Last week mom was here for a bit, so naturally it was my duty as a son to bring her form some breakfast worthy of trying. And since we’ve had bak kut teh, and red wine mee suah the day prior, I thought it was appropriate that we try one of the other less “normal” breakfast choices – chicken rice.
chicken rice with mom
Yeap, chicken rice is as popular as the first meal of the day in Klang as it is for lunch or dinner.
We headed to Jalan Gelugor for one of my favorite chicken rice fix in the area – Top 1 Chicken Rice. The stall is located at the same food court with the Jalan Batai Char Kuih Teow – with zinc roof, plastic furniture, and generally acceptable hygiene standard.
Top 1 chicken rice offers only steamed chicken, of normal and “walk on the ground” chicken, which I assumed to be kampung, or organic variety.
perfectly cooked steamed chicken with Bentong ginger
What sets this place apart though is their use of Bentong ginger as condiment in addition to their home made chili sauce. As you maybe aware of, Bentong is often touted as the place that produces the best ginger in the country, with its slightly more spicy and stronger taste profile. I love it, so did mom.
The chicken too is steamed perfectly, on that fine line between being under cooked and overly hard/tough when you boiled chicken seemingly only half a minute too long.
dark soya sauce on rice is the Klang way
Overall, this is as proper as chicken rice goes, I’ve heard that you can request for rice balls as well, maybe I’d have to try that next time.
Dinner in Klang consists mainly of three big categories – bak kut teh, seafood, and taichau places. Today, let’s look at one of the older, more traditional taichau (or in Hong Kong – “tai pai tong”) that offers some rather unique dishes – Hin Kee Restaurant.
Hin Kee Restaurant, Klang
Hin Kee is located across Jalan Meru from Klang Parade, on a parking lot/medan selera sort of set up within the residential area. The restaurant itself is a zinc roof with no wall type of set up, and it’s reasonably clean, with ceiling fan to boot.
Like most of these old school places, there’s no printed menu. There is however, a few rows of dishes printed above the stall, all in Chinese characters. You can always ask the server for suggestions, which we did.
sumptuous meal at Hin Kee, Klang
We ended up ordering 6 different dishes – deep fried pork offal with ginger, duck noodle, grilled squid, lala (Thai style?), vege, and fried Hokkien mee.
The dishes did not take too long to arrive, which is always a good thing.
duck noodle, grilled squid, lala, Hokkien mee
So how are those dishes?
Pork offal – simply excellent, prepared right on point with those ginger balances porky taste. This with some beer would be heaven! Grilled squid was similarly enjoyable, with texture that’s just right, fresh, and bits of caramelized skin really bringing it to the next level. Love it.
The noodle dishes were pretty good, though I enjoyed their duck noodle quite a bit more than Hokkien mee, which I found pretty average.
pork offal with ginger
We thought the lala dish was a bit.. odd tasting. It was sort of like Thai steamed fish sort of sauce, sourish and slightly spicy, but with lala. I guess some may like it that way, but not exactly my cup of tea.
Overall though it was a very positive experience, will order a different type of lala preparation and perhaps skip the Hokkien mee next time. Pork offal & squid would be the two dishes I’d definitely order.
Address: Restoran Hin Kee 26, Jalan Dua, Taman Meru, 41050 Klang, Selangor GPS: 3.063454, 101.451322 Hours: Open for dinner
While many restaurants boosts a certain unique selling point that draws customers with fancy dishes, deco, or exciting new tastes, there also exists those that are none of those – a place that is seemingly running in exactly the same way the day it was established, and through various decades, staying on as a sort of time capsule.
Thye Huat at Berkeley, opens from Mon-Sat
A restaurant that brings you back in time with a sense of nostalgia and peace, if you would. In the era of quirky instagrammable cafes and fad based food, this is an increasingly a rare sight.
One of my favorites of such place is Thye Huat at Taman Berkeley.
yam cake anyone?
Located at Lorong Lang, just a few minutes from the old Sungai Rasau toll area, this kopitiam certainly fits the bill. Floor with mosaic laid decades ago, a single stall offering different simple dishes on different days of the week, and even some nyonya kuih to boot.
In addition to the dishes such as curry mee, mee siam, laksa, prawn mee, curry puff and so forth, the half boiled eggs and coffee here is also one not to be missed. Expertly crafted by the old operator, the coffee carries an aroma and body that’s as good as some of the modern cafes.
simple breakfast makes for a great start of the day
I also never missed ordering those perfectly prepared half boiled eggs whenever I find myself here. They’re also cracked and served in the little old china cups for you.
A breakfast here reminds us of simpler days, one with less distractions and modern constant bombardment of “look at me” culture. Will we ever find those peace again?
Address: Thye Huat Lorong Lang, Taman Berkeley, 41150 Klang, Selangor GPS: 3.056372, 101.464057 Hours: Mon-Sat for breakfast
When it comes to food in Klang, one would usually point to bak kut teh, but if you dig in a little bit deeper, there are other gems hidden in this older part of the valley which you may not find in other places – one of such treasure is mee hoon kuih, or Klang’s own interpretation of pan mee.
Kah Ping hawker stall at Jalan Gelegor food court
The most well known of such dish this part of town has got to be Fatty Mee Hoon Kuih located at Taman Berkeley, a shop that’s almost always packed, hot, and requires a long wait time.
However, if you ask some of the locals, the best Mee Hoon Kuih is arguably the version served at Jalan Gelegor’s food court by a stall with the name of Kah Ping.
You may have recognized this particular food court for it’s famous Jalan Batai char kuih teow which I’ve penned on this space some time ago, yeap, you can have them both at the same place!
Klang style mee hoon kuih (or pan mee)
My mee hoon kuih took a little over 10 minutes to arrive (much faster than Fatty’s). The bowl of goodness comes with hand pinched dough, pork slices, liver, an egg (optional), vege, spring onion, dried anchovies, and curiously, some small shrimps.
pork, veggie, and even prawns
The dough was as solf and silky as it comes, and I thought the soup base was even sweeter than Fatty’s version, most likely due to the addition of those shrimps (much like the OUG pork noodle). I find myself enjoying this version quite a bit. As per usual Klang style, there’s only chili padi & soya sauce as condiment instead of those home made chili sauce you find at KL’s pan mee, but they do compliment the dish well if you like to add some kick.
A worthy mee hoon kuih to try, I’ll bring mom next since she loves a good bowl of mee hoon kuih!
For those who stays outside of Klang and Shah Alam, Klang seems like a destination that seems to be quite.. far. However, there are two sides of Klang, before and after the Klang River, for destination before the river, it is actually just 15 minutes from Subang, so if you were to drive to places such as Medan Selera 128, it doesn’t really require planning ahead for 3 weeks and getting visa approved by your home minister.
And the best part is, you can find some unique dishes not easily found in other parts of Greater KL.
128 food court, Klang
For example, one of these unique dishes is Hailam Rice, as offered by one of the stalls located at the rear part of Medan Selera 128.
Yeap, you read it right, Hailam rice, and not Hailam chicken rice.
Hailam rice turns out to be a dish consists of the following different ingredients:
braised 3-layer pork
hard boiled egg
braised tofu skin
pork blood + intestine in soup
rice
sticky curry sauce
Hailam Rice @ Klang
The braised meat/egg/tofu skin side is quite a familiar taste that you’ll be able to find at any good teow chew porridge shop, and the intestine + pork blood soup not too different from a good pork stomach soup. Both these dishes were executed quite on point at this particular stall, with proper seasoning, and pork cuts that was perfect and well cooked.
The sticky curry sauce though, was something quite unique, it’s almost like a cross between Japanese curry and Loh Mee’s “loh” soup, something that I haven’t really acquired the taste on just yet. If you’re new to this dish like me, I’d suggest asking for this sauce to be served separately and pace it out. Good thing is, their sambal is hot and really adds to the whole experience.
egg, pork, tofu, blood, intestine, curry rice
For RM 10, this was a rather sumptuous and satisfying meal, and it won’t be the last time I order a serving of Hailam Rice.
Address: Medan Selera 128 Jalan Mantin, Kawasan 18, 41400 Klang, Selangor GPS: 3.053676, 101.448358
