You went away…

These Kanowit ladies were here before, going all the way back to 2017…

…and yes, I did stop by their stall to buy this and that from them a few times.

One fine day, however, they told me that it was their last day there and they would be moving to some place in the Permai area, the shops opposite the Sibu General Hospital. If I remember correctly, that was before the outbreak of the pandemic and all this while, I hardly ventured to those parts of the woods so of course, I never got to see them there. As a matter of fact, I never got to see them ever again.

I mentioned in my previous post that my girl and the mum were here for brunch the other morning and my girl loved the chai peah (vegetable fritters) from these ladies’ stall. I was surprised to hear that they have moved back and are back in action here again – I guess things did not work out all that well at that other place.

My missus bought home a whole lot of things from them including these slices of or koi (deep fried yam cake)…

…and their very nice pisang goreng (banana fritters) using slices of the humongous pisang tandok…

…just like what my late mum used to make a long time ago.

No, that wasn’t all! My missus has this tendency to get carried away when she buys things and she carted home their serimuka…

…and also their version of the aforementioned with a layer of sweet potato…

I wasn’t impressed by the latter – between the two, I prefer the original.

Their bingka tapioca…

…was very nice but a tad too sweet for me especially now that I am on a low sugar diet. They’re not exactly the same despite both being tapioca cakes but I prefer the ones here.

Their yew chang koi…

…was disappointing. The texture was not quite there and the ones from my neighbourhood shop in the next lane would win hands down.

Well, if you think that was all that my missus bought, I am afraid you are sadly mistaken. She also bought these yew char koi (Chinese crullers)…

…from another stall there. Of course, she would have to finish most of everything all by herself. My girl is not really into these local delights and to the most, I would be helping myself to a piece or two.

On the whole, I do feel that the ones from this girl have an edge over these somewhat old school small town favourites but at least, we’ve tried and we know for sure and anyway, I do not think we shall be heading that way again, not in the near future because I did ask my girl and she said yes, the place was very crowded. Horror of horrors! I wouldn’t want to go anywhere near places like that – #staysafe #staywell

JIALI CAFE (2.292140, 111.841524) is located among the shops behind Medan Mall, Jalan Wong King Huo, a few doors away to the right of Junction Cafe,  facing the road leading to the Medan Hotel there.