Restaurant in Singapore, Singapore
Michelin fish head curry, hawker prices.
Zai Shun Curry Fish Head holds a 2025 Michelin Bib Gourmand for its fish head curry — velvety, umami-rich, and priced at hawker rates. Run by chef Ong Cheng Kee in a Jurong East coffee shop, it is the kind of destination that rewards food-focused visitors willing to travel west for one of Singapore's most credentialled bowls of curry.
If you are the kind of eater who tracks down Michelin Bib Gourmand winners in housing estate coffee shops, Zai Shun Curry Fish Head in Jurong East is worth the trip. This is not a venue for a special-occasion dinner with table service and a wine list. It is a hawker stall run by chef Ong Cheng Kee, operating at the $ price tier, where the measure of quality is entirely in the food. The 2025 Bib Gourmand recognition confirms what regulars in the west of Singapore have known for years: the fish head curry here competes with anything in the city at any price point.
Zai Shun sits in a void deck coffee shop at 253 Jurong East Street 24, Block 01-205. Walk in and you will see the kind of setting that defines Singapore hawker culture at its most functional: plastic stools, shared tables, fluorescent lighting, trays carried by diners rather than servers. There is no ambience in the conventional sense, and that is entirely the point. The visual experience here is the food arriving at the table — a clay pot or deep bowl of curry, red-orange and aromatic, with a whole fish head half-submerged in the sauce. The flesh, according to the Michelin citation, is velvety and loaded with umami, hot and spicy, and intended to be eaten with steamed rice.
Beyond the eponymous dish, the stall offers additional fish preparations and stir-fries. The menu is focused rather than broad, which at this format and price level is a strength: Ong Cheng Kee has built the operation around doing a small number of things at a high level rather than spreading effort across a long menu.
At the $ price tier, the service model is self-directed. You order at the counter or flag down staff, carry your own food, clear your own table. There are no servers in the restaurant sense. What you are paying for is the cooking, full stop. This is where Zai Shun's Bib Gourmand status becomes meaningful: the award specifically recognises venues offering good food at moderate prices, and at hawker prices, the ratio of quality to spend here is difficult to match in Singapore's dining market. You will spend a fraction of what lunch at Summer Pavilion costs and walk away having eaten fish that serious food travellers describe as reference-level.
The Google rating of 4.4 across 1,652 reviews signals consistent execution at volume. That kind of score, across that many reviews, at a hawker stall, is harder to sustain than a Michelin star at a fine-dining restaurant where covers are controlled and reservations managed. It tells you the kitchen is not having occasional good days — it is reliable.
No reservation system. This is a walk-in hawker stall. Arrival timing matters more than booking strategy: hawker stalls in Singapore that carry Michelin recognition develop queues quickly, particularly at peak lunch hours on weekdays and through the weekend. Arriving early in the lunch window or during the late lunch lull (post-1:30 PM) is a practical approach. The address , 253 Jurong East Street 24 , is in the western residential belt, reachable by MRT via Jurong East station, then a short walk or taxi. It is not centrally located, which is exactly why it retains the character of a neighbourhood stall rather than a tourist-facing operation.
If Zai Shun sits in your itinerary alongside other Michelin-recognised hawker stops, Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle and 545 Whampoa Prawn Noodles are both worth anchoring in the same trip. For char kway teow, 91 Fried Kway Teow Mee is the reference point. A Noodle Story and Adam Rd Noo Cheng Big Prawn Noodle complete the picture for Singapore's hawker tier. Further afield in the region, 888 Hokkien Mee and Air Itam Sister Curry Mee in George Town, Ah Boy Koay Teow Th'ng, Air Itam Duck Rice, and Ali Nasi Lemak Daun Pisang represent the same hawker discipline across the Causeway. Thailand's equivalents include A Pong Mae Sunee in Phuket, Anuwat in Phang Nga, and Banana Boy in Hong Kong rounds out the regional street food circuit.
For the full picture of where to eat, drink, and stay in Singapore, see our full Singapore restaurants guide, Singapore hotels guide, Singapore bars guide, Singapore wineries guide, and Singapore experiences guide.
| Venue | Price | Value |
|---|---|---|
| Zai Shun Curry Fish Head | $ | — |
| Zén | $$$$ | — |
| Jaan by Kirk Westaway | $$$ | — |
| Iggy's | $$$ | — |
| Summer Pavilion | $$ | — |
| Waku Ghin | $$$$ | — |
A quick look at how Zai Shun Curry Fish Head measures up.
The cuisine is built around seafood and fish-based curries, so pescatarians are well served. Vegetarians and those avoiding shellfish or fish sauce will find the menu limiting — the signature dish and most stir-fries centre on seafood. There is no documented allergen or dietary accommodation process for a hawker stall of this format, so arrive with a clear sense of what you can and cannot eat.
Groups are a practical advantage here: ordering a fish head and several stir-fries across four to six people makes more sense than a solo visit where you can only cover one or two dishes. There are no reservations — seating is first-come in a shared coffee shop — so larger groups should arrive together and send one person to queue while others secure a table. Groups of eight or more may find seating tight depending on time of day.
Casual clothes only — this is a void deck coffee shop in a Jurong East housing estate. Anything you would not want splashed with curry broth is the wrong choice. Sandals and a t-shirt are the local standard.
There is no tasting menu — Zai Shun is a hawker stall. The format is à la carte: you pick dishes at the counter and pay per item. At the $ price tier, ordering the curry fish head plus one or two stir-fries gives you a full meal for a fraction of what a tasting menu elsewhere would cost, and the Michelin Bib Gourmand is awarded precisely for this kind of value-to-quality ratio.
For Michelin-recognised hawker eating in the same price bracket, Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle and 545 Whampoa Prawn Noodles are the natural comparisons — both Bib Gourmand recipients with similarly focused menus and walk-in queues. If you want fish head curry specifically, the format and price point at Zai Shun is hard to match at the Michelin level in Singapore. For a step up in setting and price, the gap between $ hawker and $$$ restaurant-format seafood in Singapore is significant.
Workable, but not the optimal format. Solo diners can order a single fish dish or a portion of the curry, but sharing across multiple dishes — which is how the menu is designed — is harder alone. If you are eating solo, go at off-peak hours to avoid competing for seats, and focus on one or two dishes rather than trying to cover the full spread.
Arrive early — Michelin Bib Gourmand recognition (2025) draws queues, and popular dishes sell out before lunch ends. The eponymous curry fish head is the anchor order: the Michelin listing specifically calls out its velvety flesh and umami-forward spice. At the $ price tier, this is a cash-and-carry hawker operation, so expect to order at the stall, find your own seat, and clear your tray. Bring a group if possible — the stir-fries and fish dishes on the menu are worth ordering alongside the curry.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
