My sister brought the entire family for a crab dinner. She told us that the Tak Fok restaurant in Manjalara is so popular that there is always a long wait for tables. We decided to go very early so that we do not have to deal with the crowd.

That place was packed alright. The tables and chairs are placed so close to one another that there are hardly any room to move. We believe that what makes this place popular is that it’s cheap (RM 18 or CAD$6 per kilogram). They specialize in crabs and have quite a few varieties of preparation which I had never heard of.

My sister did the ordering. I had no idea what the crab dish below is called. If I hazard a guess I would say this is kam heong style crab. The claws is my favourite part. It is the fleshiest. The kam heong, you know the whatmachacallit dark pieces below, is best with plain steamed rice.

I have never seen this type of crab dish before. My sister translated this to be butter-cheese crab. The yellowish thick gravy looks really good and smells really nice.

My sister also ordered some “fried bread”. This is so unique and new to me. I had sliced bread with chilli crab before but never bread made specifically for crab dishes.

The way to eat this is to break the bread and dip it on the butter-cheese sauce. It tastes really good. This is so unique. I know Suanne will hate it but I am just thinking that I should get a Malaysian crab recipe book for her. Hmmm … maybe not.

If there is such thing as a “commonly unique” dish, the one below is it. It is basically a potato nest filled with assortment of ingredients duch as cauliflower, peanuts, mushrooms, onions, and what nots. Unique but it’s too dry a dish for me.

We also had a hot plate tofu dish. It came sizzling hot. The sizzle gave out a very nice smell.

Sweet and sour pork. Pretty good on it’s own but really the star of this meal was the crabs.

I liked this meal a lot despite the messy-ness and the cramped seating. This restaurant had a few other crab dishes — something like ten (!) if I am not mistaken. I wish I could try them all — I guess I will have to leave it to the next trip.

The day after dad’s funeral, my in-laws treated Nanzaro and I to a Yong Tau Foo dinner in a restaurant nearby Sri Damansara in Manjalara. The last time I was in Malaysia, I did not get the chance to go for this. So, I was glad when my brother-in-law suggested this.

Yong Tau Foo is a very Chinese Malaysian dish. I don’t think this is served in anywhere outside of Malaysia. Malaysia has a big Hakka community and this is one of their invention. Yong Tau Foo refers to the original stuff bean curd. The stuffing used are mostly fish paste but there are some which used pork as stuffing.

The most common Yong Tau Foo is the one you see below. In this bowl, there are stuffed bean curd, okra and chilli pepper and is served with clear broth. I enjoyed the hot chilli pepper especially. One thing about the okra (known as lady’s fingers in Malaysia) is that the seeds does not digest, if you know what I mean.

Then there is the plain fish paste. The green ones below is stuffed bitter gourd. I don’t like the bitter gourd at all — never did and never will. I can’t understand why anyone likes anything this bitter.

There is also fried ones. You can’t figure this out clearly but the ones with the dark outline is another of my fav. It’s the fried eggplant sandwiched with fish paste. The others are plain fried fish paste and fried wonton.

I am making up the names here. I never knew what of the dishes I had in Malaysia. I know what it looks like and I know what I like. Never took the trouble to learn their names.

This one below is bean curd skin with, again, fish paste. Suanne can correct me here …

We ordered other non-yong tau foo dishes too. Anyone can describe this for me? It’s pork … fatty pork and wood ears. This is great with rice … the gravy is rich and salty-sweet. The pork is sinfully fat.

This one is called jee geok chou — vinegar pork feet. I don’t like the gravy, it is sour. But the fatty pork skin, they are heavenly! This dish will definitely clog up your arteries.

Well, we need to have a balanced meal, huh? So, we also had a lettuce — blanched and flavoured with soya sauce and fried shallot.

Nice meal … I enjoyed this.

After the Hainese Chicken Rice, Nanzaro and I went for a walk in Chinatown. Chinatown is better know as Petaling Street or Chee Cheong Gai in Cantonese. This place a must-go place for tourists. This is where you could get a Rolex for only $10.

The whole street is not closed to traffic and is lined with stalls. Every other stall sells counterfeit products — clothings, watches, DVD movies, perfume. It is also where some of the best chinese food are found.

We went to the Kiew Brothers shop to get some dried meat. Many swear that Kiew Brothers has the best dried meat in the country. In Cantonese, they are known as “woh lai yeh” which simply translates to “here I come”. I can’t figure why that name but if you say those words, everyone will know what you mean.

They BBQ the meats in front of the shop and has a big fan that blows the smoke out to the street. You can smell the aroma around the vicinity of the area.

In the shop, they have mounds of the dried meat all stacked up nicely. Things had changed so much in Malaysia. They do take the trouble to display them nicely. I remember in the old days, this place looked so dark and greasy. The meat were just strewn all over the tray.

We bought one kilogram of the pork dried meat. We had the choice of two types — sliced or minced. We opted for the minced ones because they are not as tough.

One of the better upgrades to Petaling Street is that the City Hall had installed a canopy. It is a good upgrade. The canopy is installed high enough that is not stuffy.

I remembered that before I left Malaysia for Canada, I went on an eating binge, if you may, at my favourite restaurant … one of them was Nam Heong. They had been a fixture in KL’s Chinatown for over 60 years — since 1938. They are known for their Hainanese Chicken Rice. To me they had the best Hainanese Chicken Rice in the world, no kidding!

Nam Heong is located in KL’s Chinatown, specifically on Jalan Sultan. This was also dad’s favourite restaurant too. When I was in my primary school, my Saturday routine was to take a bus to the public library (I was a prolific reader then) in the morning and then join my dad for lunch. That was our only private time. I enjoyed it a lot.

On my visit this time with Nanzaro, I was somewhat shocked that it is entirely different. This restaurant had changed so much.

In the old days this place was a complete chaos. There were no airconditioning with nary a service. But today, it is all modern and upgraded now. It is certainly much more comfortable. What I noticed glaringly is the absence of a crowd.

It was later that learnt that privately owned Nam Heong restaurant had been sold to the Esquire Kitchen group for RM 5 million. Esquire Kitchen used that Nam Heong brand and opened up more restaurants across the city.

The familiar homemade sauces are still there on each table. They make great chilli and ginger sauces and it is great with the chicken rice. in the old days, they were filled on old glass jars. Oh I love their chilli.

I knew Nanzaro would like the Hainanese Chicken. You are able to specify the part that you want. When I was young, I could gobble up two servings. The chicken looked the same with that perfect amount of sweet soya sauce that gives this dish the distinct flavour.

To me what sets Nam Heong apart from all other chicken rice is their rice. They are what is called “oily rice” (yau farn). They make the rice to perfection. The yellowishness of the rice is because the chicken stock that is used to make them.

Although Chicken Rice is what Nam Heong is famous for but they have other less famous dishes too. My other favourite is their “ngau lam tong” — beef soup. There are not many places in KL that serves beef (the most popular meat is pork and chicken) and this is about the few places I know that serves chinese style beef.

I also ordered a couple of meatballs.

It is fish paste on the outside and beef (I think) on the insides. The meat is smooth.

The total tab came up to only RM 17.75 which is about US $5 for the two of us. That is what I like about eating out in Malaysia. Everything is so cheap compared to Canada.

Although the dishes are similar to the old Nam Heong I used to know, the quality is different. I like the comfort of the new setting but what was exciting back then was the atmosphere. BTW, they have a few outlets all across the city now.

First morning in Kuala Lumpur. After the funeral service the night before, it was really quiet around the house. We don’t expect any visitors until around afternoon. So, brought Nanzaro to downtown Kuala Lumpur to look for this place Suanne and I used to go for breakfast in Jalan Imbi. We enjoyed this coffee shop (I can’t recall the name but I do know how to get there) where we normally had nasi lemak.

Unfortunately, the nasi lemak stall is no longer there. So, Nanzaro and I walked across the street to another coffee shop which is much more busier. I reckon that busier means better food.

Nanzaro ordered the Chow Koay Teow (stir fried rice noodles) — the real deal Chow Koat Teow with See Harm (Cockles). We get Chow Koay Teow in Vancouver — quite nice ones too but we don’t have fresh cockles. This was nice but the cockles were too small.

For me, I had the Pork Soup Noodle. I had always yearned for this and is one of the top on my list of must eat in Malaysia. I like this with extra soya sauce and freshly cut chilli peppers. Yummy!

After breakfast, I brought Nanzaro to the Imbi Plaza — the centre of pirated software and DVDs in KL. Here you can get any movie titles — some movies were so new that they had not yet been released anywhere in the world. All titles were about RM8 (cheaper if you buy more) which is equivalent to CAD $2.30 only! Also, you can get almost any prirated software for a steal. You want Windows Vista? They have it! Nanzaro was so captivated browsing the catalogue and displays.

We traveled around on the new KL Monorail. This is the only line that goes into the heart of the Golden Triangle.

The Monorail is really small with just two cars, although I see that the stations are built for a six-car configuration. You know, I think this system will not be sufficient to handle passenger growth in the long run as compared to the other LRT systems.

The tracks now run right down the heart of the Golden Triangle. I remember this stretch as less cluttered. These days there are simply too many advertisements shouting loudly to all. I like the old look better.

This Monorail system is human driven. Its cars does bank significantly everytime it makes a turn — kind of scary for the first timers.

Saturday came around again. Suanne does not cook on weekends. She always insisted it’s her day off. This time we decided to check out one of the Malaysian-slash-Taiwanese “cuisine” restaurants in Richmond.

No, no … Ellie is not one of those fusion restaurants. When they say that they are a Malaysian-Taiwanese restaurant, it’s just that they serve food from both Malaysia and Taiwan (beef nooodles). Anyway, it’s located at 3779 Sexsmith Road in Richmond.

We stuck with the simple Malaysian food this visit. Nanzaro is addicted to fried rice. You know, everytime he gets the menu in the restaurant, he will flip the pages and scan if they have fried rice on it.

He ordered a Belacan Fried Rice. The belacan gives a distinctive pungent smell and taste to the rice. It was pretty good, I must say. Cost: $8.95.

It has been a while since I had Hokkien Mee — real Hokkien mee and not Shanghai Noodles. I ordered that and was extremely pleased that it actually looks and tastes like the real deal I had in Malaysia. The only thing that is missing is the crispy fried pork fat (”jee yau jar” to those who know what I mean).

For Hokkien Mee fans, this is it … you got to try this out in Ellie. Why they even had the all important Hokkien Mee sambal chilli for that little extra spiciness.

Arkensen ordered from a set menu, “3-spice chicken combination”. This came with a green or black ice tea, rice, few sides like fried egg, stir fry lettuces, peanuts and cold tofu with thousand year egg. This is a pretty good deal I must say. I always like dishes with so many varieties heaped on it.

Cost $7.95

Well, Suanne did not order a dish of her own … instead she ended up taxing a portion from everyone’s dishes, as she usually does.

The restaurant is small and could get very crowded during lunch time. You could end up having a long wait for tables. Moreover, they seem very short staffed. When we were there, they have only two seemingly unexperienced girls waiting on the tables. They had this busy hurried look dashing from a table to the next. Other than that, the food is great and the prices were good too.

OK, total bill came up to $29 including tips. You should check this place out, if not already.

On my last full day in Malaysia, I brought my niece and nephews for brunch in the neighborhood shopping mall. It was only about a 5 minutes drive to the Jusco shopping mall in Kepong. There were a lot of choices at the mall and it took us a while to decide where to eat.

We came across the Red Door. What enticed us was the big poster of their menu. They serve mainly traditional Malaysian food, specifically Nyonya cuisine.

Oh yeah, I had always wanted to say this. In Malaysia, the standard cutleries is a spoon and a fork for almost all food except for noodles. When I first came to Canada, it took me a while to get used the cutleries issued, which is just a fork and knife. We got to ask for a spoon. Canadians used a fork even for rice where in Malaysia, the spoon is used to scoop up the rice and the fork is to push food onto the spoon.

I ordered the Sambal Fish Rice. This dish came with two fish about 8 inches long. Don’t know what type of fish this is though. The chilli sauce is a bit sourish and certainly spicy. The okra (known better as ladies fingers in Malaysia) and eggplant (or Brinjal) adds a good balance to the spicy-sourish taste to the chilli.

The Sambal Fish Rice came with prawn crackers, fried peanuts, eggs and the sambal. I like mixing it all up before diving in. This dish costs RM9.80 (less than USD $3)

I can’t remember who ordered what but here are the rest of the dishes we had. Below is the fried rice. It’s a simple dish served uniquely on a small wok. This one costs RM5.80 (about USD $1.50).

Theirry ordered the Asam Laksa which is a sour fish based soup noodles quite popular in Malaysia. I think this one is very spicy because I think Thierry was struggling to finish the entire bowl. This dish costs RM5.80 (about USD $1.50).

Sambal Prawn Rice came with a choice of steam rice or Nasi Kerabu. We had a mix. Nasi Kerabu is the blue colour rice. The prawns in the sambal was quite small. Looks really good.

For appertizers we ordered something called Top Hats. It came with fried cups and filled with shredded vegetables. The dipping chilli sauce was great — really hot. This is about RM3.50 (USD $1 only).

We liked the Golden Money Bags. It is basically the same as the Top Hats, just packaged differently. I was thinking that this type of food would be great in picnics or parties — good conversation pieces.

My favourite niece, Tracy, ordered the Hainanese Chicken Chop. It looked very delicious — with fried potato wedges and carmelized onions on gravy.

This is what I had for drinks — cendol. I had so much shaved ice dessert the past few days. I can’t get enough of them. I am gonna miss these type of shaved ice dessert when I get back to Canada.

The ABC … looked awesome except that I hate red beans in the ABC.

This is the penultimate posting on my series on my trip to Singapore and Malaysia. I have been posting for the past three weeks. After this series, Suanne will take over and post her recipes. She had quite a bit lined up already. I had a few emails from people saying that they miss Suanne’s recipes … so stay tuned.

After the tour of Putrajaya, Terence and Choon Neo brought me to about the only eating place open. You see, Putrajaya, like many new administrative cities like Canberra and Brasilia, is practically dead after 5pm. There is nary a nightlife here.

We went to the outdoor food court of the Taman Warisan Pertainian (the Agricultural Heritage Park). It was very quiet with not many customers, the lighting were dim but the atmosphere was cooling.

We started with ordering drinks. I ordered a glass of iced sugar cane juice. I had been drinking like a fish the past few days. So, I gulped down the entire glass almost instantly. It was really refreshing. Terence and Choon Neo ordered the ABC and young coconut.

For food, I ordered the Mee Goreng which is fried noodles Malay style. Mee Goreng is popular among Malays and can be found in the many outdoor Malay hawker stalls. It is yellow noodles fried with onions, tomatoes, fried tofu, eggs and most importantly chilli. It is a spicy dish.

Terence ordered the Nasi Goreng, another popular Malay dish. Nasi Goreng is fried rice. The nasi goreng below is a bit different in that there’s a big piece omelette covering the fried rice.

Many Malaysians believe Satay is a Malaysian invention. Satay consists of chunks of marinated meat with tumeric and skewered on coconut leaf spine. It is grilled over charcoal fire. Meats used include chicken, beef and lamb. We also ordered a special kind of satay … arnab which is rabbit! The rabbit, well, tastes like chicken and they costs 5 times more than chicken!

The most important part of satay is the spicy peanut sauce which is eaten like a dip.

Terence, Choon Neo, thanks for the time spent today showing me around Putrajaya. I had a great time catching up with both of you. That was a great supper.

May King was one of my favourite lunch places during my days working at BAT. This place is located next to a huge wet market called Pudu Pasar. Their speciality is Lam Mee and Curry Mee. This place is always packed during lunch time. It was so packed then that the restaurant owner forces all customers to share tables — shoulder to shoulder! Like a lot of popular restaurants here, you have no choice because the owner could ask you to leave if you don’t like it!! Well, that was years ago … so I am not sure if this still happens.

John and I went to May King at about 3pm, way past lunch time. It was not busy at that time. The bad thing was that they had ran out of curry mee. John was my frequent lunch partner.

May King used to be hot and humid with extremely poor ventilation. I remember eating with sweat pouring down my back and forehead. The shirt sticks to the skin — extremely uncomfortable but then I could just ignore that discomfort.

Today, May King is fully air conditioned and they also have new tiles on the floor and walls. This is definitely more comfortable compared to what I remembered of this place. The service appear much better too — but then maybe it’s because there were not many customers at that time I visited.

I started with ordering a refreshing glass of boiled sugar cane with ice.

The below is their famous Lam Mee. I have no idea what Lam Mee is made of — anyone knows? I just know they were delicious. Oh, see that small plate of chilli? Well, you get ONE for each order. If you want extra chilli, you need to pay 20 sen for each! No where else does a restaurant had the gall to charge for extra chilli. Well, May King could because they are the best … and you can leave if you don’t like it! :-)

The gravy is dark and thick. The noodles were so tasty that I swear they can be eaten just by itself — OK I exagerated but not by much.

We also ordered some fishballs and whatmachallit.

I had a good meal. Thanks John for joining me for lunch here again!

Hwee Ee is my favourite niece being the only girl in the family for a long time. She was just a small girl the last I saw her. She used to like to tag along Suanne and I when we go out shopping or outing — in many ways, she was like a daughter to us. She is a young woman now. I am so glad to see how she still is the same bubbly and cheerful person I had always known her to be.

Hwee Ee brought me out to try her favourite Fried Spaghetti stall for breakfast. At a glance of the picture below, it does seem like a lot of food for breakfast doesn’t it? Well, Malaysians take very heavy breakfast. Most take noodles and rice for breakfast, believe it or not!

The Fried Spaghetti is not a common dish but a fusion of Malay and Western food. Malaysians like their food spicy and hot. So this dish had a strong taste of spiciness in it. It was a nice touch to have the spaghetti fried with some hot pepper powder — not just softened in boiling water.

On the dish too, there was a sausage, a piece of ham and a fried egg with some salad. It was a big breakfast for me. It was really very tasty — especially the fried spaghetti.

The stall is in one of the many restaurants in Manjalara. I don’t know exactly where it is. Guess how much the above costs? It’s just RM4.20 … which is about CAD$1.40 or USD$1.20!