Not the only one…

I thought the Penang guy’s Hokkien mee that I had was the only one in town but I was wrong!

My missus and I dropped by here for lunch (2.311384,111.846727) the other day and I saw that they also had it, tagged under “chef’s recommendation“. We were here a few times before and I did like what they dished out then but somehow or other, we had not dropped by for quite sometime now and I did not notice it on the menu…

…at all on those earlier visits.

Of course I wasted no time in ordering that…

…and if I remember correctly, it was only RM4.00 or RM4.50, cheaper than at that other place. As for the taste, I would say they were both equally good but somehow or other, this one too did not come across like the nice ones I had in KL and I just could not put the finger on it. Maybe there was too much sauce or it was not as thick or maybe they should add a lot more garlic to have that fragrance and taste?

My missus had the spicy chicken with rice (RM6.00)…

…which she said was all right, something like Thai-style chicken…

…or fried chicken with Thai chili sauce.

Well, if anyone hasn’t got a clue where this is, it is to the left of the Delta Mall, the second shop in that block with the Astro Sibu Office at the far end of that same block.

For dinner that evening, I decided to try another one of the Dollee instant pastes that my friend, Victor gave me – the rendang. When I cooked the prawn noodles, I did not add any extra ingredients – all I did was to boil the prawns in water and remove them and then, I emptied the contents of the packet into the stock to cook the soup/broth for the noodles. This time around, however, I did add a bit of this and that…

– one chopped Bombay onion, two stalks of serai (lemon grass), one daun kunyit (tumeric leaf), thinly sliced and a few sprigs of curry leaves. I love potatoes in my curry so I peeled a few and cut them into chunks to be added to the rendang.

Now my mistake was I was afraid the potatoes might take too long to cook so I boiled them first. As it turned out, as the rendang was simmering, the overcooked potatoes were already falling apart and turning rather mushy. When I felt it was quite ready, I added a little bit of santan (coconut milk) and let it boil a bit before dishing everything out…

It tasted great! Very very nice…but somehow or other, again, like in the case of the other instant rendang pastes that I had used before, it did not quite come across to me like rendang. My missus loved it too and insisted it was not like the regular curry and it was like rendang. Ah well!!! As long as it was good, I guess that was all that mattered.

I cooked quite a lot so there was more than enough for our meals the following day. I took out all the potatoes and heated them up by placing them in a bowl and leaving it in the rice cooker after the rice had cooked. I heated the meat in a wok, adding some water and letting it simmer a while longer to thicken the gravy and this…

…was what it looked like after that…and yes, it was good.

I think I would go and buy another packet of the instant paste and try cooking beef with it and perhaps, I would add a lot more of the daun kunyit to see if that would make it more like rendang as I know it. Any suggestions, anybody?