Whether it’s coaxing the embers of a wood-fired oven or kneading pasta dough, chef Lim Yew Aun of Bar Cicheti uses his Asian sensibilities to interpret Italian cuisine
“I love it so much...the one at Opal Crescent. They only open for lunch until 2pm. It’s very good. You should try it.” Penang-born chef Lim Yew Aun—of the recently opened Italian pasta and wine bar Bar Cicheti, its mothership Cicheti, and modern Australian restaurant Fynn’s—is raving about his favourite minced pork noodles stall.
We’re quite sure he would have scoured the island before making this call. This is someone who pursues his passions to the zenith degree. The tattoo-clad chef previously took a year offF&B to master tattoo art, and when he was learning how to be a pizzaiolo (pizza chef) at the Japanese-Italian L’Operetta Group, watched umpteen Neapolitan pizza-making videos late into the night. The wiry chef even speaks with intensity, his words loud and resonant, like new guitar strings strung taut.
Chef Aun put his pizza-making skills to good use when he and his cousin-business partner Ong Liling started Italian restaurant Cicheti at Kandahar Street five years ago. The casual restaurant with a hershey shaped wood-fired oven at its heart was a sleeper hit. With the restaurant going strong, the pair decided to start Bar Cicheti. This new addition, barely five months old, sees Chef Aun paying more of his laser beam attention to handmade pasta. But pizza is never far from his mind. He says with an easy laugh, “My heart is round (like a pizza) even after all these years.”
Why do you have a passion for making wood-fired Neapolitan pizza?
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