Hup Chong Yong Tau Foo in Toa Payoh has closed
On the morning of 28 January 2026, a certain Toa Payoh coffeeshop was swept up by a strange mix of excitement and melancholy. Excitement, because of the lengthy queue for Hup Chong Yong Tau Foo, as every customer eagerly awaited a taste of the stall’s fare. Melancholy, because this was the last time they could savour it.
If the controversy surrounding a certain Stomp article didn’t clue you in, one of the most beloved yong tau foo stalls in Toa Payoh has closed for good, after more than 70 years. Its final hours were met with great fanfare—customers new and old alike flocked to the stall as early as 10 in the morning.
We joined the queue and instantly felt the warmth and reverence the customers had for the stall. Two customers behind us were waxing lyrical about the stall’s long history. Some handed gifts to the stall’s owner, Lu Meiwen, as they wished her all the best for the future. Others silently went about their business, carefully selecting ingredients for their yong tau foo order: stuffed tofu puffs, fresh vegetables, crispy meat balls, you name it.
To give you a sense of the staying power of this yong tau foo institution, Meiwen, 42, and her husband were the fourth-generation owners of Hup Chong. Having started as a pushcart stall in 1952, Hup Chong quickly made the Toa Payoh area its home base, establishing a patron base among residents and workers in the area. Meiwen herself only took over a decade ago, when she married into her husband’s family and got roped into running the family business. She’s been incredibly busy ever since.
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“Since I moved here from Malaysia, I’ve had no time for myself,” she lamented. “So now that we’re closed, I’m finally going to travel around Singapore and see what I’ve been missing all these years.”
But that relief is tinged with sadness, most of which comes from the rapport she has built with her customers over time. The love they have shown her, especially following the aforementioned Stomp article, which unfairly criticised the stall for the quality and prices, greatly moved her.
“I was crying after I saw the article, of course. But since then, the support has been amazing. Business picked up, and there was even a secondary school boy who gave me a Christmas present to cheer me up. I was so touched.”
But the usual pressures facing hawker stalls today became impossible to ignore, so Meiwen had to go ahead with the stall’s closure. Her main difficulty, she said, was finding and keeping local workers to help run it. Furthermore, business was on the decline even before the Stomp debacle, as the Toa Payoh coffeeshop stall was situated in an “ulu” area and depended heavily on the office crowd on weekdays. Moving to another location was difficult, too—we all know how ludicrous rental costs can be for hawker stalls these days.
Fortunately, there is a glimmer of hope. Meiwen told us that the coffeeshop is in the process of being acquired, and the incoming owner has plans to buy the Hup Chong Yong Tau Foo brand. This means that, though Hup Chong will no longer be under Meiwen and her husband’s control, it could still be manned by the former workers and, of course, Meiwen herself.
Meiwen was quick to point out, though, that it’s still up in the air. No one knows for sure if it’ll happen or when.
But for now, we bid farewell to the Hup Chong Yong Tau Foo, one of the best yong tau foo stalls in Toa Payoh—some say all of Singapore.
For a story of another big-name closure in the hawker scene, read our Lim’s Fried Oyster feature. For a piece that centres on the struggles of workers instead, read our harsh realities of F&B work feature.
Former address: 203 Toa Payoh North, #01-1121, Singapore 310203
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Photos taken by Marcus Neo.
This was an independent feature by Eatbook.sg.
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