Back in town…

My friend, Jimmy, was back in town…

…on another working trip, coming in on the early morning flight arriving before 7. He enjoyed the dim sum at this place on his previous trip so we headed there for another round of what they had.

Unfortunately, we were a little bit too early so most of the things were not out yet so we decided to go for another round of these…

…that we quite liked the first time around.

These mushroom balls were pretty good too…

…while these are actually some kind of lor bak or what we call ngor hiang here…

…but they had one whole salted egg yolk in the middle…

I did not think these…

…were anything special as they came across to me as simply some fried fish balls with mayonnaise and a bit of seaweed and meat floss on top and these fried dumplings had fish paste instead instead of the minced meat filling that one would usually find elsewhere…

I think I enjoyed what we had the first time around more and to me, when anything had meat filling, it would be more or less the same as something with the same…and likewise, with the fish stuff that they had.

These steamed pork ribs were great though…

…much nicer than any that I had had elsewhere.

But whatever they had, even though they might be somewhat similar, everything tasted great with the two types of sambal…

– one with finely pounded udang kering (dried prawns) and the other with dried bubuk (tiny shrimps), both of which were absolutely awesome and the best part was they had those ready in bottles at every table and one would be able to help oneself to whatever amount one would want. All in all, it was a nice, though extremely heavy, breakfast and after all that, we just had to skip lunch that day as we just could not possibly take in anything anymore.

And just look at what my good friend brought for me – these delightful almond pretzels…

…and my favourite meat pastries and curry puffs from Chong Chon at Kai Joo Lane in Kuching…

I have loved the meat pastry or sio pao from so long ago, ever since I was staying in Kuching in the mid-70’s and this shop is still going strong.  As a matter of fact, if you do not order before hand, chances are you will not be able to get hold of any and will have to leave disappointed. After all these years, the short crust pastry still has that rich buttery fragrance and is as flaky as before and even though the filling still tastes the same…

– just as good, it no longer has those visible bits of red-coloured char siew (barbecued meat) that it it used to have way back then.

The curry puffs are great too…

…but I can distinctly feel the difference – it was nicer before but still it is way better (and cheaper) than what I had here.

Thank you, Jimmy. All those would certainly satisfy my craving so I guess I would not be yearning for them…at least for a while. Hehehehehe!!!!