Food T(r)ail Of Feline City - Eating Out In Kuching

So, what food you need to try in Sarawak?

1.    Sarawak Laksa at Chong Choon Café at Abell Street

Sarawak laksa is a bit different from the asam laksa in Penang. Here, they put lots of pepper into it. I guess the famous place to get it is at Chong Choon Café. The locals like here as well. At Chong Choon Café, you can try their toast as well. Thumbs up for me. As for the Kolo mee, I guess every shops sell it. Though this shop belongs to a Chinese, don’t be surprise there are Malays eating inside it. Here, they serve no pork but with no halal logo. But, they don’t create much fuss here.

2.    Lao Ya Keng Food Court at Carpenter Street

You will hardly miss this shop. Shared the same compound of a Chinese temple, I found this shop from the tourism brochure of Kuching. When we were there, there were journalists interviewing the owner which reflects the popularity of the stall I guess. I find the fish cake and fish ball served to be very tasty, soft and tangy as well. Beside the noodle stall, stood one stall which sell pork satay. The taste is not bad if compared to the other type of meat I tried before this.

3.    Nasi tsunami at food court along Brooke Street

My brother told me to try out this rice before I depart to Kuching. He was there just one week before me. At first, I don’t fond of the name because when tsunami happened, it was a catastrophe event which claimed thousands of people lives being swept to the sea. To translate that scenario into dishes... urgh… Nevertheless, I still give it a try. Taste just like the Chinese version of Cantonese noodle gravy serves with rice. The food court here serves quite a variety of food ranging from western, Indonesian and Sarawak. Try their ‘midin’, a green jungle fern that grows in Sarawak is a must have vegetable here. Kuching is famous for salted ikan terubok as well. But be careful when you try it. Chinese has a belief that the tastier the fish the more bone it will have. This fish fits the bill. ‘Umai’ is also served here and it is basically origin from Iban tribe. To me, ‘umai’ is actually the local sashimi. Last but not least, give the 3 layers tea a try. With the milk (white), dark brown sugar, and tea (brown), it forms 3 colors in your drink.

(in response to Han Ching's comment)

Ayam pansuh is another typical dishes among the people in Sarawak. The dish is prepared by cooking chicken meat in a bamboo and stuffed with water (which later will be the soup), seasonings and covered with tapioca leaves (later could be eaten together with the cooked chicken). Though it is a signature dish, you hardly find it easily available as the way of cooking it requires time and of course bamboo. So, if the restaurant claimed that they serve this dish 24/7, ask them to serve with the bamboo instead of serving you on the plate. I was told that I need to make a reservation in a hotel restaurant in order to taste it. But when I ventured along the Brooke Street, there is a stall selling authentic ayam pansuh. How I knew that? They were setting up a fire and rows of bamboo were aligned the fire.

4.    Ayam Penyet at Simpang Tiga Street

As Sarawak is located near Kalimantan Indonesia, ‘ayam penyet’ has been absorbed into Malaysia lifestyle. The ‘Ayam Penyet’ franchise you get in Peninsular is not as tasty as the one I found here which was recommended by the reception lady in my hotel. Sometimes, to try to best local food around, you just need to ask the local people rather than believing what’s written in the tourism brochure. You see, the locals like me won’t go to Jalan Alor in KL to eat. Still, there are many tourists got “slit on their throats” there. Why? Because Lonely Planet told them so. As for the name of the shop, sorry as I forgot to note it down. What I can recall is this shop located a few blocks away from a Chinese restaurant.

5.    Lui Cha at Pisang Barat Street

Made famous by Axian. This is the only Hakka dish that does not involved meat. With a mixture of vegetables, beans and herbs, the strong smell of the mint leaf soup either make you loathe it of love it. If you want to be healthy and go smooth in the toilet after all the rubbish you gobbled down the day before, give this a go.

6.    Layer Cake from Aunty Cynthea at Kapor Street

The gift you shouldn’t miss bringing back home as souvenir is this. There are so many shops and stalls selling this cake. But which one serves the best when guys selling aphrodisiac medicine along the street sell layer cake as well. Different from Appollo layer cake, it is made from much denser and more layers of cake that are compressed and formed a rainbow color pattern. To me, Axian has shown me the best and most characteristic layer cake shop house. Meet Aunty Cynthea. When my GPS brought me in front of 2, Taman Top Green Literature Villa, Jalan Kapor, I cursed the GPS for not doing his job well. 

Luckily, we got Aunty Cynthia hand phone as well and decided to ring her. Soon, there’s one old lady opened the wooden door and wave at us. Shoot. The shop we were looking for is actually a double storey rich lady house. Yup, she sells layer cakes. We were invited inside and for the first time I spoke the most Cantonese language during my stay here. That aunty is a Cantonese. She was so kind to us and began to relate her humble stories which she was once asked to prepare 1Malaysia logo cake to the Prime Minister. Trust me; this aunty is no ordinary aunty. Her connection with the politician’s wives even is better that Streamyx line.

I found the Chinese food in Kuching has a lot of influence from the Hakka community while the Malay food has the influence from Kalimantan. When it comes to food, different people have different taste, view and judgment. Just like durian. I dislike it but others worship it so much. Even my blogspot spell check does not recognise the word 'durian'.

A Jamie Oliver Twist - God Of Cookery

“Remember not to put so much salt”

That’s the advice my boss’s wife told me when my girlfriend joked that I applied leave just to cook for her on Valentine’s Day.

 “You never cook for me before!”

Well, girls like to repeat the same sentence over and over again. The sound is just a bee buzzing your ear over and over. Well, I decided to take matter in own hand and kill the bee once and for all. That morning, I took my shopping bag and grabbed all the ingredient and groceries I needed. I spent most of my time preparing the dishes while I regularly took some photos. You have to or else they will say,

“Cheh. Must be your mom cook one la!”

Not satisfied, I even took video of me cooking just in case she says,

“Cheh. You just took for the picture of your mom cooking only!”

I used to like some cooking shows like “Yan Can Cook, So Can You!” and Oliver Twist. I noticed one similarity among all those cooking shows. After they prepared everything and jumped to the part which required some waiting i.e. marinating or baking, they will come with this line,

“Because of time constraint, I’ve prepared this in advance.”

And then he/she took out a prepared dish out of nowhere (normally the camera crew hid it in the oven).

(With a revised version of me) Because of the length of the blog constraint, I would like to fast track my description using animated photos instead. Basically, I prepared 3 dishes+1 soup with rice. Sounds little huh? But when you consider one person has to do the shopping, preparing, marinating, cleaning, cooking and then cleaning again, you will go back every day and hug your mom, thanking her for doing that for the last 30 years without complaining! If you have spared money, you might as well heed Andy Lau advice on the latest OSIM advertisement and buy her one massage chair.

Stir-fried pak choy. When I was in UK, shopping for grocery is the most enjoying moment because you get to come out. I always like to know what certain vegetable are called in English. After all, I was into the mindset that the Chinese name my mom taught me might not be understood by any vegetable sellers abroad. While browsing through the vegetable area, I stumbled upon pak choy on the fridge rack. I recognised this must be the vegetable that is always served up in the dining table back home. The label shows “Pak Choy”. Looks like they are lazy to come up with an English name and decided to follow the Chinese name instead.

Steamed egg with century egg. Now century egg does not mean I’m using a rotten 100 years old egg. I once remember Joe Rogan used this egg to fear the contestant into believing that this egg is a rotten egg in Fear Factor. But it’s totally untrue. It’s actually a preserved egg. Still, the process of how this egg comes from will disgust some of those who never ate it before. But, believe me. It’s good. If durian also can be king of fruit, I don’t see why this can’t be king of eggs.

Oven baked fish. I was introduced the way of using baking when I was in UK. When I was young we only fry, steam or stir fried. Seldom have we baked unless it’s cake, bread biscuit or pizza. I would say baking is more to Westerner style. I found baking is healthier after steaming. Don’t believe me? Take one fat chicken. Put on top of the grill and place a pan at the bottom. 45 minutes of baking. Take out the pan and you can have one week supply of cooking oil.

ABC soup. ABC does not stand for Air Batu Campur. The term is used by the parents to “trick” their kids into believing that the type of vitamins it has from the ingredient used.

Rice. The staple food for Asian. Without it, it’s like eating dhal without roti canai. I once saw in a vegetarian shop when one guy can gorge down half bucket of rice! Seriously, I doubt how one can stuff so much into one small built frame body.

The outcome was good. The taste was well OK. Reasonable. My mom used to say this,

"If you cook for me, I'll be very happy already no matter what."

I believe that those words come from those who understand the art of cooking. He/she who really sweats it out to prepare the food before knows the story behind every dishes served. Judging from the look of one food served, it really can reflect the effort one had put into making it. 

They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel.

Yut Kee Cafe - Pork and Roll

One fine evening, my colleague bought us a Swiss roll after he went out surveying some sites in KL with our English counterparts. He told us that this restaurant is very famous in KL. Being raised up and studied in KL, I was very curious to know where on earth this restaurant is. How can I miss out such restaurant that he claimed has been there for decades? The name of the restaurant is “Yut Kee”.

A quick Google on the name brought me to the street which I always passed by when I took the Len Seng bus no. 172. At that time, I thought it was some old kopitiam shop which serves normal coffee and bread. A few more links I read, led me to the discovery that this place has a signature dish which only offer on certain day and time.

Their so-called famous Swiss Roll Pork is the sensation of those church-goers every Sunday. I purposely went there on the time that the internet information told us will serve the pork.

As usual, when the place is famous, you just have to stand and wait for seats. I was standing beside one table which I saw are towards the end of their session. They were left with a few sips more of their coffee. Then, I noticed something was wrong as there are some waiting customers staring at me. Only did I know that I need not to hunt for places like that. All I need to do is to leave your name and how many seats you need to the owner/cashier. He will arrange the seats for you. Soon, they called out my name. Browsing through the menu, I was adamant to try the Swiss Pork Roll. Another signature dish that caught my attention was this “Roti Babi”.

OMG. Such an un“halal” name which I think the shop sure being banned in Kelantan! How about the taste then? “Roti Babi” aside, the “Swiss Pork Roll” is a must try. With limited days that it offers to customers, this has certainly made it so special just like the Pork Chop Bun in Tai Lei Loi Café in Macau. Served with apple jam, this is certainly an unique combination for me.

I was lucky that day, which I even managed to see one celebrity. I’m sure I recognize his face in some local comedy series just that I don’t recalled his name until the owner of the kopitiam shouted,

“Douglas Lim, table for two!”

Kejor Yop Kejor Perak

Most of the pretty girls in Malaysia come from Ipoh. That’s what the old folks used to say. However, Myolie Wu told me that in this world there are no ugly girls, only lazy girls. I agreed. Full-stop. Actually, I’m not interested in Ipoh girls. I’m more interested as to why they labelled Ipoh with the most pretty girls around. There is one myth which says that it is due to the fact that the water at Perak is much cleaner and clearer there. Ironically, there are a lot of Ipoh Mari ladies in my office. Whether they still carry on the tradition is beyond the thoughts of the male counterparts in my office as all of them are unavailable. Perak used to be a rich mining state. Tin mining is so famous that it was one of the reasons why our ancestors set their feet into this country.

Having dropped by Bidor a few times to taste the culinary there, I decided to visit Perak this time around. Actually, there are a lot of attractions here. For instance, there is a leaning tower of Pisa look-alike in the shape of Teluk Intan Tower (GPS: 4.023324, 101.020317). We all know that it was an engineering blunder that caused Pisa to lean but here is different case. Pisa needs to be anchored to prevent it from tumbling, but Teluk Intan Tower does not need any anchorage. There’s no limit to the amount of tourist that can enter the tower at a go. What surprised me is they even provide free Wi-fi service. Funny huh?

This trip to Perak is my first journey without relying the “ever reliable” map reader beside me. That’s because we have a sweet-sexy-gentle and soft spoken voice of a GPS as our blind man’s stick. If they asked me to rank the most innovative creation of the century, GPS shouldn’t be outside the top ten for sure. It’s certainly a relationship protector! It makes quarrelling due to getting lost in direction trimmed down to almost zero! Guys, if you don’t want to end up at Johor instead of Kedah, you better go get one. It costs roughly RM500 and I can assure you it is worth to starve for one month in order to save money to buy it. It pinpoints us to the location with ease. During this Perak trip, there is never a single moment it gets me to the wrong destination. This is mainly due to the fact that all the roads in Perak are old and for that reason, the map inside the GPS is still up-to-date.

We had our brunch by grabbing the famous rice flour roll in Teluk Intan which was recommended by one couple we met inside the tower. Another thing I like about my GPS is that it not only shows you road but also the attraction like hot spot for food. Initially, my GPS pinpointed me to a place “Liew Kee – Teluk Intan Famous Chee Cheong Fun” (GPS: 4.028405, 101.014628). Upon reach the location, I was a bit dubious whether the device had disappointed me by bringing me to a dilapidated wooden house. However, when we asked one lady in front the patio, we were assured the effectiveness of our device.

One thing I like about driving instead of flying is I get to stop for a detour upon seeing something nice. There’s no chance you can do such a thing in plane or train. Along our way to the Ipoh town, we saw one gigantic abandoned dredging ship beside the road. We decided to stop by. The secluded place turns out to be a museum! Tin Dredge Heritage Museum (GPS: 4.396856, 101.052187) Well this big grey machine has been moored at the makeshift pond. Getting inside the ship is like entering a haunted ship. Seriously, you never know if there’s any hidden soul like strayed cat or dogs jump out from no where when you are to open certain doors.

With no guides or caretaker around besides the one collecting the entrance fees, you can virtually do anything on the ship. With all the machineries still intact, one can barely see how advance the technology it was in the golden days. At one stage, I was wondering whether this dredging ship is actually one of the Autobots transformations. Who knows I might be the actor in the movie who have this so-called connection with Autobots. I just need to say:

“Autobot, transform yourself!”

And the dredging ship transforms into “Optopus Crime”!

Soon we headed to the mythical castle in the name of Kellie’s Castle (GPS: 4.47754, 101.087351). This castle was so famous that it was shown in Discovery Channel. It is famous because it was rumoured to be haunted by owner. But don’t worry. There is no brutal killing or murder happened. It is just the owner, Mr Kellie himself passed away without seeing the completion of the castle. It is being seen as an incomplete mission because he built the castle as a dedication of love for his wife.

Many of the tourists claimed they saw Mr Kellie himself and came up with all sort of eerie encounters. We too have our own creepy moments in this castle even though it was a short period. Two of them to be exact. First was when we entered one chamber on the first floor. There were a few other visitors there that time too. Then, we heard a knocking sound. We ignored it initially. But then the knocking sound kept repeating. I was looking at Han Ching. So haunted even on the day time? Shiver crept into our spine. Hair straightened. The sound was getting nearer and nearer. We decided to escape from the room to the corridor.

We realised the sound actually came from the room next to us. There was this old man. The sound came from his makeshift walking stick. As there is a raised wooden platform in that room, the knocking actual come from his walking stick hitting the floor. Phew … Much to our relief.

The second came when I was in my room at night trying to edit the photos of our trip. Upon reaching the photos at Kellie’s Castle, I was a bit scared at the beginning. Who knows what I might capture in the background of our photos? While I was moving on one by one of the picture, I came to this picture of Han Ching at the corridor. Well, we read of one write up on the wall at Kellie’s Castle which states of many people witnessing “weird” encounter along the corridor. Behind Han Ching, there was this one black figurine at the other end of the corridor in the photo. I quickly deleted the photos and switched off the laptop.

The next day, I opened the photo again at day time with a lot of people around me. I put on a brave front. I restored the photos from the recycle bin. This time I zoomed at the “object”. Again, I breathed sigh of relief. It was actually a Muslim lady with black clothing covering from top to bottom. With her walking the opposite direction, it looks like those “thingy”. I gave a quick thought. I remembered on that day, the lady came from the same family of the walking stick old man in our first scary encounter. I guess she is his wife. OMG! We have been frightened by the same family twice!! Mr. Kellie was so famous in the society around there that even the Indian community still treats him as God. There was one temple nearby with his statue being erected alongside the deities.

We stayed one night in Ipoh town. During our short trip, we tried the famous chicken rice with bean sprout at Jalan Yau Tet Sin (GPS: 4.596523, 101.086619). Service was poor. Chicken was oily. But still there are a lot of people. Sorry I think it’s not good to put the name of the shop but I give you a hint, there are only 2 shops there. If I saw this earlier on, I would not have step into the shop.

The next day, we headed to Foh San restaurant (GPS: 4.596523, 101.086619) for dim sum. The place is very clean and spacious. There is a lot of variety of dim sum to choose from. As we came in two, there was not much we could order. Everything was nice except the price as it was a bit expensive. To make matter worst, we were conned of our parking fee. The story was when we arrived at the area before 8am, we decided to park at one parking field. We paid this one guy who came to our car. We thought he was the ticket officer of that parking area. After we had our breakfast, we saw our car’s wipers being pulled up. There was another guy claiming he was the “ticket officer” of that parking area and tried to collect the parking fee from us.


I told him that we had paid to the first guy. He told us that the guy is not the real ticket officer and showed us the official receipt on his hand. To our anger, we tried to overlook the situation with us questioning why he was not there before 8am. Han Ching was flabbergasted by this misfortune but then I pulled up the socks and accepted our luck. I decided to pay the fee with the objective of not spoiling our day over small matter. Yes, I was dumb to be cheated by first guy but I’ll just accept the faith that we were unlucky. So, people reading this blog, the next time you are at Ipoh on weekend, please get a receipt from anyone who claimed to be the “real” ticketing officer there. Take his picture too so that if you want to report to police you have evidence.


Putting this aside, we channelled our anger into energy to look for the origin of Ipoh Old Town coffee. With so many Old Town coffee shops mushrooming in KL, it’s time to trace the background of that coffee shop. Thanks to our trust on our GPS, we found the original coffee shop which is located at the junction at Jalan Bandar Timah. There are 3 coffee shops there.

Nam Heong, Sin Yoon Loong and Sun Yan Foong. Nam Heong (GPS: 4.59406, 101.077985) is the original shop of which the owner established Old Town chain Malaysia. One can see the newspaper cut-outs inside. Our finding was further confirmed when we chat with one of the locals there. Coffee has never been my cup of drink may it be black, brown or white! But this is different. It’s worth to give a try for those coffee lovers or even the haters.


At the beginning of this blog, I mentioned that one of the reason there are many pretty girl in Ipoh is because of the water. With crystal clear water, it only makes a good choice to make good bean curd, one of the famous foods in Ipoh. We headed to this famed bean curd stall called “Funny Mountain” (GPS: 4.594237, 101.084486). It was so famous that there was a drive thru with staff running up and down to take order, serve, collect money, return the change and collect the bowls and sometimes tips too. With this kind of explanation, need I say more about the quality of the dessert?

Before we called it a day, we headed to the Ipoh Railway Station (GPS: 4.596488, 101.075018), which is part of the historical monuments in Ipoh. One can see the influence of British colony on this town with some of the buildings reflect the culture of Britain’s ruler. The next time if one were to visit Ipoh, I would suggest staying at the Ipoh Railway Hotel itself. Though I didn’t stay here but it is worth to experience the upper class treatment of the “gwei los” in JWW Birch’s era.

Sam Poh Tong Cave Temple (GPS: 4.563933, 101.113583) is another attraction that we stopped by. Though it is just another temple but seeing how one makes their way into the cave by blending the manmade creation with the wonders of the universe is a sight to behold.

Perak is a certainly another gem that’s worth to pay a visit again. A state that is famous for it past is now living through the post era of mineral mining. One would wonder how a once giant of tin mine would now deal with the now defunct business.