Toronto's newest registered Singaporean restaurants

What dishes should I order at a Singaporean restaurant?

Start with Hainanese chicken rice — poached chicken served over fragrant rice cooked in chicken stock, with chilli sauce and ginger paste on the side. It's considered Singapore's national dish and the benchmark for any kitchen. Laksa is the other essential: a coconut curry noodle soup built on a rempah spice paste of shallots, galangal, lemongrass, and dried shrimp — rich, spicy, and nothing like Thai or Malaysian versions you may have tried. At AGAK AGAK (253 Gerrard St E, Downtown), both dishes are the core of the menu.

How is Singaporean food different from Malaysian or Chinese food?

Singapore's food is genuinely its own thing: a product of Chinese (Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese), Malay, and Tamil Indian communities cooking side by side in hawker centres for generations. Dishes like laksa, char kway teow, and Hainanese chicken rice exist in Malaysia too, but Singaporean versions are distinct — Singapore laksa is coconut-heavy and richer than Penang's asam (tamarind) laksa. Chinese food in Singapore also carries Straits-Chinese (Peranakan) flavour profiles — more lemongrass, pandan, and sambal — that you won't find in mainland Chinese cooking. Think of it as Chinese technique filtered through tropical Southeast Asian ingredients.

Is Singaporean food spicy?

Most Singaporean dishes have a chilli component but are not aggressively hot by default — the heat is usually served on the side as sambal or chilli sauce so you control the level. Laksa has a warming spice from the rempah paste, not a sharp chilli burn. The genuinely spicy outliers are dishes like mee goreng or sambal kangkong, where the heat is integral. If you're sensitive to spice, just ask for the chilli sauce on the side — that's normal even in Singapore.

Where can I find Singaporean food in Toronto?

Toronto has very few dedicated Singaporean restaurants — currently AGAK AGAK at 253 Gerrard St E in the Moss Park / Cabbagetown area is the only newly licensed Singaporean kitchen tracked by NowServingTO. It sits on Gerrard East, a stretch that already draws South and Southeast Asian diners, making it a natural fit. Given how small the Toronto Singaporean restaurant scene is, this is genuinely the place to go if you want hawker-style laksa or chicken rice without flying to Singapore.

What is laksa?

Laksa is a spiced coconut noodle soup that is the signature dish of Straits Chinese (Peranakan) cooking and the dish most people associate with Singapore. The base is rempah — a hand-pounded paste of shallots, galangal, lemongrass, dried shrimp, and candlenut — cooked in coconut milk with chicken or shrimp stock. It's served over rice vermicelli or thick noodles, topped with poached chicken or prawns, tofu puffs, bean sprouts, and a spoon of sambal. AGAK AGAK on Gerrard St E anchors their menu on it.