Boycott the Lorong Selamat char kuey teow auntie, yeay! Only when I’m not in Penang lah…

I was rolling about in laughter as I read Eleen’s forwarded e-mail about a call to boycott the famous Lorong Selamat char kuey teow lady seller. You know, the one that Penang folks dislike as she is notoriously rude and unfriendly. All the bad service at a premium price for her char kuey teow, ohhh trust me, I feel their disgust every time I propose lunch at said hawker stall 😛

Apparently some customers witnessed an unpleasant incident which you can read in detail at The Star report here. Someone then drew up a caricature and it went its rounds and finally arrived at my Inbox courtesy of Eleen, who knows how much I adore the stall’s char kuey teow.

Lorong Selamat char kuey teow caricature
Click here to view the larger version.

Yeah, very rude I agree. Actually don’t talk about that incident lah. Before she moved to her own corner shop lot, she was renting a stall at the middle part of Lorong Selamat. Also very rude what. Remember when customers had to line up for their own plate of char kuey teow because she was too busy and she was short-handed and refused to serve? Or the 3 hours of waiting for your food because of the simple equation of her cooking each plate individually and there were just way too many orders? Or the many alleged incidents of “cannot wait then don’t eat lah” or “too expensive don’t eat lah” uttered from her red beret, goggles-wearing down turned mouth?

Yes I know all the stories. It’s terrible, I admit. But I don’t go to Penang often. When I get the chance to, I only want to eat her char kuey teow. You can’t tell me that there are other nicer char kuey teow around. I tried all the others and they don’t compare to this one:

Penang Aug 09 - 39 Lorong Selamat Char Kuey Teow

Sorry I tourist. Tell me if you want me to help boycott other things and I will! Just not this one 😀

the great penang getaway: august ’09: day one

Penang Aug 09 - 01 MAS plane *Note: This trip was partly sponsored by Malaysia Airlines. Go check out the best fares at www.malaysiaairlines.com

I was in Penang last month for a short holiday + attend Peter Tan‘s wedding dinner. I asked my dear Shirley to come along with me because we were in Penang the same time last year and it could be an annual thing! Provided she doesn’t do something like migrate to somewhere really far away lah. Who knows, women… hearts very far away one 😛

My flight to Penang was at 10 something in the morning. As usual I took my own sweet time getting ready. Sis sent me to a nearby LRT station, I stopped at KL Sentral and went on the KLIA Express to get to the airport. The line at the MAS counter was pretty long and I panicked for a bit. Out of time mah. Then I heard an announcement for my flight’s final call which led me to an empty desk, and wahey! I made it on time! Go me 😛

(But okay, next time I’ll start getting ready earlier.)

Penang Aug 09 - 02 Inside the plane Penang Aug 09 - 03 Going Places magazine

I’ve not been on a MAS aircraft for a while. So when I stepped into the plane, I was a bit surprised by the colourful seat covers. Quite nice lah, makes the atmosphere happier. My sister went to Bangkok not long ago and she also commented on the covers. She also took a photo of herself camwhoring with the seats but I don’t have her permission to post it here. If you ask her nicely, maybe she’d show you. Just maybe.

It was a short flight, drinks were served, reached Penang International Airport in less than an hour. Waited around for Shirley’s flight from Singapore to arrive. Called Hot Chick to let her know I’m in her state, and the woman swung her car around (she was nearby the area) to pick us up. That was so nice and generous, thank you so much!

Called Cheesie who was in Penang that day with Taka, but leaving for KL in the afternoon. Still had time for one last meal, so we went to Padang Kota Lama for…

Penang Aug 09 - 04 Hameed's stall  at Padang Kota Lama Penang Aug 09 - 05 Hameed's mee sotong at Padang Kota Lama

Mee sotong!!! Oh man, Hameed’s mee sotong at Padang Kota Lama was the first thing Shirley and I craved for when we returned to our respective homes last year. Took us one whole year to be able to eat it again, and it still tasted GREAT! Slightly spicy with a generous serving of cuttlefish. Super delicious, RM3.50 a plate. Goes down well with our coconut shake from the drinks stall nearby.

Padang Kota Lama’s food court is just next to Fort Cornwallis. The place looks a little run-down, but then that’s where you get the most yummy food! 😉 GPS coordinates: 5.4206, 100.3429.

After our (first) lunch, Hot Chick dropped Cheesie and Taka off somewhere because they needed to catch their flight home. We then went to Jalan Hutton because I’d booked a room at Hutton Lodge for the night. Why? Because I rely a lot on Trip Advisor, that’s why. A restored heritage building in the middle of Hutton Road, Hutton Lodge is clean, minimalistic and inexpensive. A twin room with an attached bathroom costs RM90 and dorm beds go for RM28 a night. Cheap or what? GPS coordinates: 5.4196, 100.3308.

Penang Aug 09 - 08 Hutton Lodge Penang Aug 09 - 12 Hutton Lodge, twin beds room

While Hot Chick was finishing up some work, Shirley and I walked along Hutton Road to check out the neighbourhood. By the way, I can safely say that Hutton Lodge is pretty much in the middle of town and it’s a good place to stay, location-wise.

Bought some drinking water at a 7-11 and spotted loaves of Gardenia Butterscotch bread. Shirley never had it before and wanted to try, so we got a loaf. Don’t think she was all too impressed, heh.

Penang Aug 09 - 16 Shirley with Gardenia Butterscotch bread Penang Aug 09 - 17 Shirley trying a Gardenia Butterscotch bread

After Hot Chick was done with her work, she took us to Lorong Selamat for… what else? Penang char kuey teow lah!

Penang Aug 09 - 19 Lorong Selamat, Heng Huat Char Kuey Teow stall Penang Aug 09 - 21 Extra spicy Char Kuey Teow, Lorong Selamat

The famous unfriendly auntie was still there, now operating next to an open car park. Apparently she is less unfriendly now (note the difference between friendlier and less unfriendly) because it’s her own shop and she can’t go around offending people, can she?? RM8 per plate, I think it’s worth it for a tourist like me. I know many Penang-nites would shake their head and refuse to pay that kind of price, but we don’t have the luxury of living in Penang okay! Of course the char kuey teow was super delicious! But I suppose most of you who have been to Penang have eaten there. GPS coordinates: 5.4171, 100.3247.

Hot Chick ordered a bowl of laksa lemak from the opposite stall, a mix of assam laksa and curry mee. It was superb! The gravy was super addictive and they were generous with the fish. RM4.50 per bowl, very worth it! Of course cannot eat this everyday lah, it’s akin to inviting a heart attack.

Penang Aug 09 - 23 Laksa Lemak, Lorong Selamat Penang Aug 09 - 24 Auntie selling meat floss, Lorong Selamat

An auntie came around our table to sell her goods, pork floss. She was really funny: went into songs and rhymes of how delicious her pork floss is, how you would be beautiful and wonderful after eating her ‘bak hu’, that she went to school and didn’t study so cannot be ‘cikgu’ (teacher) hence have to sell ‘bak hu’… It was quite delicious so we bought some from her. Of course her charms and saleswomanship were the more influencing factors, heh. She also readily posed for photos and told us to catch her on TV.

More food? Yes please. Shirley wanted some fehmes Penang cendol, so Hot Chick took us to Penang Road for THE famous cendol. GPS coordinates: 5.4171, 100.3306.

Penang Aug 09 - 25 Penang Road cendol Penang Aug 09 - 26 Suanie and Shirley eating cendol at Penang Road

It was nice, but I prefer Melaka-style cendol along Jonker’s Street. If you’d notice, they have a photo of Gurmit Singh as Phua Chu Kang eating a bowl of cendul at their stall. Think Shirley took a photo of that to show her dad.

Went back to Hutton Lodge for a short rest before dinner. I think we were knocked out for a bit. A couple of hours later, Hot Chick and Aaron came to pick us up for MORE food. We went to Zealand Seafood restaurant along Gurney Drive, which is owned by a friend of Aaron’s. Next door was also a restaurant with a stage for people to display their… uh, limited vocal abilities. Surprisingly they got a lot of customers that way. Anyway, check out our dinner!

Penang Aug 09 - 27 Seafood along Gurney Drive

Balitong, mantis prawns, kum heong lala, frog’s legs (which I didn’t touch), vermicelli, drunken prawns and grilled crabs. Fresh, delicious and inexpensive, though I suspect our bill was discounted because of Aaron. Check out the sign at the female toilet!

Bloody bottomless pits for stomachs we have, right? Here’s dessert! 😉

Penang Aug 09 - 33 Mango crepe with mango ice cream, Crepe Cottage Penang Aug 09 - 34 Strawberry crepe with strawberry ice cream, Crepe Cottage

We walked down Gurney Drive to The Crepe Cottage, kononnya want to walk off dinner so we’d have space for dessert. Don’t think it worked very well, but we downed everything at The Crepe Cottage because it was very yummy! Also had a lot of fun photographing the resident fat cat.

Penang Aug 09 - 32 Satanic cat

Can you eat as much as we did in one day? Heh. Second day in Penang: Parkroyal Penang and more food, of course.

More photos at my Flickr set for Penang, August 2009 here.

the great penang getaway: august ’08: day one

About a month ago, my dear Pinky was in town for a week for a short holiday before she begins work at a new company. She suggested that we go to Penang, as she’d never been there before. Obviously the main reason she wanted to go there was because she’d heard that they have really great food up North. You can take the Singaporean out of Singapore… 😛

I took a couple of days off work so I could go to Penang with Pinky. We took the Aeroline coach which departs from Corus Hotel at 8.30 a.m. (the ones at BU depart at 10.30 a.m.). While waiting to board, I looked up the sky and felt so happy when I saw this:

Penang Aug 08 - 01 Blue KL sky
Morning sky

Blue skies and nice fluffy clouds do weird things to me.

The journey was quite nice, as my sister had kindly loaned me her neck pillow. We reached Penang on time, and I made a call to HotPenangChick (HPC). She is this really awesome Penangite who reads my blog sometimes. After I blogged about feeling cheated by certain vouchers, she contacted me and asked if I needed help to get a decent hotel room in Penang at a decent price. She’d also offered to take us around in Penang for food and what-not. In short, HPC was a major, major reason why Pinky and I had such a fantastic time in Penang. In case I forget to write it down later (though I don’t think I will), thank you so much HPC. We really, really appreciate everything and more that you’ve done 😀

So HPC picked us up at the bus station and took us to Lorong Selamat for lunch. She, like every other Penangite I’ve encountered dislikes the tourist-famous Lorong Selamat char kuey teow, due to the haughtiness of the proprietress. Turns out that the tourist-famous Lorong Selamat char kuey teow is no longer where it used to be — the proprietress now has her own corner shop just selling char kuey teow. We wanted to taste other food as well, so we opted for the shop where the tourist-famous char kuey teow used to be. We had ais kacang and some lobak, Pinky had prawn mee and we both ordered a plate of char kuey teow each (another dude was selling it). I ordered mine with extra ingredients — check out what arrived on my plate:

Penang Aug 08 - 05 Suanie eating a gigantic prawn
z0mg the biggest prawns I’d ever seen!

After lunch, HPC took us to our hotel at the Hydro Majestic. We got the deluxe room (with breakfast) for RM 270 a night, quite decent. When we arrived to check-in, we got quite a shock because there were police trucks, cars and bikes all over the parking area. Later we found out that there was a police function/ training thingy at the hotel. Well, at least we’d feel safe that night… 😛

For dinner, we went to Gurney Drive and had assam laksa. It was bleurgh. I remembered a grilled cuttlefish stall at Gurney Drive which tasted fantastic when Jaime introduced it to me a few years ago. The stall is still there and we bought our fill.

Penang Aug 08 - 11 sotong bakar, Gurney Drive
Scrumptious sotong bakar/ grilled cuttlefish

We walked to Gurney Plaza and shared a bowl of beef noodles at a Taiwanese beef noodle shop, as recommended by HPC. Not bad. I can’t remember the name of the restaurant now though. Maybe later.

After loitering about at Gurney Plaza (including getting lots of stuff from Cold Storage and chilling out at Starbucks), HPC and her boyfriend took us to Restaurant Kapitan at Chulia Street. HPC claimed that they serve the best tandoori chicken ever, and ordered one to share along with a garlic cheese naan. Her boyfriend got a claypot briyani; we had a taste of it and it was absolutely delicious! I know I always claim that there’s no better briyani than Mat Shah’s in Batu Pahat; guess I have to revoke that one. But it’s different lah, as Mat Shah’s briyani is more Malay kampung type, and Kapitan’s claypot briyani is… uhm, more Indian, I suppose. Both are awesome and I wish I could have either one just about now.

Then came the garlic cheese naan and tandoori chicken…

Penang Aug 08 - 13 cheese naan and tandoori, Kapitan, Chulia Street
Hands down the BEST tandoori chicken I’ve ever had

OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG. OMG.

(That should be indication enough on how out-of-this-world the naan and tandoori were)

After supper, HPC suggested that we check out Momo, a popular club along Upper Penang Road. She parked her car at Cititel so we walked along a road dotted with eateries and pubs. Then out of nowhere, I heard someone yelled out my name. I looked around and saw Patrick! Hah! Of all places!!! Turns out that it was his last couple of days in Penang; he had been there for some time now to shoot for a movie, The Funeral Party.

Penang Aug 08 - 15 Pinky, Suanie, Hot Penang Babe at Momo
Pinky, Suanie and HPC at Momo

After a couple of hours at Momo, we decided to call it a night. Lots of activities planned for day two!

*Click here to view the entire Flickr set for ‘Penang, August 2008’, which includes photos not published here.