Sunday, July 19, 2009

Best Mee Goreng (fried noodle) in town - Mee Hassan

Just take your GPS and find this location N2 12.183 E102 14.097. The 'mee goreng' here is just so simple but yet so nice. When I said simple, yes, I do mean simple. The 'mee goreng' just consist of yellow noodle (mee) and bean sprout (tau geh), stir fried to prefection using oil and chili. However, their chili or sambal adds that special 'kick' to our taste buds making it the best mee goreng in town. If you still don't believe me, just pass by the shop and look at the crowd there every single morning. People will literary line up to be served.




This shop is famously known as "Mee Hassan" and located at Jalan Tengkera, nearby Melaka town. It's just situated beside the main road, so u'll be able to spot it easily. You can use gps(if you have one) to find it also.

Other than Mee goreng, they also serve nasi lemak. If you want to try their nasi lemak, come early. It can be sold out as early as 10 am. Btw, the 'mee goreng' also finish fast. Normally they will close shop before 12 pm. So this place is strictly for breakfast.




Price list:
Mee Goreng: RM1.40
Nasi Lemak: RM1.80
Fried Egg: Rm0.60

Location: Jalan Tengkera (near Methodist Girl School)
GPS Coordinate : N2 12.183 E102 14.097
P.S.:Updated on the price and opening time here

Sunday, July 12, 2009

Yee Wat Yong Tau Fu

If you come to Melaka through the Alor Gajah Toll, you'll definitely pass by "Restoran Yee Wat" on your way to Melaka Town. I highly recommend this shop as it serve delicious home made fish balls or 'Yong Tau Fu'. "Restoran Yee Wat" can literally translated as "Fish Paste Restaurant". Also, if you see on the left of the shop signboard, there is a logo, stating "Ivan's Ikan Parang". Ivan should be the shop owner name (correct me if i'm wrong) and 'ikan parang' is best type of fish to make fish paste due to it smooth texture and taste.

Yee wat yong tau fu

Yong Tau Fu shop in Krubung, Melaka


This shops is quite unique compared to other Yong Tau Fu shops found in Melaka. One of the reason is that you can order it with various types of flavours. Usually, most shops only serve 2 types, soup or dry. But here, you can also order tom yam and mee rebus flavour. Secondly, and the most important reason is that they make their own fish paste (using "ikan parang" I believe) and the taste is just superb. Yummy! Besides, there are also a lot of certificates and awards proudly hanged on the wall of the shop. This shows how good and experience the chef's culinary skill.

Yee wat yong tau fu

In Melaka, Yong Tau Fu is served with noodles


Yee wat yong tau fu

Tom Yam flavour Yong Tau Fu


Yee wat yong tau fu
Mee rebus flavour Yong Tau Fu


For those who doesn't know what is 'Yong Tau Fu', you can read the origin and description of it in Wikipedia here. 'Yong Tau Fu' (釀豆腐) literary translated as stuffed bean curd. Basically, it is a Chinese soup dish containing food item such as tofu (bean curd), 'tau ki' (soya sheets), 'tau pok (fried bean curd) and vegetables that are stuffed with fish paste or meat paste. Look at the pictures below and you'll know what I'm talking about.

Yee wat yong tau fu

Yong Tau Fu in soup

Yee wat yong tau fu

Mix Fried Yong Tau Fu with special sauce


Price : Reasonable and can be consider CHEAP if you're from KL or Singapore. Only RM3.20 per bowl and RM0.60 for each piece of Yong Tau Fu. So, what are you waiting? It's the best Yong tau fu in town.

Alai Ikan Bakar - Seafood by the river

Last weekend my family and I went to Alai 'Ikan Bakar' for dinner. For those who don't know what is 'Ikan Bakar', well it is a Malay word and it literaly translated as 'burned fish'. Just kidding, a better translation would be charcoal grilled fish. Sounds yummy rite.

Alai is our favourite place to eat 'Ikan Bakar'. It has a lot of choices of seafood and the price is resonable here. On weekends Alai 'Ikan Bakar' never fail to be packed with customers, both local and outstation. But that particular Saturday, the place strangely does not have so much customer as I expected. Anyways, lucky for us as less people means faster service:D Location wise, in fact Alai is not quite strategic as it is not in the center of town or even visible easily along the road. In fact is located quite deep inside and is situated just beside a river. Most customers know this place though the word of mouth. This just show how delicious the food there can be:P

alai ikan bakar
Alai Ikan Bakar river view


alai ikan bakar
Choose your seafood!

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There's so much variety

alai ikan bakar
Tables and chairs


alai ikan bakar
Price on that day




alai ikan bakar
The first thing that came was nasi lemak and otak-otak. I can't wait for all the food to arrive... so I ate first:P


There a various seafood that you can choose from:
-Fish (Jenak, Siakap, Pari, Kembung, Selar Kuning, Merah, etc)
-Clam (Lala, Scallop, Kerang, etc)
-Squid
-Crab
-Prawn
-etc.

Cooking method:
  • Bakar(Charcoal grilled)You should at least have one dish cooked this method. If not, wouldn't it defeat the purpose of going to Alai 'Ikan Bakar' and not eating 'Ikan Bakar', rite? (Note: If you saw the 'ikan bakar' picture below, please excuse it... i forgot to take the picture BEFORE we ate it.. i guess it was too tempting :D). Anyways, my recommandation, choose 'Ikan Jenak' a medium sized fish and ask the to 'bakar'(grill) it. Jenak is suitable as its flesh it thicker and juicer if compared to smaller fish. It is also a saltwater fish, so cooking this method is better compared to fresh water fish that might have a bit of the fishy smell. The best part of grilled fish is that you get the taste the original fresh flavour of the fish and able to dip it with their 'special' soy sauce. Definately a must try:)
    alai ikan bakar
  • Goreng Berlada (Deep fried with Chili paste on top)This is one of my favourite cooking method here. I love spicy food, and if you are the same then you definately try Deep fried with Chili paste on top menu.
    Photobucket

  • Goreng tepung (Deep fried with flour)If you thinking of cooking method for squid, you should definately try deep fried with flour. It's absolutely tasty. Photobucket

  • Asam pedas (hot and sour soup) Quite tasty actually. Should try:)
  • Sweet and sour (Tomato paste)
  • Goreng kunyit (Fry with tumeric powder)
    alai ikan bakar



Other food:

Otak-otak RM0.50 each

Nasi lemak bungkus RM0.70 each

Vegetables (not many choices)
Beverages:
Hot drinks,Cold drinks,Fruit juice,Coconut drink


Finally, here's the receipt. The owner was quite nice and gave us some discounts. Total paid, RM95:)
alai ikan bakar


Seri Muara Alai Nasir Ikan Bakar
Contact Number:016-6331373 / 012-2725310 /06-2634612
Address: Km 8, Alai, 75460 Melaka
Opening time: Dinner time
GPS Location: Coming soon ...

Friday, July 10, 2009

A Famosa Fortress or Porta de Santiago - A must visit

Similar to the Dutch Square, A Famosa is definately a must visit as is one of the most famous historical landmark in Melaka.

A Famosa Fort or also known as Porta de Santiago was built by the Portuguese in 1512 under the direction of Alfonso de Albuquerque. The name A Famosa means famous in Portuguese and it remains true till this day as it is still the most well known and biggest fort once built by the Portuguese in history. Originally, the function of the fort is to fense off the attack from Sultan Melaka (Sultan Mahmud) armies and also from Acheh empire.

However, the one that you can see today is only the remains of one of the four main gates of the fort. As Melaka experience various change of colonial powers (Portuguese, Dutch, British), the fort also undergone different stage due to this. Here's the story...

In 1641, after more than a century, Melaka was then took over by the Dutch (Dutch East Indian Company). The Dutch kept the fort, renovated and rebuilt it for their own use.

Years later, during the reformation in Europe, King William of Orange from the Netherlands handed over Melaka and other Dutch territories to British on a temporary term agreement. It was done to avoid these territories from being taken over by the French colonizer Nepoleon. However, the British too had the intention of keeping Melaka for themselves. Therefore, in 1795, before the temporary agreement came to the end, Captain William Farquhar ordered to destroy the fort to break down the Dutch defence.

The task of demolishing the fort was not easy as it initially thought. Using human strength of slaves and labourers to manually taking it down was not sufficient. Therefore, he then ordered gun powder and cannon to blast it all down. Luckily, if not for Sir Stamford Raffles and Lord Minto efforts to stop this devastation, there will not be any remains of the fort left in Melaka today.

The Dutch Square (Stadhuys and Christ Church)

If you have not step foot in the Dutch Square area, then you can't say that you've visited Melaka. It'll be just wrong, haha. Well, technically it's untrue. But it is one of Melaka most famous historical landmark. You should at least visit there once.



How do you know that you've reach the Dutch Square? Easy, if the surrounding building are all painted in red, then you can be certain that you've reach there.



There are a few historical landmark which you can find in the Dutch Square area:



Stadhuys : This building was built in the year 1650 as the center of Dutch administration and residence of the Dutch Governor and their officers. The structure truly reflects Dutch architecture in that time and is believed to the the oldest Dutch building in the East. Now, it is known as "Museum of History and Ethnography" which exhibits traditional wedding clothes and artifacts of historical Melaka.


Christ Church: Built in the year 1753 by the Dutch and it is the oldest functioning Protestant church in Malaysia. Inside the Christ Church you can find jointless wooden ceiling beam(each cut from a single tree trunk), a brass Bible inscribed with the first verse of St. John in Dutch, a tombstones written in the Portuguese language and a tiled artwork replica of " The Last Supper". It also still contains the original hand crafted pews (church long bench seat) and window dated back 200 years old. Later, during British occupation in the year 1795, the church was consecrated as an Anglican Church.


Both Stadhuys and Christ Church is opened daily for tourists from 9 am to 6 pm.