Hawker spotlight: Mr and Mrs Mohgan's Crispy Prata

Mr Somasundram Mohgan is a man who doesn’t say much. A queue is building at his stall in Tin Yeang Restaurant, an eating house in Katong but he keeps his head down kneading the prata dough. His wife calls out to him to come out for a quick chat and he obliges, takes off his apron and sits himself at the marble table while his wife takes over manning the stall. She’s an efficient multi-tasker; taking orders from customers, dishing out chicken curry into saucers and also interjecting during the interview with some of her own anecdotes.

While the Mohgans have an assistant who helps flip prata on the stove, the pair are always busy completing different tasks at once. Without saying much to each other, they seamlessly switch roles or pick up where one left off. Such a high level of communication only happens when one has been married for a long time – or running a prata business for over thirty years.

Veterans of the local hawker scene, the Mohgans’ story is an interesting one. Prior to the current stall on Joo Chiat Road, they used to run an equally busy shop down the street at Crane Road. They closed it briefly in 2018 and out came rumours that the couple has retired. Mr Mohgan said that he was simply offered a stall at the current location for a good deal and moved. Coincidentally, his former space is now also a prata stand – so naturally, he cites competition as one of his challenges as a hawker.