Nyonya Food at Nancy's Kitchen ...... Melaka, Malaysia

Our Melaka road trip's foodie highlight must have been inside Nancy's Kitchen. If I ask everyone that has been in this trip, I bet everyone would have agreed and some may even suggest another day trip just to feast on Nancy's Nyonya food. We spotted Nancy's kitchen along Jalan Hang Lekir, a branch street along Jonker Street. That afternoon, the restaurant was filled and we only managed to queue for the popiah. We tried to make a reservation but was told that they don't take reservations. Fortunately, our conceige back at the hotel knew Nancy and managed to help us reserve a table in the restaurant.

We were seated on the second floor where we even spotted President Nathan in a photo on the wall. Service was quite good on the second floor, contrary to complains of service lapse in some reviews of Nancy's Kitchen. Many of us still missed Nancy's food and already started talking about making another trip up to Melaka.

We had almost 15 dishes and all within RM200 for 9 of us.

Cincalok Ulam - Fermented Shrimp Salad

A typical nyonya salad. The taste was too raw for me. It's an acquired taste.

Ayam Buah Keras - Chicken Candlenut

Nancy's signature dish that was pass down from generations. The chicken was cooked with candlenut and lemon grass that creates an appetizing flavor.

Sambal Prawn with Bitter Bean

Fried Egg Cincalok

Omelette fried with fermented shrimp

Laksa Nyonya - Nyonya Laksa

Thick and rich coconut base sauce that was very fragrant. HY who normally don't eat Laksa thought that it taste good.

Banana flower with Shrimp

This is the first time I ate the banana flower cooked in nyonya style. Interestingly refreshing taste.

Nangka Lemak - Jack Fruit with Coconut Milk

Cooked in various spices served with coconut and unripe jack fruit

Sambal Belacan

A tasty spicy chilli base dip sauce that is used with nyonya dishes.

Ngoh Hiang - Pork Fried with bean curd skin

Pork wrapped with bean curd skin, deep fried to have the crispy on the outside and sweet juicy pork on the inside.

Babi Pongteh

Stewed pork in slated yellow bean cooked with preserved soya bean and dark sweet soya sauce. This dish was half finished when I started to take a photo of it.

Popiah - Spring Roll

Steamed spring roll served with turnips, cucumber, fresh beans coriander leaf, eggs, garlic and manu other vegetables. A must try at Nancy's.

Pai Tee - Top Hat

Hat shaped cone filled with vegetables

Cendol Birthday Cake

It was HY's birthday, Ade and Jane actually got the kitchen to prepare a special Cendol treat. Ade bougt the candle stand that plays the Happy Birthday Song. HY looked quite touched by their gesture.

Cendol campur campur, all mixed up

Jalan Hang Lekir

Off Jalan Tun Tan Cheng Lock

Melaka, Malaysia

Tel : 06 2836099

Nancy's Kitchen Location

榮茂茶室 Yong Moh Dim Sum.... affordable dim sum and good pork bun

After a good night's rest, we all managed to wake up at 8am for Dim Sum to check out if the recommendations from the June edition of Her Style magazine's hold any truth. When we arrived at the place, I already liked what we saw, people filling up the tables in a old pre-war shop house and best of all, there was one big table waiting for 8 of us and the dim sum place is full house. There's no reservation here.

When we were at the table, the service staff spare no time in showing us the dim sum on a tray and we just took as many different types to fill the table. The dim sum stuff here was good for the very economical price that we paid. Eight of us ate to our fill and the result ..... RM56.

I would have to put the spot light over the meat bun. We saw a few old ladies at a table behind us eating only the meat bun. You know the feeling when you look at other folks table and peek at that special dish that they eat and you tell yourself that you have to try that. So we ordered two meat buns and we had to reorder again because they were so good. HY and I tried to share one at first and as I tore the bun into half, we realized that we spill the essence in the bun. All the juice that was locked up inside the bun spill out. When I ordered another one I started to eat it like how I eat the 'Xiao Long Bao', suck out the juice then eat up the bun. The bun was soft and the meat tender and tasted so good

Along with the dim sum food, there was even a plate of Ampang Yong Tau Foo.

32 Jalan Tukang

(Near Jonker Street)

Melaka, Malaysia

肥李 Restoran Lee .... crab specialist in Melaka, Malaysia

One of the hotel counter staff, Bill, who scored an 'A' with us for service, gave us some recommendations for good food. I can tell that he actually been to those places that he recommended by the way he can describe them. Bill pointed us to a crab specialist right at the entrance into Majestic hotel private car park (at the rear of the hotel) which was perfect venue for dinner as most of us were just slurring from our late afternoon nap or massage.

肥李 Restoran Lee was more like a local 'chi char' shop tucked under a shop house with 'no-frills' plastic chairs and foldable wooden table. The ambience was lively, very casual and also, no air conditioning except for wall mounted fans.

Lining on the wall of the restaurants were the different pictures describing the many ways that Restoran Lee can serve us our crabs. We chose the popular ......

鮮奶螃蟹 Fresh Milk Crab

This crab was cooked with milk sauce with the extra tint of piquant. The sauce wasn't too thick and hence it didn't feel at all cloying. A plate of toast was ordered for swiping up the sauce for a complete enjoyment of this crab dish.

鹽焗螃蟹 Salt Baked Crab

I prefer the way this crab was prepared as compared to the fresh milk crab. The sweetness of the crab came through with the salt that went with baking this crab.

Even though we did enjoy the crabs, I thought that they were a bit over cooked. The meat at the claws just made it over the edge of tenderness. However, the meat at the body where it joins the legs were alright. Don't think we can complain for the price we paid for the crabs. We ate only crabs for 'appetizers' and left Restoran Lee for Newton Hawker Centre for our mains. You heard me right. There is also a Newton Hawker Centre in Melaka.

155 Jalan Bendahara

75000 Melaka

Malaysia

Tel : +60 19 361 2008

Newton Hawker Centre ........ in Melaka, Malaysia

Wow it takes a trip to Melaka to make me realize that name Newton is not dedicated to the famous or rather, infamous hawker centre in Singapore. In Melaka, we chanced upon a Newton hawker centre, the old one. I read that there was a new and an old one. Lucky us, we came to the right one that served good hawker food. This Newton hawker centre is also a congregation of hawker stalls like the one in Singapore, just no giant prawns at exorbitant prices.We recommend the following ......

Claypot Rice

This claypot rice was cooked really fragrant and taste really good, down to the charred rice at the bottom of the claypot.

Satay

The satay at the stall here was self made and skewered on the spot. The marinate for the satay was "tekong", superb and very tender.

Oyster Omelette

The Oyster omelette was quite good and we added an extra RM2 of oysters topping.

Apart from the above, the wan ton noodles was very popular.

Corner of Jalan Parameswara and Lorong Bandar Hilir

中華餐室海南雞飯 Chop Chung Wah Hainanese Chicken Rice ........ Melaka - Malaysia

The first stop of our Melaka trip was a visit to 中華餐室海南雞飯 Chop Chung Wah Hainanese Chicken Rice. This Hainanese chicken rice shop is very popular. There is always going to be a queue no matter rain or shine. It was one of the must-try food places in Melaka. Do prepare to wait 30~60mins to get a table.

The chicken rice was rolled into bite size balls, the size of golf balls. Though fragrant, I thought it was a bit too sticky.

Chop Chung Wah's chicken was tasty from the sauce that was drizzled over it. The chicken was tender but not the most tender of Hainanese chicken that I've eaten. The savory sauce was the highlight for their chicken. It was good enough that 8 of us polished off 2 chickens.

Chop Chung Wah's chicken rice is located at the start of Jonker street, beside the river. As we walk into Jonker street, there were so many chicken rice shops, unlike Chop Chung Wah, they were all too commercialised by one look of their shop fronts. All of them definitely didn't have Chop Chung Wah's queue that was consistent no matter rain or shine.

Location : Shop house at the junction of Lorong Hang Jebat and Jalan Hang Jebat at the start of Jonker Street

Melaka, Malaysia