As I was walking around chinatown this week after delivering Bak Kwa to my customers, I quickly noticed that salted eggs fish skin had become a regular item sold this upcoming lunar new year. There were many stalls selling it. It was at this time that I asked myself, “Are there that many fishes to be skinned to be made in to salted eggs fish skin?”
I texted Mr. Lennon Ang and asked him if he supplied fish skin to those snack sellers. His reply was that these snack sellers could have purchased the fish skins from a fish skin factory. I dug a little deeper and realised that there is such a thing called a Fish Skinning machine. Each machine cost between US$1500-3000 before shipping. Check out this video:
Easily costing S$12 (or more) per 150g of salted eggs fish skin, these addictive snacks packs a super high margin for the sellers. And if you crave for some, do have a look at the following news article before you buy:
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/irvins-salted-egg-apologises-dead-lizard-fish-skin-packet-11079720