There was an old couple here before but somewhere along the line, somebody told me that they were not a couple – they were not husband and wife, not married to each other. Anyway, I loved the old lady’s noodles and the special soup very much so of course, I went there a few times. I even brought my dad there a couple of times, when he was still with us, and at other times, I would tapao the noodles for him to enjoy at home.
One day, I saw the old lady at the restaurant a few doors away, buying something for lunch. They told me the old man had passed away and she had given up her business – at her age, her legs could no longer take it. A few people had taken over the coffee shop since but none of them lasted very long and this…
…is the latest in line. I do not have the slightest idea why it is named thus – perhaps the owner is into marathons that appear to be the current trend these days. There seems to be some kind of run here almost every other weekend and many simply love to participate in these events and collect the medals.
I first got to know about this coffee shop when I saw friends sharing photographs of the prawn noodles…
…that they had here. It said on the notice in front of the shop that those were going for between RM13-25.00, probably depending on the size of the crustaceans and the ones with fish would cost a little less, RM10.00 only.
I had no intention of ordering any of those but I was thinking of trying one of the noodle dishes there. Unfortunately, I was extra early, before 6.30 a.m. and the chu char (cook & fry) guy at the back was not quite ready yet. In the end, I just ordered something from the kampua mee stall…
…in front.
I had the kampua mee…
…and liver soup set (RM4.50)…
…which I thought was rather cheap as most of these sets elsewhere would set one back by RM6.00 at least!
The noodles were a little on the mild/bland side which was good in a way, less msg and light soy sauce but I thought it was all right with the chili sauce that came with it, not anything to shout about nor was it anything to complain about either.
The liver soup was surprisingly very nice, very strong on the traditional Foochow red wine. I did not expect that as it was not red in colour but then again, the superior quality ones, very well filtered, will be lightly orange in colour, not red…so if you go for a bowl of mee sua here and everything, the soup and the chicken, is horrendously red in colour, then they have used the cheaper wine of poorer quality and probably a bit of the ang chao too, nothing to get excited about – it’s just a sales gimmick!
I suppose I will be back here again in the near future especially when it opens real early when most of the rest are still closed but I think I would like to try something from the guy at the back the next time around.
MARATHON CAFE is located in the same block of shops as the A-PLUS FOOD CENTRE/RESTAURANT (2.293355, 111.823653), somewhere in the middle, along Jalan Kampung Datu at the back of the block of shops (where Fair Price Supermarket is) near the traffic lights at its junction with Jalan Tun Abang Haji Openg and Jalan Kampung Nyabor.
...STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! 