Try it again…

I was here…

…a long time ago but I had a problem communicating with the people there and in the end, I just pointed at some of the things they had in the array of choices on display…

…but I was not too thrilled by what I had and I never went back there again.

I went out with my friend, Jimmy, again on one of the mornings when he was in town and actually, I wanted to take him here for breakfast but he was not at all enthusiastic about the very limited choices they serve for breakfast so we made our way here instead, just a few doors away to the left. I left the ordering to him…

…but I did tell him to include those very famous and very popular Foochow fish balls that never fail draw people by the droves at every cultural festival or food fair in town…

*photo proudly displayed on the wall at the shop*

In order that you will not be disappointed, you will have to go early to get a number. Once all the numbers have been taken, that will be it for the day – you will not be able to buy any and will have to go back and try the next day. If you are lucky enough to get a number, do not rejoice yet. You still have to queue up and wait for your turn before you can get to buy these much coveted balls…

…that have meat filling inside…

Personally, I do not see what the excitement is all about – the fish ball is overly soft just like a rubber ball, not unlike those frozen factory-manufactured ones sold at every supermarket in town. They certainly do not have the taste and the texture of those very lovely own handmade ones that I have had here and enjoyed a great deal. I would not want to have these again, that’s for sure, much less go all the way to the crowded festival grounds in the heat and queue up to buy, thank you very much!

As a matter of fact, they now have frozen ones available in plastic packs and somebody gave some to a cousin of mine in Bintulu and she cooked fish ball soup with them and she said they were great. They have some for sale too at this shop and if you guess that I did not bother to buy any, you are right!

But don’t write off this place…

…just yet for even though their fish balls failed to leave a favourable impression on me, I did like some of the other items that we chose – at 3 for RM11.50. It used to be RM10.00 only but obviously, the price has gone up…like everything else around here (except my measly pension).

These yam puffs were very nice…

…except that there may not be very good quality control as we found that there wasn’t much of the char siew meat filling in one…

…but a lot in the other.

Never judge a book by its cover for as we all know, appearances can be deceptive and even though these may look very colourful and attractive…

…both Jimmy and I did not think they were anything great and would surely give them a miss the next time around.

Now these peculiar-looking buns…

…turned out to be really very nice indeed…

…but the char siew filling would be the same as what one would find in the yam puffs but there is glutinous rice inside and the odd-shaped bottomless bun is actually sitting on a thin layer of omelette.

Now, these were really good…

– something made of sushi rice with a topping of meat floss (and a bit of mayo probably to make the floss stick to the rice) and yes, there is a bit of that char siew filling inside too…

I don’t know what happened to the photograph or the lighting or whatever but actually, the rice was white, not blue like those nasi kerabu or nyonya kuihs where they would colour the rice using the bunga telang (blue pea flower). Both of us loved it a lot and also these…

…that are made up of Taiwanese sausage on top and layers of minced meat filling and glutinous rice underneath that…

…and ooooo….the sambal at this place is really very very nice and it certainly brings the taste of everything to a whole new level.

They now have an elaborate menu with photographs and names in English so I don’t think I would have any problem ordering the next time around and since I quite like some of the stuff here, plus the things are not exactly expensive, I probably would be dropping by again sometime soon.