By The Table desk · Last verified 28 September 2026

Zi char is the Chinese stall or restaurant with a long menu, where every dish is cooked to order and shared family-style over rice. The usual order is one meat, one seafood, one egg or tofu dish, one vegetable, and rice for everyone. Order small, because even small plates are generous. And before you order anything marked “seasonal price”, ask what it costs.

Quick facts

• Zi char is cooked to order and shared, with rice.
• The classic order for four is one meat, one seafood, one egg or tofu, one vegetable, and rice.
• Most dishes come small, medium or large, and small is often enough for two or three.
• Crab and whole fish are priced by weight or at a seasonal price.
• Rice is charged by the bowl.
• Crab is where the bill jumps.

What is zi char?

The name is Hokkien, meaning cooked food made to order. In practice it means a kitchen turning out stir-fried and deep-fried Chinese dishes from a long menu, unlike a hawker stall that sells one dish. Crab bee hoon, san lou hor fun, cereal prawns, prawn-paste chicken (har cheong gai) and sambal kangkong are the kind of dishes you’ll find on most menus.

What should four people order?

The standard template is one meat, one seafood, one egg dish, one vegetable, and rice. For bigger groups you double it. For four, that might be coffee pork ribs, cereal prawns, hotplate tofu and sambal kangkong, with four bowls of rice.

What do the sizes mean?

Each dish has a price for small, medium and large, and the small is bigger than you’d expect. One visitor ordering large for two was talked down to small by the waitress, and found even the small plates were family-sized. As a rough guide, order small for two or three people and medium for four to six.

What does it cost?

Starting prices at well-known zi char places run from about S$6 for a hor fun and S$8 for pork ribs to S$18 for salted egg squid. Four small dishes at S$8 to S$18 each come to S$32 to S$72 plus rice, or about S$8 to S$18 a head. Add crab and it changes: chilli crab is quoted by the kilo, at around S$60 a kilo at one popular place. One diner reported a seafood-heavy dinner for four at a well-known spot coming to about S$30 a head.

What does “seasonal price” mean?

On a menu it may appear as “SP” or “market price”: the price changes with the catch. Crab, whole fish and large prawns are usually priced by weight. Ask the price per kilo, and ask the weight of the actual crab or fish before it’s cooked, not after.

Other charges to watch

Rice is charged per bowl. Some restaurant-style zi char places also charge for wet towels or peanuts put on the table, and you can send those back if you don’t want them.

The WahLiao Verdict

Order small, follow the template, and ask the weight of anything sold by the kilo before it goes in the wok. Crab is where a S$60 dinner turns into a S$200 one.

Questions people ask

Can two people eat zi char?

Yes. Two or three small dishes and rice is plenty.

Do I need to book?

At the popular places on weekends, yes. Coffee-shop zi char stalls rarely take bookings.

Is zi char halal?

Many zi char stalls cook pork, so look for a MUIS certificate if it matters to you.

What’s san lou hor fun?

Flat rice noodles charred hard in the wok and topped with fish or seafood; our glossary has the rest.

Sources: foodpanda magazine on the standard zi char order; Burpple zi char guide and diner reviews on prices; Migrationology on portion sizes; The MeatMen, Zi Char at Home (dish list).

Read next: What ++ Means on a Singapore Menu · Hawker Centre, Coffee Shop or Food Court · The Singapore Hawker Food Glossary · Back to The Table

For what’s worth it this week, with the bill shown, read The WahLiao Week.