So, we clearly were going to revisit "magic food alley" (Ngõ Trung Yên). This time, we had our sights set on phở.
We'd seen Phở Sướng on previous visits, but hadn't eaten here. We had a great breakfast - one bowl of tái chín (rare beef and cooked beef), and one of tái gầu (rare beef with fatty brisket).
Both bowls were great, and the place was busy, but efficient. Perfect way to start the day.
Our hotel in Da Nang did a very nice breakfast - with very servicable versions of local dishes. Above, Mì Quảng.
Bò Kho.
Gỏi Cuốn.
Phở Bò.
"Western Breakfast".
Another take on Mì Quảng.
Bún Bò Huế.
Another evening in Saigon after dinner "Plan A" had fizzled, we again found ourselves hungry and looking for targets of opportunity.
We came across a nice looking little shop selling Hủ tiếu and Bún Bò Huế.
We got one bowl of each. Hủ tiếu was a new soup for us, and this version was terrific. Great broth, and lots of goodies - shrimp, quail eggs, pork slices, meat on the bone. A very "dặc biệt" bowl.
The Bún Bò Huế was also loaded and delicious. We left happy and satisfied.
Another place I found via google maps, but had confirmed by a local as a "good spot" (this time, a grab driver). Selera Padang Puteh is a breakfast/lunch place - we went for both.
First up, lunch. The restaurant is primarily a buffet - you take what you want, and they charge you based on what you've taken. The options were a bit overwhelming. We ended up with one plate with fish balls, braised egg, and beef rendang.
The other plate heaped with fish, two types of chicken curry, potatoes, and eggplant. They had both a regular sambal, and another with ikan bilis in it.
Everything was really good, and it was a very pleasant place to eat, so we came back another day for breakfast.
Breakfast was a similar affair, with a buffet that overlapped with the lunch offerings, but with some different items. We got a plate with some fried chicken and rice with a gravy from a few of the dishes.
They do roti in the morning, so we ordered a roti pisang - roti canai with banana cooked in it, served with condensed milk.
And a couple of half-cooked eggs.
Great local restaurant - the kind of place that would be in our regular rotation if we lived here.
It had been a while since we'd had nasi kandar, so we had dinner one night at Hameediyah Restaurant - supposedly Penang's oldest nasi kandar spot.
They are obviously popular, as they have expanded into another storefront a few doors down. You order at one place, and then sit at the other.
We got one place with beef rendang, and another with grilled chicken and an omelette with okra and some other veggies in it.
Nothing revelatory, but a very tasty dinner.
One rainy evening (most evenings have been rainy for an hour or so during our visit), we had dinner at Laksa Kg Baru.
The owner was very friendly and helpful, and took us through the menu.
They specialize in Laksa and Kari Mee (curry laksa).
We made a bit of a mistake by both ordering curry laksa. We got slightly different versions - one with mee (wheat noodles) and one with bihun (fine rice noodles) and chicken and beef added. We prefered the bihun version, as the texture of the mee was a bit too soft. Favorite parts were the bits of fried tofu and tofu skin soaking in the broth.
Another evening, we found ourselves hungry in the KLCC mall (we'd come there in search of an ATM that would take our debit card). We ended up having Yong Tau Foo for the first time in the mall food court. You pick a set of ingredients (we got water spinach, bok choi, fish cake, fish balls, eggplant, bitter melon, and a big chili all stuffed with fish paste, and tofu skin), tell them how you want it (we got soup with rice noodles), and they prep it up for you. We really enjoyed it, and look forward to having Yong Tau Foo again in a non-mall context.
On our way to the airport to travel home from Taipei, we used the convenient baggage check at Taipei Main Station and headed out for some noodle soup.
Our destination was Liu Shandong Beef Noodles. Located on a corner at the intersection of two alleys, this place just oozed atmosphere.
We sat down and ordered a couple of bowls of noodle soup - one beef, and one pork chop. They arrived steaming hot and very generously sized.
The beef bowl was very tasty, but on this occasion I think I may have enjoyed the pork chop version a little bit more.
The lightly coated pork that had been fried before being added to the bowl really hit the spot on this rainy afternoon.
We took our time enjoying our noodles, listening to the happy slurping going on at the tables around us. It was a perfect last outing before we descended back into Taipei Main Station to board the airport MRT.
For the second part of our stay in Kuala Lumpur, we were in the Chow Kit neighborhood, the heart of which is the Chow Kit Market. We walked through it multiple times and at different times of day as it always seemed to be on the way from our hotel to somewhere else.
During the day, the market is a very colorful and dynamic place, with a large fruit and vegetable section that is covered, but still very open-air.
The section selling animal bits is more covered.
A huge variety of meat, fish and poultry is on offer.
We walked past on a number of nights, and the meat section was still fascinating to look at even as it was closing down.
With the main produce market closed for the evening, a secondary set of stalls starts up.
One night we walked along the market row with the twin Petronas Towers lit up in the background and the call to prayer from a local mosque washing over everything.
Our destination was Restoran Rose - a place that serves up a variety of Indonesian fare.
On this night, we were after Satay. They had their skewers all prepped and ready to go:
Some fumbling mixed-language interaction revealed that the decisions to make were what protein we wanted, and whether it would be sweet or not.
We went for two combos of beef and chicken skewers - this one was the non-sweet version:
The skewers were small, but tasty. The sauce was savory and plentiful, and there were chunks of Nasi Impit (a simple, dense rice cake) in it to add more sustenance to the dish and use to sop up the sauce.
The second combo we ordered was the "sweet" one, which turned out to be a peanut sauce:
The sauce was thick and not overly sweet - again served with the chunks of nasi impit.
We washed everything down with some tea and enjoyed the scene. Overall, it was a fun and inexpensive meal in a pleasant setting.
To be honest, we found Kuala Lumpur's Chinatown area fairly disappointing - lots of people selling merchandise and very little food. Still, we managed to find a few things to eat.
Right in the heart of Petaling Street is Kim Soya Bean, and it was doing a brisk business when we stopped by.
We got a bowl of warm soy pudding ("tau fu fah") and it was really, really good. Lovely, soft and creamy and swimming in lightly sweet syrup.
If you've followed our time in Hong Kong, you are aware that we developed a bit of an obsession with egg tarts there. So when we found Bunn Choon Egg Tarts on the edge of Chinatown, we had no choice but to stop in.
And when we saw they had durian flavored egg tarts, we just had to try one.
The regular tart is on the left and the durian on the right. The standard egg tart was very good. I wasn't sure what to expect from the durian version, but it turned out to be terrific. The tart itself wasn't durian flavored - there was a layer of durian jelly on the top. Very good.
Later in the day, we found ourselves back in the same area, desperate to grab something to eat. Most things were closed, but on our earlier visit had seen a Ramly burger cart just starting to set up and they were now in full swing.
Ramly burgers are definitely a thing in Kuala Lumpur. As I understand it, they are named after the Ramly patties, a product of a local fast-food company. Various street food vendors take these patties and do their own thing with them. Above is a chicken and fried egg version.
And there is a beef patty somewhere in that one, although it was hard to see (or taste) under all the other goop. Definitely a case of condiment overload for me, but it was fun to watch them make it.
