01 AM
Settled at the far fringes of Singapore, the Jurong Fishery Port bustles with boat engines revving, forklifts and fishmongers boots squelching on the wet floor. In the wee hours of the morning, shipments of fish from neighbouring countries like Malaysia and Indonesia arrive at the port. Styrofoam boxes are taken from the docked ships and then dragged to the fish merchants by workers. The paths leading up the to the stalls are littered with fish scales of all shapes and sizes.
02 AM
Within the fish merchant’s space, their workers begin to open the delivered boxes. Containers that come from neighbouring countries tend to have a mixture of wild-caught fishes of different varieties, ranging from prawns and snappers, to sharks and stingrays. The seafood is then unloaded into baskets and crushed ice is shovelled on top of them to keep them fresh. The fishery port still retains the method of making ice using old traditional machines and continues to remain a cash-free business.
03 AM
The merchants and their workers are highly skilled in inspecting and verifying the seafood’s quality before sale. The workers use a gaff to inspect the stingrays before sorting them, the same technology used in the past by fishermen. In this article published in 1938, a gaff was used as part of their fishing technique to lift up the heavy-weighted animal onto the boat. Once the quality has been approved to be up to standard, the workers will arrange the stingrays into distinct piles, according to their size and weight.
04 AM
The most coveted parts of the stingray are the fleshy wings (flaps), the area surrounding the eyes. Stingrays are cartilaginous fish, so their bones hold the meat together and are not traditionally filleted like a bony fish. The workers expertly gut, clean and prepare the stingray for sale, and with the flick of the wrist, the gills fall like butter. Merchants know what their customers want and prepare the ray beforehand. Building a strong merchant-customer relationship creates a pool of regular buyers to support their livelihoods.
05 AM
As the last few transactions are made and packing up begins, the port quietens down. With a large yawn from the 老板 ( lăobăn - boss in chinese), one thing’s for sure, this is a physically draining job- a fact that is often forgotten about when we consume our seafood dish. As the sun starts to rise, the market quietens down from the recent mayhem as the seafood leaves to their next destination: a wet market, a hawker stall, or the kitchen of a 4-room HDB flat.
05 PM
Jiao Cai Hotplate BBQ is one of the oldest BBQ Stingray stalls in Singapore. Now taken over by the hawker’s son, Zhi Jie continues to follow the classic method of cooking: barbecue. Barbecued and served on top of banana leaves, sambal chili paste is smeared on top of the stingray meat. Served with limes and chinchalok (a spicy fermented shrimp sauce), the condiments give the dish an extra zest to its already smoky, spicy meat.
06 PM
From catch, to sale, to wok, to the plate, this individual ray has finally reached its fate: a slab of sambal stingray. The skill behind the catching of the stingray, inspection by the merchants of the individual ray, and the style of cooking by the cook all comes down to the taste buds of the consumer. Thanks to the skills of each individual along the supply chain, the quality of the stingray will be verified by one simple inspection. With the cartilage at the bottom holding the wing of the stingray together, can the meat be scraped off with a fork like butter?
