Food Finds
We’re definitely blessed with a great selection of street food in Malaysia, from your typical char kuih teow stalls to burger tepi jalan, to nasi lemak shacks.. but if you look harder, you can also find authentic street food originated from neighboring countries, case in point – Little Rara with its authentic Thai fare.
Little Rara Thai Noodle House, Kia Peng
The restaurant is located at the carpark next to Menara HLA by Jalan Kia Peng, a stone’s throw away from Pavilion KL. The set up is as “authentic” as they get, seemingly putting up together by someone who happened to have a set of table saw, hammer, and nails. There’s no such thing as air conditioning or tinted windows, but you are somewhat shielded from rain should it starts pouring.
The place starts operating by 5:30 pm and does work up a crowd pretty soon. While the set up is old school, they do have a proper digital queuing system, color me impressed.
tomyam talay meggi
Like most proper “street food” stalls, the kitchen is pretty much open. There’s a BBQ grill where they prepare beef/chicken/corn, a stall for noodle (wet & dry), plus a drinks’ kitchen.
We started out with their famous tomyam talay meggi (RM 19 for small), it was basically tomyam maggi on steroid. Packed with prawns, mussels, squid, egg, and ultra strong tomyam flavor. Love it.
bbq beef, pad thai
BBQ Beef (RM 13, Australian beef apparently) goes well with the accompanying sauce, and it wasn’t over cooked either. Portion though was a bit small I thought.
However, the must-order from the grill turns out to be their BBQ Corn (RM 7 for 2). They were ultra sweet and almost half caramelized, I need this for movie night!
mango sticky rice & the excellent bbq corn
We also had seafood pad thai (RM 12) which I thought was quite competent, and a dessert in mango sticky rice (RM 8) which turned out to be just average.
Over all thought I really liked the place and the intense flavor of their tomyam & those corns. Will definitely order those two again when I revisit, and perhaps try some of their other dishes.
Address:
Little Rara Thai Noodle House
Menara HLA, 3, Jalan Kia Peng,
50450 Kuala Lumpur
GPS: 3.151342, 101.713584
Tel: 012-372 2706
Hours: 5:30 pm to 12 am, Closed on Sunday
A couple weeks ago I managed to check off the list of states to travel in Malaysia, finally stepped foot in Kelantan after all these years thanks to a colleague’s wedding invitation.
ayam bakar, solok ladi, daging bakar
While it was only for a short day-trip and the wedding reception involved food, I can’t help but stopped by one of the more famous nasi kerabu place for a pre-kenduri brunch.
After consulting my brother’s friend who’s a Kelantanese (my brother spent years in Kelantan as a uni student), we decided to visit Liniey Nasi Kerabu Tumis in Kota Bahru town.
The restaurant is just over 10 minutes from the airport. Renting a car to move about in KB is probably the easiest way to move about this town. Pro tips: search with the term “kereta sewa” and you’d usually get it a bit cheaper than “car rental”.
The restaurant was rather busy in the brunch hours when we were there. There was a queue, we lined up for our turn and waited for our turn to pick the version of rice (dagang/kerabu) and lauk (dishes).
liniey nasi kerabu kota bahru
I opted for the blue nasi kerabu (color from butterfly-pea flower) with ayam bakar, daging bakar, and a piece of solok lada (stuffed green chili).
The meat were flavorful if not a bit sweet, as most things in Kelantan often is. If you’ve not had solok lada before, imagine yong tau fu, but also with shredded coconut, and spicier, I love it.
options of dishes to choose from, and that long queue
The brunch at Liniey Nasi Kerabu Tumis was lovely, a word of caution – the drinks was still too sweet despite us ordered it “kurang manis”, you’ve been warned.
Address:
Lieniey Nasi Kerabu Tumis
GPS: 6.125033, 102.258844
Hours: 7:30 am to 2 pm
If you’re at KLIA between 8-10th November 2019, you’re in luck!
MIGF KULinary is happening on these three days at KLIA as a collaboration between Malaysia Airports and Malaysia International Gastronomy Festival (MIGF), allowing guests to sample award-winning dishes from participating restaurants at KLIA.
MIGF KULinary 2019 @ KLIA
KULinary is an annual event by Malaysia Airports to award top F&B outlets both from KLIA & KLIA 2 terminals starting from 2016. The campaign strive to encourage F&B operators to offer food in terms of variety, quality, value, and also service level for passengers passing through this space.
As someone who travels almost monthly for work, I certainly appreciate this move.
Horse meat, camel milk anyone? from Kazakhstan
Among the stalls, one of the most interesting is the offering from Tal Cafe & Restaurant in Almaty, Kazakhstan. They have camel milk, horse milk, horse meat, and a host of other dishes, including beshbarmak, their national dish.
fried chicken, nasi lemak, pizza, burger
There are a host of other international and local dishes to choose from as well, including the usual suspects such as fried chicken, sandwich, nasi lemak, pizza, burger, to sang har mee (yee mee with prawns), curry laksa, mutton nasi briyani, and even roti canai.
yee mee, curry laksa, spaghetti, nasi briyani
The good news is, each of these dishes can be redeemed for 1 GastroDollar, which is equivalent to RM 5.00. The GastroDollar vouchers can be purchased at venue or online at https://migfkul.com.
Godiva chocolate, beef, and even cendol
Throughout the three days, there’ll also be cooking demonstrations by well known figures such as Chef Wan and Chef Dato’ Fazley Yaakob , as well as Master Chefs including MIGF Golden Cauldron Winner Chef Nathalie Arbefeuille and Chef Giuseppe Lioce from Nero Nero.
performances and cooking show by Chef Wan
The participating restaurants include Godiva, Fukuya, Flight Club, Grandmama’s, Tampopo, Dome Cafe, Sama Sama Express, and more. For the first time, the festival will also feature Airlink Gastro Village, highlighting signature menu items from partner airlines, including MAS, Astana Air, and Citilink.
There’s also a RM10 Grab rides by booking with promo GRAB2MIGF, and RM 30 off ERL tickets by purchasing at self-service kiosks at KL Sentral, KLIA, or KLIA2 with promo code MIGFKUL.
Go check it out, especially if you’re traveling this weekends.
MIGF KULinary award winners
Date: 8th-10th November 2019
Time: 12 pm – 8 pm
Venue: Stage Area, Level 5, Departure Hall, KLIA
While Klang Valley is one of the best places for those of us who eats out, one has to admit that it is not usually easy to find something that’s genuinely healthy.
It’s easy to find food that’s delicious (that’s what this site mostly concentrates on), and also cafes that offers cool concepts and beautiful dining environment/experience (those “instagrammable” spots, anyone?), so when I was contacted by MEDIFOODS to check out their unique proposition, I was pretty eager to take a look.
MEDIFOODS Lifestyle Cafe, Damansara Kim
The founder of MEDIFOODS is actually a licensed pharmacist, you wouldn’t have guessed it, but it is not a surprised when you really look at the name of the restaurant, right?
What the founder aim to do is to provide delicious food that is also healthy in nature – by the way of preparation and carefully crafted ingredients. For example: non-GMO, MSG free, vegetables from own farm, etc.
FIT meal – 2 protein 1 vege, or 2 vege 1 protein
In addition to these food, they also offer consultation on food selection and choices if healthy lifestyle is what you seek. Like I mentioned above, founder is a pharmacist, and often there’re also nutritionists in house.
I was there a couple weekends ago to check out their FIT Menu – where you can choose from either 1 protein + 2 vege (RM 16.90), or 2 protein + 1 vege combo (RM 18.90). The set is also served with a base of Medifoods rice (parboiled basmati), multigrain brown rice, or quinoa + millet (extra RM 2.00)
fish, steamed egg, and chicken dishes
So, what are you choices of these protein and vege? And most importantly, are they any good?
There are four different fish dishes (farmed raised organic tilapia) – ginger steamed fish, deep fried with ginger, steamed with soya sauce and fried ginger, steamed with assam sauce. Three chicken dishes – steamed with minced ginger, green curry, and with herbs. A couple egg dishes in Chinese style omelet and steamed egg, as well as a four different tofu and mushroom dominated dishes.
I found that the tastes aren’t overwhelming and generally a little bit more subtle in nature, while retaining natural sweetness of ingredients, very.. comforting.
tofu and egg dishes, basmati rice, multigrain brown rice, or quinoa
There’s also over half a dozen different vegetable dishes to pick from as well. I particularly love my bitter gourd with egg, but there’s also bok choi, choi sam, mixed vege, brinjal, and so forth. If paired it with tofu or egg as your protein choice(s), you can easily have a rather delicious set of vegetarian meal without resorting to those “fake meat” dishes, something I find rather contradicting at times.
which one is your favorite vegetable?
As for the base, I’d suggest trying out quinoa and millet, both of which offers higher fiber, magnesium, and antioxidants. But if you are a true Asian who can’t live without rice, there’s they are also available.
The FIT Menu is available daily, if a healthier hot meal is what you look for, this is a place to check out.
salad bar and noodle soup station
On weekends, MEDIFOODS also offer their signature Healthy Breakfast Buffet in the morning. Essentially a buffet spread specifically curated to contain healthier options in the all you can eat format.
At RM 21.80 per person, here’s what you get:
A salad bar with over 20 different ingredients from green peas, cherry tomato, roast pumpkins, cons, to eggs, spinach, and salad greens.
meehun, pizza, fried rice
A noodle station, as well as fried meehun, pizza, and fried rice.
angku, chai kuih, pumpkin cakes, radish cakes, fried fuchuk spring roll
A variety of traditional kuih, pumpkin cakes, radish cakes, fried spring roll, as well as santan free nasi lemak with their home-made sweet/spicy sambal.
oat embryo milk, bread, onde-onde
Bread, onde-onde- oat embryo milk, and free flow coffee and tea. There’s also porridge and two different types of tongsui to choose from.
The buffet is really the option to go if you have a good appetite, not willing to scarify healthy eating, and want a good value all at the same time.
spoiled for choices
Other than Damansara Kim (address below), MEDIFOODS is also presence at the following locations:
Address:
Medifoods
37, Jalan SS 20/11,
Damansara Kim,
47400 Petaling Jaya, Selangor
GPS: 3.134634, 101.626955
Tel: 010-950 8290
On my last work trip to KK, my buddy Yann May suggested that dinner should come in the form of chicken wings. I like chicken skin, and wings has the most skin, so, why not?
And that’s how we got ourselves to Lido Square at Lintas.
Lido Square, Lintas, Kota Kinabalu
Lido Square is this huge food court situated about 15 minutes away from Kota Kinabalu city center. Like most food courts, there are dozens of different stalls offering a wide variety of dishes, many of these are pork free, but some aren’t. If halal food is a must, choose wisely.
We ended up having more than just chicken wings, of course.
The highlight, for me at least, would be those big cockles – RM 10 for half a kilo if you have them boiled, or RM 15 if fried. These cockles are several times larger than those you typically find in Klang Valley – only 9 pieces for half a kilo. They were absolutely on point and delicious! I love it, the lady doesn’t eat cockles, hmph.
May approves of the stingray, but maybe not cockles!
The ikan pari (stingray, RM 25) was properly grilled and rather tasty as well. The fish was fresh, and prepared to a texture that lets you chew down 90% of the cartilage. We enjoyed the fish quite a bit.
melvic chicken wings is the “brand” to go
Then there’s we came for – MELVIC chicken wings. That took quite a wait as the stall is almost always pretty busy.
The wings were nice, sweet with all its honey goodness, and made better with a squeeze of limau on top as well. These are comparable with some of the best wings in KL too.
the popiah is a bit of a disappointment
If you’re a fan of popiah, I can safely say that you may want to skip the version here in KK. Their “Northern style popiah” is almost acceptable, but the Lido style popiah was just a blend of thick popiah skin with not much else to shout about. I’ll avoid.
Other things worth checking out would be the freshly made mochi, and those steamed soup. Plenty of stalls we had no stomach space to try, perhaps next time!
Address:
Lido Square
Jalan Penampang,
Lido Square,
88300 Kota Kinabalu, Sabah
GPS: 5.943246, 116.081579
Hours: 7:30 am to 11:30 pm
