Yes, if you remember from this post, I did go once and twice and yes, I did go the third time but it was only because I was on the way to the airport to pick up my girl who was flying back from Kuching after attending a course there.
That was Friday, the start of the school holidays and probably many of the army personnel, their wives and children had all flown home for Hari Raya so most of the stalls at this Ramadhan Bazaar were not open. Thankfully, I did manage to get what I wanted – the laksam (RM3.50)…
…that my girl enjoyed so much the previous time I was here and managed to get that for her. I did get myself a packet too and yes, it was indeed very nice.
I also saw somebody selling this roti jala (RM3.50)…
…and of course, I had to buy that to enjoy as well. The last time I had that was here at Nyonya Colours in Mid Valley, KL in 2013 and before that, in 2012 in Auckland when my wonderful friend there made some to welcome us to New Zealand. The ones I had here were kind of different, more like the roti jala I had at one nasi kandar place in Penang in 2011. Other than those, I did stumble across some at the Malay kueh stalls around here but I did not think they were all that great, not anything that would get me rushing back for more, not at all. This one that I bought that day was pretty good, good enough to appease my craving for that for a while, at least.
The ikan bakar (grilled fish) stall was not ready yet so I drove to Sibu Jaya, the satellite township near the Sibu Airport over 15 miles from the town centre. My guess was that they would have some Ramadhan stalls there too and I was right. I waited in the car while my missus went to grab one (RM20.00, if I remember correctly)…
…and we quickly went to the airport after that, getting there just when my girl’s plane had landed.
It turned out that my missus bought an ikan sultan, one fish that we had not bought for a long long time as we get a lot of those farmed ones here and they have that horrendous mud smell…and we really cannot tell the difference between a freshly-caught natural one and one from those fish ponds. Thankfully, this one was very very nice…
– no mud smell, very lemak (fat/oily) and fresh too but of course, we had to be more careful when eating as this fish has quite a bit of bones.
So that was our dinner that night when my girl came back from Kuching, simple and very very nice!
...STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! 