A netizen has taken to social media to voice displeasure over the attitude of a Cai Fan storekeeper in Yishun after his mother and himself have allegedly gotten food poisoning from consuming food purchased from the store located at Block 618 Yishun St 61 on Sunday evening (20 Feb).
After eating food from the store, he claims that his mother and himself have suffered from stomach upset, ache and consistent diarrhoea.
He then went to the store to explain nicely to the owner but the owner blamed it on their weak immune system instead.
Here is the complaint by the man
“Food poisoning incident involving economic rice & cai peng stall at Block 618 Yishun St 61 on Sunday evening 20/2 (food purchased ~740pm). If any viewers of this post suffered similar incident involving this stall, please reach out to me and/or lodge a report to SFA for investigation. I believe this is the correct thing to do. If you stay around Block 618 in Yishun/khatib avoid this stall until the authorities have conducted and concluded investigations. Long post ahead as I have to provide some context.
Pictures are of the stall. Guy in blue is the owner and cook. Notice the dishes in trays are not on any sort of warmers or heaters. They settle to room temp quite quickly after leaving the stove area. Great breeding ground for bacteria that probably caused the food poisoning.
TLDR; owner & cook didn’t want to admit that his food caused food poisoning to my mother and I, despite explaining nicely to him what had happened, gave him ample time and chances to own up, but our courtesy was only met with coldness and repeated phrases of “it’s not my food problem, it’s your stomach can’t take it”. Both my aging mum and myself suffered stomach upset and pain and consistent diarrhoea throughout Monday and discomfort persists into Tuesday, after consuming food from this stall. We’ve taken appropriate medication but the ordeal doesn’t magically disappear. Extremely poor conduct and dishonesty from a food stall owner, deserved to be made publicly known.
Details
Been purchasing from this stall for a few months now without incident. Recently around start of CNY I made some small talk with the boss who is also the cook. Found out that he is from Malaysia and spending CNY here and didn’t go back to his hometown. I thought to myself it would be a nice gesture of buy him some festive gifts especially so since he’s spending the new year apart from his family (you know the soft hearted kind of feeling). Eventually gifted him some goodies and I felt that the neighbourhood hawker-resident type of relationship was going in a good direction. More small talk, more knowing about their backgrounds allows us to better appreciate their hard work and give them out support vs. the bigger FnB establishments. I felt that this is a good spirit to have and increased my patronage to his stall. To be frank, before this incident left a sour patch in my mouth, I felt that the boss was a good person as he seemed honest, hardworking and outwardly friendly. He cooks quite tasty food too.
Everything was going well before Sunday’s incident. I went to his stall around 745pm, even brought a second round of gifts (malaysian tidbits) to bless him. By the time I arrive I think he was prepping to close shop and there wasn’t much food left. I packed what I wanted for myself and my mum and left. All the packed food was consumed at home at about 830pm. The food was not warm, basically at room temperature. From the stall, only the rice was served and packed warm. Rest of the dishes are not heated by any means. Anyways we didn’t find anything amiss with the food whilst eating. Nothing tasted sour or off. We had eaten all the dishes before so we know how they taste and also that our stomach could take the “spice”.
While in bed on Sunday night, I felt alot of churning/guggling in my stomach. A sour feeling began developing around midnight. Sleep wasn’t pleasant and was quite disruptive due to the weird feeling in the abdomen area. At this point I didn’t think much about it and thought it was just abnormal digestion.
The next morning around 8am I woke up to a piercing pain in my stomach region and rushed to the toilet. The rest I shall’nt describe. Spent 30 mins inside in agony and also realizing what had gone wrong. The next round of disgusting business happened 10am. Then another at 1pm. Took meds I had left over from a recent visit to the doctor for stomach issues (stomach ache & diarrhoea). Check with my mum, and she indeed also had quite severe stomach upset and diarrhoea when she reached her work place around 8am on Monday. She had to keep working with stomach pain and trips to the toilet. I cannot imagine. How would you feel if this happened to your own mother?
After some rest and letting the medication take effect, the diarrhoea got slightly better but appetite was null and the pain was still ongoing. It was clear this was a case of food poisoning from the cai peng stall as we both ate the same dishes in Sunday night. We suspect that it was the curry that caused the poisoning. It could be other dishes as well but curry is the most likely culprit as it goes bad very easily.
Around 4pm after another visit to the throne, I left home to get my booster shot. Enroute to the vaccination centre, I dropped by the stall and wanted a word with the boss.
He was busy cooking at the time and made me wait more than 5 mins like a fool while trying to hold my shit in my ass. He then asked me if it was urgent (like seriously mate). I told him obviously it was. Another 3 mins of waiting for him and then he gave me time.
I told him nicely what happened hoping for some degree of empathy care and concern, and also an explanation of the cause. I was appalled when he replied saying that it wasn’t his food or the curry as he had it himself. He had the cheek to tell me not to eat his food anymore and to avoid curry and spicy stuff as our stomachs can’t take his spice.
There was not a single apology or concern given, or if both me and my mum were ok. Idk if I was being way too courteous and nice (I felt that it was correct to be so as I leaned back of the casual relationship we had formed over all that small talk and gifting).
Regardless, I told him I’m wasn’t out to sabotage him by lodging a complaint with the authorities and sought to find a resolution with him privately first. Guess what? The chap didn’t give a flying *fish* about my cordial approach and replied saying just not to eat his food anymore. Wow. I was appalled. Very appalled.
I read the fella wrongly. Honest friendly? Nah. Proud and dishonest more like. Not only did he not take any ownership of his food, his fast response was to shun and divert the blame to… well, the customer. It’s amazing really to think about if such food poisoning incidents occur (and they do all the time), he would blame the customer’s weak stomach rather than giving the benefit of doubt to the customer.
Walked away shaking my head. I had to rush for my vaccination slot so didn’t bother reasoning for any longer. You won’t talk sense to an illogical and unappreciative bugger like him.
So here I am, writing this long ass first post on this group, hoping to bring much needed awareness to his stall. Maybe the boss low key wants this type of attention. Here you go. Ah Hao (his nickname) if you happen to read this post, shame not on you, but on me for thinking you’re an honest and responsible chap that takes pride in your food. How wrong was I. People indeed show their true colors when shit hits the fan ehh.“
Image source: Arc Lingerson/Facebook