Lao shu fen (Short Rice Noodles)


This is also one of my favorite noodles. It is cooked with mince pork soup with fish ball. Later, an egg is added into the boiling soup so that the egg white get cook fast enough but leave the yolk only to be warm but not cook. That the ideal case if I can get that type of egg in the soup. (There go my high cholesterol). The hawker stall that I visited the most when I stayed in Penang island is the one near the road junction's coffee shop in Sungai Nibong. I visited so many time till the owner of the stall and also coffee shop's the Indonesian maid/waitress know me, so I did no need to really order what I want when I went there because they know what I'm going to have :-) Lao shu Fen + egg and drink is Nescafe Ice.

Unfortunately during my last visit back home, I only managed to visit the place once due to the distance far from where I stay in Butterworth, basically I need to travel more than 30km with crossing a 13km bridge to get this food. But it is definitely worth it.

Chicken Rice
Chicken rice is one of the most common food one can find from the hawker food. It is actually quite simple food mainly consist of roast chicken or plain steam chicken. Beside that, it also offer some other choice like roast pork and char siew, (Chinese barbecued pork). Check the picture below, it is show how the stall look like. Well, I selected at that time to eat Char Koay Teow so no picture for the dish :-). By the way, the stall not belong to me ;-) because I'm not that fat.

Penang Char Koay Teow
Next hawker food I would like to share is Penang Char Koay Teow ("炒粿條"), fried flat noodle. Again there are many famous Char Koay Teow places in Penang Island, but during my last trip back home, I only managed to eat the Char Koay Teow near my home. It is in the coffee shop in Bagan, Butterworth, next to KFC. If I'm not mistaken, the hawker used duck egg for better taste. It is also consist of prawn and Cockles. It can be spicy but it could be pre-order with how much chili that you could take. Normally I will order with a bit of chille.


One important tips to get good Char Koay Teow - the hawker only prepared or fried one person's portion one at a time. Besides that it is best taste when it is serve straight from wok.

Laksa
As I have promise that I will share something I like to eat in Malaysia, at top of the list is a very simple spicy noodle, name Laksa , the one that I like is Penang Laksa. I've not tasted this noodle for 2 fxxxing long years :-), it was a long wait. I'm very choosy when come to Laksa, since the laksa hawker stall (small stall that sell mainly noodles and other food), can be found everywhere, I only like the one in Ayer Itam market place laksa, the noodle is so smooth and the soup.... *wah lau ... DELICIOUS.... (Wah Lau - expression meaning like "Oh my God" in Penang's Hokkien dialect)

Penang Laksa will look "ugly" to some, especially for foreigner (Finn), Hey, if I can eat Finnish Mämmi (Look more like "Shit"...Sorry Finn guys, I need to explain to my home friends), so eating laksa is nothing for me:-)

Food will be anyway a very personal thing, so I hope I will not offence anybody :-) I always keep an open mind... unless it came to eating liver ...

As for the laksa, I got this explanation from Wikipedia:
"Penang laksa, also known as assam laksa from the Malay for tamarind, comes from the Malaysian island of Penang. It is made with mackerel (ikan kembung) soup and its main distinguishing feature is the assam or tamarind which gives the soup a sour taste. The fish is poached and then flaked. Other ingredients that give Penang laksa its distinctive flavour include lemongrass, galangal (lengkuas) and chilli. Typical garnishes include mint, pineapple slices, thinly sliced onion, hε-ko, a thick sweet prawn paste and use of torch ginger flower. This, and not 'curry mee' is the usual 'laksa' one gets in Penang."

As how it look like...(don't be scare.. look)





And below pictures are the Ayer Itam's market Laksa hawker place...it is near the main road, there will be always traffic jam, so, it is not the ideal place but that the Penang's style of having good food places, no air-con, wet market smell and noisy.. there will be always long queue during the holidays. Check out the soup !!!



It will be another 1 year to go for my next laksa trip :-) This previous trip I accidentally got sun burn on both my hands because I went there by bike (100cc only) and I have not regret.