Singapore’s Seafood Giant Ha Li Fa Launches Plant-Based Seafood Brand Eat, Plant, Love

Singapore is getting its first plant-based mee pok in a partnership between the new Ha Li Fa brand, Eat, Plant, Love, and Bib Gourmand LiXin Teochew Fishball Noodles.

A popular Chinese noodle dish, mee pok is one of many Asian dishes with few plant-based options, according to Eat, Plant, Love (EPL), the new plant-based brand under the Ha Li Fa umbrella.

Eat, Plant, Love

As part of the EPL brand launch, a plant-based mee pok is coming to the popular LiXin Teochew Fishball Noodles restaurants.

Ha Li Fa says the taste of the plant-based mee pok is “indistinguishable” from conventional. The dish features the EPL fish cakes, minced meat, vegetable rolls, and fried tau pok — stuffed tofu — served atop LiXin’s springy house noodles. The dish will also replace lard, a key ingredient in conventional mee pok, with shallot oil.

Ha Li Fa is known for its popular BoBo fishballs and other seafood products, but the new EPL brand dives fully into plant-based options as the demand for alternatives is on the rise across Asia.

The new range includes seven alternative seafood and meat products including plant-based and mushroom balls, vegetable rolls, plant-based calamari, fish cakes, minced meat, and stuffed tau pok.

The new EPL products are launching at select supermarkets including Fair Price Finest and Xtra outlets.

Asia ups its plant-based seafood

Alternatives to conventional seafood are on the rise across Asia. In August, leading shrimp exporter Thai Union announced its first plant-based shrimp option.

“We have had consumers come to us and say, ‘I know you are an expert in seafood and shrimp – I would like to have a shrimp tempura, but not containing shrimp’,” Tunyawat Kasemsuwan, Thai Union’s innovation director said last year. “They come to us because they see we understand product quality, its functional properties, characteristics, taste, and sensory texture.”

Also in August, Umami Meats debuted the world’s first cultivated fish ball in Singapore, which is currently the only government to have approved cultivated meat for sale and consumption.

Mihir Pershad, Founder and CEO of Umami Meats said the company chose to develop fish ball laksa as a first prototype to create a dish that embodies Singapore’s rich food culture, “When we thought of classic, iconic Singaporean dishes, laksa immediately came to mind.”