I had this bowl of kampua mee…
…just the other day at a coffee shop across the road…
…not far from the school where my girl is teaching.
No, it’s not new. It has been there all this while ever since my girl got her transfer here from her previous school in Selangau. So far, I did stop by once to buy the fried chicken wings – I think they were RM2.30 each – from that boy in the green t-shirt at his stall in front. He was very nice – he said that his supplier gave him wings that were rather small that day so to make up for it, without my asking, he gave me two for the price of one. I asked for four and in the end, I got eight. They were all right – my girl enjoyed them a lot. Well, what can one expect from fried chicken wings?
There is a food court two doors away but when I walked over to have a look, none of the stalls were open. There were a few customers loitering around there having their drinks, that was all. Go straight ahead to the extreme right end and you will get to this very popular Taiwanese beef noodles shop.
Coming back to this aforementioned coffee shop in the above photograph, I noticed that the shop units here are somewhat small, rather narrow and short and it does not help one bit that the people running it are no Maria Condo. The kampua mee stall is the one in front and they have a chu-char (cook and fry) stall at the back. If you want fried noodles and stuff, you can order from there and they do have chap fan (mixed rice) come lunchtime. I did go and have a look at the dishes that they had that day – I think I would be able to come out with better looking ones if I had a stall like that. LOL!!! In the middle, there was a vacant stall.
I asked for a bowl of kampua mee, white…
…from the Iban lady waiting at the tables and no, I did not want a drink, thank you very much. When the noodles came, the lady told me that they had run out of their complimentary soup so I would not be getting that. Well, usually, what we get at such stalls aren’t anything to shout about so it did not bother me one bit, not at all.
The lady running the stall, open in the morning only, is an Iban lady too and yes, she did a very good job in cooking the noodles…
They were perfectly done, not overcooked so they were not soft and soggy and they were cooked long enough so they were not QQ or kind of firm still – I do not like my kampua mee like that as it would give me the impression that they are still uncooked to some extent.
As for the taste, yes, they tasted good like how kampua mee should taste like but I did not feel like there was anything that would make me want to go out of my way to go there again just for this. If I happen to be around those parts of the woods and I feel like having a bowl, I may just drop by, that’s for sure.
What took me by surprise, however, was when I paid the lady a RM20 note and got RM16.50 in change. Gee!!! Believe it or not, that big bowl with a whole lot of noodles and chopped spring onions cost only RM3.50, around AUD/SGD1.00 only!!! The going price elsewhere these days is RM4.00 a bowl/plate and there are a few places that will ask you for RM4.50 for the same. Imagine saving RM1.00 each time you eat here instead of there!!!
AURORA CORNER (2.288216, 111.833938) is located along Jalan Bukit Assek/Lorong Bukit Assek Lima to the left of Arki Sapi.
...STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! 
Well, count your blessings if you have a big bowl of kampua with char siew and lots of spring onions in it. Having said that, the char siew looks like boiled meat and dye red. Not appetising…😂😂. Over here, the minimum charge in most places for kolo mee is RM5 and for RM3.50 you can get kolo mee kosong only. Nice bowl but is it ceramic or plastic.
No, not plastic nor melamine…or it would get into my little black book, for sure. Not sure, probably glass – the plate I always use for my noodles photos (the ones I cooked myself at home) is glass too, I think…not ceramic but coated to look like ceramic.
Well, I’m afraid you will never get REAL char siew with authentic Sibu Foochow kampua mee – it is always boiled pork, dyed red going all the way back to my childhood days. At one time, the colouring was banned so we had colourless boiled pork but it sure looks like it’s coming back. Hope they are using permitted dyes. Personally, I prefer pain sip kampua. Gee! Haven’t had that for a while now – gotta go for it one of these days.
If you are looking for REAL char siew, you will have to go for Kuching kolo mee…or the wanton mee in West Malaysia…but I do know of a couple of places here in Sibu where they are using real char siew now…or slices of braised pork. Nice too!
RM3.50 for that bowl of kampua is good. Over here, I don’t I still could find that price. The Foochow fried stall we usually go to, now charging RM4 for kampua.
That is cheap, the standard price at most places here. I think Foochow fried is RM6.00 now, not cheap anymore.
A sprinkling of green does wonders to the plating of any dish!
A little bit of effort in the presentation does work wonders.