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REVIEW – CIFU OMAR HOKKIEN MEE

>> Thursday, October 30, 2008

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As a Penangite, most Chinese would go for non-halal Hokkien Mee where the soup is pork based. Have you tried the Malay version of the Hokkien Mee (Mee Udang) before? There is this old house along Jalan Tanjung Tokong selling this yummy hawker delight solely manned by Pakcik Omar. There would always be endless stream of customers from all different races patronizing this stall on weekdays. Well, they would only open their business for 3 hours from 11.00am until 2.00pm daily except weekends.

The taste of the soup is different as it is chicken based. Moreover, it has the sweet taste of rock sugar and prawns. Even the color of the chili paste looked so mild and yet can be real fiery to taste. You can choose your noodles to be either koay teow, bee hoon, yellow mee or mixed. You also have choices of the meat to be either chicken, beef or mixed. My friend tried out the mixed koay teow and mee Chicken Hokkien Mee (RM3.30). The dish came with lots of chicken meat, some crab sticks, prawns, eggs and chicken gizzards. The serving was large.

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REVIEW – JIT SENG HONG KONG ROASTED DUCK RICE

>> Tuesday, October 28, 2008

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Penang is one of the states where you can savor quite a few types of duck rice. You can have the Peking Duck Rice, Pei Pa Duck Rice, Braised Duck Rice and the Hong Kong Roasted Duck Rice. One of the famous one would be the Jit Seng Hong Kong Roasted Duck Rice situated along Lebuh Carnarvon. The sole chef cum owner, Mr. Lam, has been in this business for the last 3 decades, selling his freshly roasted duck rice daily.

Even before he opens up his business around noon, you can see that the whole coffee shop would be crowded with people. What makes his duck rice so unique that people would queue up for half an hour just to eat it? Firstly, the duck is real tender with so much of ingredients stuffed in it prior to roasting. Secondly, the skin of the duck is coated with his special sauce which would include some molasses (Ba Lei Ko in Hokkien or Melaco in Portugese). Thirdly, the portion served is very generous.

Most of the time, he would include a duck drumstick for a serving for two and above such as the photo below.

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RECIPE – SPICY NYONYA NASI ULAM (JUNGLE HERBS RICE)

>> Thursday, October 23, 2008

Cooking Nyonya cuisines which are normally spicy, tangy, herbal and aromatic has always required a lot of patience. In fact, the preparation alone for most of the dishes would take up a long time as it involved so much hard work in slicing, cutting and chopping of herbs and ingredients. Some such examples could be seen in dishes like Laksa, Perut Ikan, Acar Awak, Otak Otak and many more. But there is one dish that even some of the established Nyonya restaurants such as Hot Wok did not have it in their menu as it involved a lot of tedious fine slicing of many herbal leaves – SPICY NYONYA NASI ULAM (JUNGLE HERBS RICE).

This dish is definitely a very healthy diet as most of the ingredients are taken raw. My demised grandmother had made this yummy dish all the time, so have my mother some of the time. Before it ended up in my generation that none of us would even remember the existence of this dish, I would like to take some time to prepare this dish and share with you my heirloom recipe. Although I am not the descendants of the Baba-Nyonya, I would love to see someone pick up this recipe and be proud that it has been part of the Malaysian cuisines.

NASIULAM

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REVIEW – DEE TOM YAM

>> Wednesday, October 22, 2008

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I must admit that I have been going to so many Chinese stir fry restaurants and hawker stalls in Penang that I tend to have overlooked on the Malay stir fry stalls. In fact, some of these stalls can provide food as delicious as any of the food stalls out there. Hidden within the compound of Farlim’s apartment, Block 1B, is a small Malay stall providing cheap, good and yet delicious Malay cuisine. Although it has no signage on the stall, it runs the business by the name of Dee Tom Yam. At times, you can see patrons of all races queuing up to order his delicious food. The wonderful thing about this place is that you can opt to sit inside the coffee shop (Huat Huat) or relax yourself on the field between the two blocks of apartments.

You can either order dishes to be taken with rice or simply ask the boss to cook up some fried/soup rice or noodles items for your meal. The menu list is not long but it is good enough for a simple meal. What else would you expect as nothing in the menu (except fish based on market price) costs more than RM4.50? You could easily order Masak Pedas Daging (Stir Fry Spicy Beef), Tom Yam Udang (Prawn Tom Yam) and Kangkong Belacan (Fried Shrimp Paste Water Spinach) for just RM10. Rice would be at RM1 each plate.

As I did not have to crowd to test out all the dishes, I managed to order his Nasi Goreng Ikan Masin (Salted Fish Fried Rice) at RM3.50. The combination was great as it did not contain the overpowering taste of the salted fish and the rice maintained its softness. Moreover, there are a lot of vegetables and squid slices in the dish.

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REVIEW – KOWLOON HAINAN CHICKEN RICE

>> Monday, October 20, 2008

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Sometimes it is rather hard to make a decision to get good Hainanese Chicken Rice in town area as there were just too many around. Moreover, more and more shops have mushroomed all over town selling this yummy food. You might not believe it but all the shops have their own version of Hainanese Chicken Rice. Some might use sesame oil, rice wine, ginger juice, oyster sauce or just plain soy sauce. Somehow, I was stuck to one stall by the name of Kowloon Hainan Chicken Rice (same coffee shop as the famous Super Lai Lai Bak Kut Teh selling at night) for years. It could be due to growing up in the neighborhood and got accustomed to the taste or maybe I love the way the chicken meat slices were presented with lots of vegetables and dark soy sauce.

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REVIEW – CREPE COTTAGE

>> Sunday, October 19, 2008

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The C.A.S.T. (Criz, Allen, Steven & Tan) team had an interesting food expedition last night in Pulau Tikus area. Initially, we wanted to have our dinner at Francis’s Fusion Western Food along Jalan Cantonment and Jalan Burmah junction but the place was packed. We ended up at Yaw’s Roast & Grill at Gerbang Midlands instead. The place was rather crowded as it was a weekend. After dinner, we adjourned to Crepe Cottage, a place which has been in operation for the last 9 years, along the famous sea front of Gurney Drive for desserts.

The place was packed as well, leaving us just a small table outdoor under the bright yellow neon light of the lamp post. Although the place had limited sitting capacity, the menu was an amazing 14 pages consisting of starters, soups, savouries, desserts, sundaes and juices. The team had decided to share out some crepes (Thin French pancake made from a mixture of flour (wheat/all purpose), milk, eggs, salt and butter).

The first order was Espresso Crepe (RM7.50) served with a large scoop of homemade Vanilla Ice Cream and some whipped cream. This was rather mild as we could hardly taste the bitterness of the Espresso Coffee.

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REVIEW – MEE MANJA

>> Saturday, October 18, 2008

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I have reviewed Mee Manja when I first started on food blogging but I guessed not many would have known about its existence except those regular customers. Manja is the Malay word for “Pampered”. You would have asked why the name “Pampered Noodles”? You might have interpreted it wrongly as that’s the family name for the cook cum owner Encik Aman Manja. He had followed his father and uncle as early as 13 years old when they were located just opposite the recently relocated premise at Jalan Hutton. For over 40 years and 3 generations, Encik Aman has served thousands of loyal customers with his delicious Mee Goreng and Mee Soup. Encik Aman is in fact the elder brother of the famous CRC Mee Goreng stall located in a coffee shop next to Dorsett Hotel, Jalan Larut, Penang.

While most of the Mee Goreng stalls in Penang are using the modern technology to blend their ingredients, Encik Aman believed in using the traditional way to grind his ingredients with the old fashion Batu Giling (Metate Millstone). According to him, that would preserve the original taste of the blended items. Mee Manja’s style of cooking the noodles is totally different compared to the rest. Their noodles (Mee, Bee Hoon or Koay Teow) are more towards the salty chicken bones soup based flavor, whether fried or soup. You can opt for plain, chicken, beef or mixed meat too. If you do not want spiciness, you would have to inform him.

The Chicken/Beef Mee Soup (RM4) is the most popular in his stall as you can taste the sweetness from the chicken stock. This is really good for eat in. Takeaway would make it soggy.

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REVIEW – FARLIM SHELL STATION LAKSA CAFE

>> Friday, October 17, 2008

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It has been as a long time since I have taken any Laksa and decided to visit the famous Farlim Shell Station Laksa stall. Coincidentally, PenangTuaPui also have the same thoughts as we went exactly to the same shop, the same day, only at a different time. The last time I went to the shop for their Laksa, they where at the opposite coffee shop where the crowd was amazing. When I went back to the same shop the other day, I was stunned by the lack of customers and stalls in that shop. Then only did I realize that they had moved to the opposite coffee shop with a big signboard “Farlim Shell Station Laksa Café”.

Walking by the Laksa stall, I could smell the fragrant assam aroma of the boiling Laksa soup. Upon finding a cool spot to sit down, I ordered a bowl of their famous Laksa (RM3). It came with a full boneless Ikan Kembong (Indian Mackerel). It was so fresh that you could even see the glitters on its body. The yummy local delicacy consists of thick and spingy rice vermicelli, lots of sliced big onions, cucumber, lettuce, pineapple, chilies and some mint leaves and shredded bunga kantan (torch ginger); accompanied by the fragrant soup base (a combination of assam peel, blended shallots, garlic, chilies, candlenuts, galangal, turmeric, shrimp paste (belacan) and lemongrass); and topped with thick hae gou (black prawn paste).

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REVIEW – TYE SIN STREET ECONOMY BEE HOON

>> Thursday, October 16, 2008

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I had a laugh when I asked Allen and Steven if they would like to join me for a round of “Teong Kok Hoo Chi” (Chinese shark’s fins) yesterday for dinner. Both of them thought that I was crazy enough to go for a RM40 small bowl of soup without realizing that this was the local term used for Economy Bee Hoon (Rice Vermicelli)/Mee (Yellow Noodle) which would cost me RM1-RM1.50 per plate. LOL! I have been using this term ever since I was in my primary school which was ten of years ago. We used to call this dish the “poor man’s shark’s fin”.

Anyway, after a few days of lavish dining, I thought of visiting such stall for a simple meal which is cheap yet delicious. I have tried many such stalls within the town area and find this one along Jalan CY Choy to be one of the best around. Other than having some add on like their ever delicious Lor Bak (Pork Roll), they have something better. Their noodles did not have the strong taste of unwashed Lye water. Here’s my large plate of the Economy Mee (RM1.50) with some sweet chili sauce and fried sweetened tofu sheet (Teik Gar Kee in Hokkien).

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