I ate the world's cheapest Michelin-starred meal, a $2.25 street food dish in Singapore. I've never gotten better value for my money.

Chan Hon Meng, born to farmers in Malaysia, opened Liao Fan Soya Sauce Chicken Rice & Noodle in a Singapore hawker center in 2009.

Chan has since shortened the name of the stall to Hawker Chan, opened up two additional locations in Singapore, and partnered with Hersing Culinary to open franchises in Taiwan, Malaysia, Thailand, Australia, the Philippines, and Kazakhstan.

Prices start at 3 Singapore dollars (about $2.25) for the signature chicken and rice dish and can go up to 16 Singapore dollars (about $12) for a whole soya sauce chicken.

One other hawker stall in Singapore, Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle, currently holds a Michelin star, but the price range starts at a slightly higher 5 Singapore dollars ($3.75).

His morning routine also includes "many hours of manual braising," according to the Hawker Chan website.

Singapore is home to more than 100 hawker centers, which are typically open-air food courts that sell a variety of Asian cuisines at affordable prices.

In December 2020, Singapore's hawker culture was even added to Unesco's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, which also includes things like yoga in India and sauna culture in Finland.

"These centres serve as 'community dining rooms' where people from diverse backgrounds gather and share the experience of dining over breakfast, lunch and dinner," reads Unesco's description of Singapore's hawker culture. "... Evolved from street food culture, hawker centres have become markers of Singapore as a multicultural city-state, comprising Chinese, Malay, Indian and other cultures."

Source: Michelin Guide

Even though each stall is numbered and I knew Hawker Chan's number, it took me nearly 10 minutes to find the stall.

A sign noted that the stall's opening hours were from 10:30 a.m. until it sold out.

I stepped right up to the stall to order, only to be told that the line was behind me.

I should've known, as Singapore's Michelin guide notes there is "always a queue" at Hawker Chan. From what I could see, most people seemed to be ordering the signature chicken and rice dish for 3 Singapore dollars. Like many hawker stalls, Hawker Chan accepts only cash.

By the time I'd been standing in line for about five minutes, another 10 people had lined up behind me.

Hersing Culinary CEO Angel Chong told me later that Hawker Chan serves about 80 whole chickens per day, which comes out to roughly 600 portions.

After picking up their orders on a brown tray, diners can add extra soy sauce or chili sauce from the bottles at the counter.

I waited for less than 20 seconds before my chicken rice was set in front of me and the next person approached to order. Things moved so quickly that I didn't even have time to snap a picture of my food before I had to pick it up and move out of the way.

When rating a restaurant, Michelin inspectors do not, in fact, look at interior decor, table settings, or quality of service.

Instead, they look at five criteria: quality of the ingredients used, mastery of flavor and cooking techniques, the personality of the chef in his cuisine, value for money, and consistency between visits.

One Michelin star — which Hawker Chan has — is defined as high quality cooking that's worth a stop.

According to the Singapore Tourism Board, it's the rice and chili sauce that can "make or break" the dish. The rice should be oily but not too oily, while the chili should strike a perfect balance between spiciness and sourness.

The chicken was impossibly tender and the sauce had a rich, balanced flavor. It was a perfect portion size for a filling yet not too heavy lunch.

As I ate, I observed the activity of the hawker center: some people ate alone, while others grabbed lunch with coworkers or friends or family.

Thanks to multiple fans positioned throughout the hawker center, a pleasant breeze circulated throughout the space. The center hummed with the sounds of clattering trays, voices, laughter, and the occasional chirping bird.

I finished my meal in about 10 minutes and then I was ready to head back to work, like many others who had stopped by the hawker center that day.

And the laid-back dining experience was part of the appeal. As Unesco aptly recognized last year, Singapore's hawker centers offer an intangible quality of community.

Even though I'm a newcomer to Singapore — and even though I was eating alone — I felt a sense of camaraderie with everybody else in the hawker center. For me, the most worthwhile experiences, particularly when traveling or experiencing a new culture, are those that evoke the spirit of a place.

And from what I've learned in my short time here, there's almost nothing more uniquely Singaporean than eating a plate of chicken rice at a hawker center.