Golden Sands Bun There seems to be quite a bit of change at Yishun Park Hawker Centre ever since our last visit to the hawker centre quite a while ago; while many stalls such as that of Ah Lock Tofu and Ah Tan Wings are still operating around the food centre, there seems to be quite a change with a number of the tenants — there are now quite a few Indian-Muslim and Muslim stalls that occupy a stall unit such as that of Bismi Briyani, Ayu Cooking Indonesia Cuisine and Naina’s Kitchen which are establishments that are not part of the initial list of tenants that operates in the hawker centre. A rather recent addition to the hawker centre would be that of Zao Dian You Ni 早点有你, a stall that serves up dim sum; the name is actually quite an interesting wordplay with various meanings — either being “great to have you early” or “there’s always you for breakfast”. Being a stall situated in a hawker centre, Zao Dian You Ni’s selection of dim sum revolves around the typical selection of fried and steamed dim sum that is usually available at coffee shops and food courts. That being said, Zao Dian You Ni does offer some interesting items such as that of the Taro Pau and Sesame Lian Rong Ball — items that are less commonly seen around.
Having tried a number of items from Zao Dian You Ni’s menu, one of the items that we thought did slightly better than the others was the Golden Sands Bun. The Golden Sands Bun is what other establishments would usually dub as the Salted Egg Lava Bun. Sold in a portion size of two pieces per order, the Golden Sands Bun is a white bun that comes with molten salted egg lava within. Sinking our teeth into the Golden Sands Bun, we found the bun to be a little bit on the thicker side; the molten salted egg lava in the middle does however oozes out eagerly as one takes a bite into the bun. The salted egg lava itself was actually well-balanced; perhaps one that could match itself against similar offerings from more established dim sum specialty stores — a good balance of sweet and savoury with gritty bits of salted egg for good texture. That being said, the temperature of which the Golden Sands Bun came with was a little odd; while the molten salted egg lava was warm, the bun was a little bit of the lukewarm side of things. Overall, something which we found to be decent — this is considering that there are far worse that we have had from other establishments be it dim sum specialty stores or just stalls serving up dim sum in coffeeshops alike.
Zao Dian You Ni isn’t that sort of establishment that attempts to put out artisanal dim sum at heartland-friendly prices; they also do not necessarily need to be that as well. In fact, it does seem that Zao Dian You Ni is more of that establishment that aims to just provide residents around the area an option to have dim sum whilst being at Yishun Park Hawker Centre. The set-up at the stall does seem to suggest that the selection of dim sum available are likely to be supplied, and that there are some offerings of which that seems to be slightly better than the rest. The Golden Sands Bun mentioned above was one of the better items that we have had; other items like the Siew Mai itself was a bit of an oddity amongst other Siew Mai which we have had thus far — the meat within the Siew Mai felt especially savoury and almost identical to that of chicken luncheon meat. It wasn’t unappealing, though was something to get used to. Then there was also items like the Taro Pau — the pau feeling seemingly thick like the Golden Sands Bun, though the Taro Pau’s filling was a touch to sweet for our liking. The prices of the dim sum items are not the cheapest around, with items generally served between $1.20 to $2.50 (other establishments such as Lion City Dim Sum Express 筷餐点心 serves up a wider variety of dim sum in the lower price range) depending on the type and its portion sizes. Having tried a number of their offerings, we would say that Zao Dian You Ni isn’t that establishment which one should make a visit if they are looking for something particularly artisanal — the dim sum offerings at Zao Dian You Ni are more tuned towards the average taste bud that are not to picky about; something that would probably satisfy those whom are just looking for a light bite around without too much of an expectation.
