BEST MALAYSIAN RIVER FISH @ YAN KEE, MEDAN TAKONG GERIK (小吃中心)
Gerik, Perak, Malaysia - March 2019
I am back in the towns in Hulu Perak, which are renown for their fresh river fish. This time I am at one of the bigger towns, Gerik, which has several restaurants to sample these river fishes. One of the convenient place to eat at Gerik, is at the Medan Takong 1 Food Court (It's actually should be called Medan Tokong, but a spelling error has rendered it such). To one end of this food court is Stall No. 10 from which the Yan Kee Rice Stall operates. It's simple name may conjure the wrong impression of a shop that sells economy rice. In fact it is a tai chow place that other than the good river fish also offers other delicious dishes.
One look at the above dish may turn one off, it looked just like a mass of unsavoury meat. Other than fish, this is one dish that should not be missed; it is their signature Lam Yee Fah Lam Poh. This is a dish of pork belly (Fah Lam) seasoned with Lam Yee (fermented bean curd).
Normally, this dish is served in a clay pot, coming steaming hot with a fair bit of gravy. The ones here were served on a plate, cooked until almost dry without any gravy and with only some oil at the bottom.
So don't expect gravy to go with your rice. Instead take this meat as an interesting sweet meat. It's crispy at the edges and chewy on the inside, and the Lam Yee seasoning had formed a caramelized layer on the surface, making it a real tasty treat.
The dish that came next balanced off the strong flavours of the Lam Yee. It was tofu cooked in a light stew with some fresh shrimps and spring onions.
I am not sure whether they made the tofu themselves, but it was one with the best smooth texture that I have ever tried - soft yet firm enough not to break easily. Just slurp it in with the sauce.
For fish, we had a Tengalan that was sliced in half and just steamed with a light mixture of soy sauce and vegetable oil.
An here's me, eye zooming at the best part - the belly where it had good creamy fat and was easy to eat as it did not have those thin barbed bones.
This Tengalan was fresh and sweet, but somehow it lost out to the one we had at Chat Sook in Lenggong the previous day. And oddly, the one at Lenggong (a smaller town) cost us more, perhaps it was from a better river source. Does the source play an important part in the fish sweetness?
Another favourite dish in these hinterland towns is Wild Boar Curry. This one had tender meat that had absorbed the spices well, too well as what was left of the curry was mostly oil!
The meal for the four of us, including a plate of stir fried spinach and a three large bottles of beer came to around RM140/-. Very reasonably priced, we must come to the small towns to eat again! The food is GOOD & CHEAP!
YAN KEE RICE STALL
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