Char kuih kak (fried radish cake) might not be in many people’s radar when it comes to Penang hawker food. It is somewhat a less glamorous dish compared to the likes of char kuih teow, laksa, curry mee, and hokkien mee (prawn mee).
The reason is probably due to the relative rarity of this dish, there aren’t many places that offers them in Penang, and generally only available at pasar malam in Klang Valley as a bit of a novelty dish. It’s a shame really, cos I absolutely love char kuih kak, and none of them at pasar malam around Klang Valley manage to impress me thus far.
batu lanchang food court, just right next to the wet market
So last weekend while traveling back to attend Tim & Audrey‘s wedding, Haze and I stopped by Batu Lanchang wet market’s food court for some char kuih kak love.
I have a bit of history with this char kuih kak stall, it used to operate at the (now defunct) Fettes Park market in the morning nearby where I grew up, and at current location in the afternoon. I had it pretty much on a weekly basis as a kid. It’s good to see that the same stall is still doing well after all these years.
char kuih kak is what I came for
By default, char kuih kak is a pretty bare dish with radish cake, bean sprout, egg, and preserved vegetable. However, over here you have the option of adding seafood and spice it up a bit, which we did.
The result is a plate of char kuih kak worth RM 4 but laden with a couple good size prawns, cockles, squid, and crab stick. It was the same old taste that I remember, savory, strong, and absolutely delicious. A bit like char kuih teow but with more texture, try it!
You can opt for either chicken or duck egg, ours was RM 4 per plate with chicken egg (ran out of duck egg that day).
curry mee and laksa were our second dishes
Of course, one does not simply consume only one dish per meal in Penang. I ordered a follow up dish in the form of curry mee from the stall located behind the #42 kuih kak. This was only RM 2.80 and came with prawns (small size lah), coagulated blood, cockles, tofupok, cuttle fish, and even mint leaves. It was fairly decent and absolutely worth what I paid for, would not hesitate to have it again.
it was hot and we were sweating, but it was worth it (blue case – invisalign)
Haze ordered a bowl of asam laksa (RM 3) instead, and yep, it’s laden with fish meat, vegetable, and managed to satisfy her Penang laksa craving, even just for a while.
We had a couple glasses of fresh sugar cane juice to go with these as well at RM 1.20 a pop.
That brought our total for this late lunch to RM 16.20, which is almost RM 12 cheaper than our breakfast at this Hometown Hainan Coffee in Taman Megah where we had 4 half boil eggs, 2 sets of toast bread with kaya + butter, 1 carrot juice, and a large coffee. I vow never to go back that chain again.
Address:Stall 42
Batu Lanchang market
Lorong Batu LanchangÂ
Jelutong, 11600 Penang
GPS: 5.38945, 100.30633
Wow, the prawn is bigger than the kua kak….not bad!
JD: ya they also usually cut up the kuih kak pretty small.
Penang food is the bee’s knees! 😀
ciki: it’s the awesomesttt
the cheh hu there isn’t bad as well 🙂 also, the nyonya kuih stall is REALLY popular, opens about 3:30pm or so. i try to drop by before heading out of the island each time..
radiance: haa ya i gotta do that next time!
eh, next time tar pau two plates of char kuih kak for me (it looks like something that could keep overnight). i’ll make it worth your while, sort of, by collecting it from you and forking out RM15 per portion 😀
Sean: haha unfortunately those things don’t last, now if you’re talking about laksa then yah!
Next time you are there, try the pasembur stall, which is perpendicular to the koay kak stall 😉 It’s the Chinese version, not the mamak one, but still so good!
Jayna: ya just like radiance said 😀