Malaysia Food:
In Kuala Lumpur

The fantastic Malaysia food is influenced by several ethnicities:

Malay, Chinese, Indian, Nyonya (early Chinese immigrants) and the people of Borneo.

It's such an experience to try Malay dishes because of the great variety. And if you travel to Melacca, you'll get to try the Portuguese-influenced cuisine.

... I can't come up with any people who I met who didn't like the food in Malaysia. It's just so damn good!

What's so special about Malay food?

Lemongrass and kaffir leaves are among the ingredients in day-to-day Malay cooking. A combination of dried spices and fresh seasonings make a fine paste, and it's finally cooked in oil.

Lucky for me and other fish-lovers, fish is a popular guest in Malay cooking. Rice (often enriched with coconut milk) or roti canais are always supplements for a dish.

Hungry?

Here are some options for where to eat Malaysia Food! I've divided this article into areas: First up is Chinatown, then Little India and Golden Triangle!

Chinatown

In Chinatown, you can eat whatever you want and it cost like nothing. Along Petaling Street and in the side streets of it, you'll find Chinese food stalls selling soups from 3-4 RM. Or noodle dishes like Hokkien Mee (from 5 RM).

Other food stalls sell Malay dishes like curries called Nasi Campur (rice, anchovy, various meat like beef and lamb, egg and vegetables) for as little as 3 RM.

Yep, my friend loving the fruit!

During the whole day, food vendors can offer you fresh fruit which they cut into small pieces for you. Then they bag it and give you a stick. One bag of fresh fruit cost 1 RM!

Every day we ate water melon, papaya, yellow mango, honey dew and my favourite: Jackfruit.

Other goodies to try:

• Sugar cane juice in a bag -- 1 RM

  Sugar cane drinks are the most popular cooling drinks in Malaysia.

  The sugar cane is boiled, then it's mixed with pressed fruit. You can get all types of sugar cane juice, mixed with different fruits like logan, chestnut, coconut etc.

• Dried pork 100 gram -- starting from 7.50 RM

• Rice with chestnut packed in a banana leaf, called Tepong Bungkus --
  3.50 RM

  Strange taste though. The look of it reminds of the ones we have in the Philippines, but it wasn't sweet at all (Filipinos do have a huge love for sugar though).

• If you dare, try frogs 100 gram -- 5 RM

Picture left: Frogs Picture right: Tepong Bungkus

Here are some restaurants you should try (and perhaps not try):

Pavilion Restoran

Our first meeting with Malaysia food was at Pavilion Restaurant. We were hauled in by the staff and they were trying to promote Tiger Beers at 4 pm in the afternoon.

Well, we ate their delicious food and washed it down with 1 liter of ice-cold Tiger (think the Tiger cost 18 RM)!

For starters, I tried the fried dumplings (15 RM) with chilli sauce. It was so crispy and just melted on my tongue. Mmmm!

Then I had fried Assam fish for dinner (starting from around 19 RM). I ordered a "small" portion, but it was large. I still ate the whole damn thing!

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Restoran Mee Hong

Mee Hong is located next to Backpacker's Travellers Inn and serves top Chinese breakfast, lunch and dinner.

During lunch hours, the restaurant is full of locals and Chinese tourists -- it was sometimes hard to get a table.

I got some soup with fish balls and rice (4 RM), while my friend was excited about his beef soup. Then finish your meal with a lovely hot green tea.

One funny thing is that we didn't know how to use the extra plates and bowls. We observed how the others were eating, and they were eating the rice right from the little bowl. But we got confused when we got a plate.

We thought: "Couldn't we just eat from the rice bowl?!" What a heck, we used the plate!

Seng Kee Restoran

My fatty BBQ pork noodles

I personally prefer these kinds of restaurants because you can actually see what's being done to your food -- more like a "quality check." You can guarantee that no one's spitting in your food.

First the great part…

Their menu was full of exciting meals and I had trouble choosing. So I ended up with BBQ pork with wanton noodles (9 RM). My friend chose the sweet and sour chicken (15 RM), and based on his sounds going "Mmmm" the whole time, I assumed he liked it!

But my choice turned out to be a mistake. I got this too fatty noodle lump on my plate, and it only tasted like burnt noodles. It wasn't worth the 9 RM. I only ate the pork and the part of the noodles which wasn't burned, so I wouldn't feel like I've wasted food.

Picture left: Outside Seng Kee Picture right: Flavors of Malaysia (chilli paste, green chilli and soya sauce)

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Central Market

If you're shopping at Central Market, get tired and need a break from all the bargaining, they have a food court on the 2nd floor. They open as early as
9 pm and it's a good place to have your warm breakfast.

I got addicted to their Malay-Chinese soups (4.50 RM-10 RM), especially at Aneka Sup. The variety of ingredients is only limited by your imagination, and you can add fish balls, chicken, beef or just vegetables!

For example, we tried the Herbal Chicken Soup (5.5 RM) with some hot green tea (2 RM).

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Little India

We didn't eat that much in the neighbourhood of Little India, but we did try some hawker stalls selling Indian fast food like Roti Canai (20 sen-2 RM).

Plain Roti Canai cost 20 sen, and Roti Canai with egg can cost up 2 RM. The typical drink to have it with is the soothing Teh Tarik. The usual deal at these stalls is that you get a Roti Canai + Teh Tarik for only 1 RM.

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Golden Triangle

The Golden Triangle is an array of local, Thai, Japanese and Western restaurants, coffee shops, bakeries filled with colorful doughnuts and bakery goodies, and large food courts inside the malls.

Many of the eateries are found inside the shopping centers, or just outside the malls on the sidewalk.

If you miss the coffee at Starbucks (average price 12-13 RM for a coffee,
9 RM for an orange juice, sandwich 4-5 RM), you'll have no trouble finding it along Bukit Bintang and Sultan Ismail. Or if you want to run off to Hard Rock Cafe, they have it as well.

We tried only one restaurant in Golden Triangle because of our budget.

Here's the one we tried:

Bangkok Jam Restaurant

We found an open-air area near Low Yat Plaza where they hide some of Kuala Lumpur's restaurants. Since I was craving for Thai food, we tried Bangkok Jam.

The Bangkok Naked Duck (kind of a sexy name and it cost 18 RM) was a definitely a big hit. My friend explained that it wasn't spicy at all, but had this strong flavour which tasted VERY good.

Again, I ordered a huge fried fish with chilli sauce (45.90 RM), but the meat was dry. It was the second time I was disappointed. I got the meal on our table 10 minutes after we ordered, and sensed that they didn't cook it with love...

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You're done with Malaysia Food, where do you want to go next?

Need a place to sleep in Kuala Lumpur? Get over here!

Ready for partying? Here are some choices for you!

Ready for shopping? Thought so!

Want to get a tattoo?

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