Footsteps - Jotaro's Travels

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

YummY! - Curry Noodles ala Kuala Lumpur @ Petaling Street/Madras Lane

You are at - Jotaro's Blog / FootSteps / YummY! / Chinese Food / Noodles / Curry Noodles ala Kuala Lumpur @ Petaling Street / Madras Lane

YummY! Jotaro's Food Review

CURRY NOODLES ala KUALA LUMPUR @ PETALING STREET / MADRAS LANE

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - January, 2014

After taking part in the OCBC Cycle Malaysia event (... see blog), me and a few friends rode off to the Madras Lane food street for some good Kuala Lumpur Style Curry Noodles.

Kuala Lumpur style curry noodles has its own distinctness. Firstly, two ingredients make it unique - boiled dried pork skin and boiled eggplant (brinjals). The other thing is that the soup is thicker than the Penang variety, thick with coconut milk.

Also the locals call it laksa; so those from Penang may get this confused thinking that this laksa is the Penang Asam Laksa.

The stall is located in the Madras Lane hawker street just behind Wisma Pak Peng, Petaling Street. To get there use Jalan Bandar; just after Hotel Malaya make a left into a side lane (this lane is actually Madras Lane). There is ample car-parking here (but could be packed during weekends). The hawker centre is just at the back of this car-park.

There are two stalls here, just next to each other - both are equally good having been selling here for decades.

Above is a photo of the vendor cutting up the pork skin with a scissors. Other ingredients shown here are (from top centre) boiled cockles, boiled eggplant, curry chicken, curry long beans and chilli paste extra. At the centre is a clay-pot of curry with tau-pok and eggplant boiling inside. Whoa! These really look good even before they are added into the serving bowl of noodles!

So how was the taste? The soup was creamy with santan (coconut milk) but well cooked so that the "green" flavour of the santan was not there. The eggplant and long beans were adequately soft and easy to bite into; having been cooked in curry itself they were wonderfully spicy. The cockles added that slight seafood flavour.

For me, best of all were the pork skin. These are pork skin that have been sun-dried that they have become hollowly with cells. The dried pork skin is then boiled so that it becomes soft and spongy. I like these so much that I added extra pork skin for and additional of RM1-50.

The spongy pork skin absorbs the curry. At the same time the sponginess gives it a good munchiness while squirting curry into the mouth. It's a good combination of bite and taste. YummY!

For those who want that extra spiciness, there is a bowl of fired chilli to add to one's liking.

And to cool one's palate after that hot curry - a glass of ice cold chrysanthemum tea.

For those who are not into curry, the stall also sells noodles soup that comes with good fish paste and minced pork.

The price for a small or big bowl of curry noodle or pork/fish ball soup noodle is RM5-00 & RM7-00 respectively. A small bowl with curry chicken is RM7-00.

A nearby stall sells the renown Madras Lane Yong Tau Foo (... see blog).

Madras Lane Hawker Center Location Map (Google Map Link)

MADRAS LANE HAWKER CENTER

off Jln Tun H.S. Lee,

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Kuala Selangor, Selangor

Malaysia.

Hours : 6:00am - 3:00 pm daily

GPS : 3.144035, 101.697215

Relate Blogs :

OCBC Cycle Malaysia - The Escort Riders 2014 19th January 2014

I am riding the OCBC Cycle Malaysia event again; but this time it's with a difference.
This time I will be an Escort Rider to a VIP!

Yong Tau Foo @ Petaling Street /

Madras Lane Hawker Center

Good fishy taste Yong Tau Foo from a stall that has been around for decades.

- off Jalan Tun H.S. Lee, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Saturday, January 18, 2014

YummY! - Good Hokkein Food @ Hong Ngek Restaurant, Kuala Lumpur

You are at - Jotaro's Blog / FootSteps / YummY! / Chinese Food / Good Hokkein Food @ Hong Ngek Restaurant, Kuala Lumpur
YummY! Jotaro's Food Review
GOOD HOKKEIN FOOD @ HONG NGEK RESTAURANT

Jalan Tun H.S. Lee, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - January 2013

After collecting our goodies for the OCBC Malaysia 2014 Ride (... see ride blog) and going for a good ride at the Bukit Tunku area, we were looking for the Sang Kee fried noodles to have lunch. Somehow, I got a bit disorientated and could not locate the place. Our cycling buddy Felix (of the Outdoor Xplorer blogs) suggested that instead we go to the nearby Hong Ngek Restaurant. And we were most glad that he did, for we "discovered" a gem of a foodie place right in the heart of Kuala Lumpur City - right there, where the city started it's birth!

Hong Ngek is on of those old traditional Chinese restaurants in the heart of the city. These traditional places are getting pretty hard to find these days as they are slowly dying out as the latter generations of the founders find it hard to compete with newer joints. It's a pity as in these places one will get good food cooked in old time-honoured style, dishes that are delicious and harder to come by these days. Prices are very reasonable too as the operators usually own their own place and don't face high rentals.

Founded in the 1940's by Phung Kim Hui, the place started off by serving Hokkein dishes similar to Phung's birthplace of the Heng Hwa region of the Fujien province, China. These days however, there is an infusion of spicier fare into their menu to cater for the present younger generation's taste.

We started off with simple dish - Stir Fried Kangkong (water spinach) With Whole Garlic. This simple dish being quite bland was not a very good introduction to the place. I do hope better will be coming.

And we were not disappointed; what came next really bit on our taste buds. The Thai Style Deep Fried Tofu was very spicy. Being sweet and sour, it was poles apart from the first blend dish. What a lovely contrast!
The tofu were quickly deep fried in very hot oil so that the crust were crispy while the inside were still very soft. The hot Thai sauce really gave this dish an oomph! Laced with sesame seeds, it was just adequately sour without being overly spicy that to taxed our taste buds.

Surprise! Surprise! The tofu were in-filled with fish paste that had small cuts of spring onion and radish. YummY!

The Pork Ribs In Sweet Sauce was another onslaught on our palate! The deep fried pork ribs were laced with sweet sauce that is so thick to the point of being a caramel.

The pork ribs came in big chunks, with each piece well laced by the sauce. Although it was tasty, I found the meat to be a bit tough; perhaps they can find some way to tenderise it.

The Stir-fried Spicy Prawns & Cuttlefish that came next was just slightly spicy hot. The sauce brought out the fresh taste of the prawn and the cuttlefish was surprisingly very tender.

The spicy flavour of the sauce, with its prawny flavour went very well with our white rice.

The piece d' resistance - Pork Slabs In Bean Paste Gravy - was a dish that came to finish of a nice meal.

The pork with the skin and a thin layer of fat were lightly deep-fried in large slabs. Cut into thick slices, these chunks of meat were then cooked in a bean paste gravy with stock made from ground-nut soup. Some of the boiled soft ground nuts were added into the cooking. Surprisingly, the skin were crispy soft and the meat had absorbed the gravy well too. YummY too!

Overall it was an interesting meal - one of a mix of traditional Hokkein fare together with some spunky spicy dishes. Sitting there at the old restaurant makes the experience all the better. Although it was lunch time, the place was surprisingly quite cooling. And on hot days, there is always the air-conditioned section upstairs.

Some photos that were pasted on their walls showing the good food that they offer:

One of their signature dish - Tong Poh Yoke (Braised Slabe of Pork Belly).

Price list on the wall of their noodles & rice dishes. These are favourites take away for neighbouring office workers to take away for lunch or dinner.