He came back…

I was somewhat sad when I heard that he was going to call it a day and would close his restaurant for good. I would drop by time and time again for lunch or dinner and I would order a few of his dishes that I really liked a lot and at other times, we would go for his chap fan (mixed rice).

Needless to say, I was delighted when I heard that he had come back and is now based at a food court in town, not in the town centre so there would not be any traffic jam nor any parking problem (plus it is free) here.

However, I did not manage to go and check it out until the other day. Yes, he is still serving his chap fan – there is a glass display cabinet exclusively for those dishes but by the time we got there around noon on a Saturday, many of the dishes were already running out.

I spotted one of my favourites – the braised too kha (pork leg) and the stewed eggs…

…and the soy sauce chicken…

…looked very good too.

This was the kangkong (water spinach)…

…but there wasn’t much left of all the other dishes and the little bit that was left of each dish would not look very nice in photographs, so I did not bother to take anymore.

This food court was not doing well before – most of the time, there were hardly any customers around, but I was pleased to see that there were quite a number that day, and 9 out of 10 were there for the chap fan. Of course, I did not want that seeing that there wasn’t much of each dish left – I would go a little earlier should I feel like going for that.

Instead, I went to the other glass display cabinet…

…and asked for the dishes I wanted. The young girl took note of my orders and passed the slip to the kitchen…

Aha! The boss was there, doing all the cooking himself.

Of course, I must have the mini-ngor hiang balls or lor bak as they are called in West Malaysia…

…and the prawn fritters, both of which tasted as nice as they did before. The own-made tofu was disappointing because it turned out to be so very salty but I particularly loved the cucumber pickles by the side…

Other than those, I also ordered the fish maw clear soup…

…that I’ve always loved a lot too and yes, it was as nice as before.

For our vegetable dish, I saw this among the options in the chap fan cabinet but there wasn’t much left so I asked for it to be cooked for us, their mixed vegetables platter…

Yes, it was nice – we did enjoy it very much but no, it was nothing that spectacular that would get us running back for more. As a matter of fact, I was thinking that it would be very nice if served in a yam basket!

The total for the food came up to RM65.00, inclusive of rice. I guess that is more or less what I would usually have to pay for the dishes we order when we eat at these Chinese chu-char (cook and fry) places here. For one thing, I was mighty pleased to see that they have done away with all their plastic plates and bowls, those hideous ones in all the gaudy colours that may not be all that safe when used to serve food that is piping hot from the kitchen.

Incidentally, they will ask you how many plates of rice you want – we asked for three, of course, but the guy came back with one big bowl filled with that instead of three individual plates!!! We could barely finish half! We certainly would just ask for two…or maybe, one even the next time we drop by here.

KIM HOCK PREMIER FOOD COURT (2.301777, 111.843215)…

…is located along Jalan Dr Wong Soon Kai (formerly Jalan Pedada) somewhere across the road, opposite Wisma Liberty and Wisma Sri Minyak.