One of my friends Fred is the founder and owner of a restaurant in Singapore called Pince & Pints.
He just opened the KL branch this October and he invited us over to try it out. I don’t eat lobster but because it was Fred’s opening I decided to get out of my comfort zone and give it a shot.
Fred is the guy here on the left. Next to Fighter.
And this is the lobster Pince & Pints grew famous for.
And their only in Malaysia Pince & Pines special dish: Lobster noodles.
Over dinner we talked about how Fred ended up in the restaurant business and he told us his story. Fred and his wife Velda were part of a very successful online fashion retailer called Love Bonito. After building up the company over the years they exited and took an 8 month long break.
Velda went to London to study fashion and Fred spent those months relaxing and thinking about what to do next. In London he discovered the popular lobster chain Burger & Lobster. He really liked it and thought of bringing it back to Singapore. He did the math and realized that the only way to do it was if he were to import his own lobsters. Until that point he knew nothing about lobsters.
Fred spent the next few months becoming an expert in lobsters and learning about the processes in an F&B outlet. To get that experience he took a job as a kitchen staff at Fish & Co earning S$3.50 an hour. On his first few days he realized that the money he earned for the day was barely enough to cover his parking fees at Paragon. Eventually he learned to cycle to work instead.
After a month of doing everything from deep frying french fries to cutting up prawns for 8 hours straight, he finally left. Armed with the knowledge of how to run an F&B outlet and kitchen he started out Pince & Pints.
The first Pince & Pints in Singapore was a huge success with lines at the door even up till today. In the process, Fred also became the largest importer of lobsters in Singapore supplying other hotels and restaurants.
His KL outlet is his second outlet and trying his food for the first time I can see why people line up for it in Singapore. Everything at Pince & Pints is made with their unique recipe that Fred came up with. They import almost everything on their own from the lobsters, to the wines.
Try Pince and Pints. They open for booking in KL next Monday.
Timothy Tiah – Co-Founder of Colony, Kuala Lumpur Co-Working Space