s sentences. “We fight a lot,” Su-Lyn laughed when asked what it’s like working with family. “I’ve always found her very irritating,” she said, eyeing her mother, “but it’s been a wonderful experience working with her because I see a different side of her now that I’m her colleague. When she scolds me in the context of work, it’s meaningful because I’m learning from her and have such a newfound respect for her.”

Oon returned a doting smile. “I could never possibly do this (on my own),” she said, gesturing to the restaurant around her. “I’m a prisoner of my generation. You need the next generation to enliven it.”

Before she could begin her next sentence, Su-Lyn chirped, “And there are still so many stories to tell!”

Editor’s note: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that Violet Oon is 79 years old and stayed in India. Oon should be 76 years old and spent a year and a half in the UK. This has been corrected. We apologise for the error.