Kuching: Popular Vegetarian Restaurant

The last restaurant we tried was one we found by accident. It proved to be a good find. It was named 'Popular' which proved a good name for us.

As soon as we entered we felt the difference in this venue from the others we had tried. It was quite spacious with room between all the tables. There were  tablecloths on them. The staff was dressed uniformly.

We were approached by a genial maître d’ who instantly made us feel welcome. When we asked that the friendly host suggest a meal for us he had hesitation in telling us what he would recommend. He was spot on for it was an excellent meal.

We had a soup which the maître d’ said was good for our health. It contained a host of ingredients and it was difficult to actually work out what the flavours were though ginger came through. It was light and refreshing.

For a green dish the host suggested midin but as we said we’d rather try something else he came up with a dish of a local green that was unknown to us.

Our final dish was of taro. Another very tasty one.

A dish of watermelon was supplied at the end to cleanse our palates. This was complimentary unlike the Thank Food which I guess would have charged for it.

While I still think the ‘rids’ at the Fook Khang was my favourite dish, I feel that Popular Vegetarian Restaurant would have to be the best of the four we had tried.

Kuching: Kek Lapis

Walking along the streets of Kuching I was often struck by the stalls that sold Kek Lapis (Layer Cake). These cakes, which are a feature of the local cuisine, are like pieces of art in cake form.

They are formed of layers of different coloured and flavoured cake, each layer added one at a time and cooked before the next one is added. The cake is thus built up layer by layer until the cake is complete.

For the more elaborate Kek Lapis, which have geometrical patterns inside them, two or more cakes must be made. These are cut up and added into the layers of the main cake as it is being constructed. Some of the results are most amazing.

When the cake is complete it is not particularly impressive looking but when it is sliced open the magic inside is revealed. 

Kuching: Fook Khang Restaurant

The next restaurant tried was the Fook Khang. We walked there but wished we hadn’t; it was much further than it appeared on the map.

The restaurant was well patronised—a good sign. We managed to obtain a table and when the waitress came to serve she was asked to suggest what might be a good meal. We did however stipulate that we wanted to have a dish of midin. She chose well for us with the other two dishes.

Midin is a local fern which I had been wanting to taste for some time but it was generally cooked with belachan. This one was also served with belachan but it was vegetarian. The midin was worth the wait. The fern is flavoursome as a green and retains a small amount of crunch.

The waitress suggested what was called ‘rids’ on the menu. I thought this was supposed to be ribs, but as we had the same name at another restaurant I’m not sure that I was right.  This dish proved to be my favourite from all the restaurants we eventually visited. The mock meat pieces were crisp and the sauce was rich.

We also had a handmade bean curd dish. The bean curd was made on the premises and not bought in. The curd was creamy and flavoursome like no other bean curd I had ever eaten before. As a contrast to the crispy rids, these soft pieces of curd floating in a gentle sauce were excellent.

Chinese tea accompanied the meal.

It was an exceptionally good meal chosen by the waitress. I can see why the restaurant was well patronised. And you can see by this shot of the table at the end of the meal just how much we enjoyed it.

Kuching: Zhun San Yen Restaurant

It had become quite clear that finding meals for a vegetarian was not going to be easy in Kuching. Looking into a tourist guide we found the names of two vegetarian restaurants. A friend gave us the names of two also. With one repeat in the two lists we now had three to try out.

The first was Zhun San Yen which was not far from the hotel. So this was first one that was tried out.

It was a buffet-style restaurant. There was a good selection of dishes to choose from. The food was pleasant, a little over-cooked but a nice selection of flavours and textures. As a place for a fast but satisfying meal this was a good choice.

I had lime juice to drink. This was a new sensation for me as it was flavoured with salt as well as sugar. The woman at the counter explained this as ‘Asian style’. I liked it.

The other drink is an iced tea.

Kuching: A Western Meal

One day on our way from Permai to Kuching we noticed a large new supermarket so we decided to investigate. It was huge and consisted of several separate buildings that seemed to be in an area that so far had not been developed. Everyone would have had to arrive by car—and they certainly did. When the area does become more developed it will be amazingly well situated.

There were numerous places to eat. We visited most of them looking for one that might have had vegetarian food—without any real success. So we had to eventually settle for one café that was not near any of the other food places. It was a bit more up-market and the menu had a selection of Western Food. This was also mainly not vegetarian. However I was able to get two items to satisfy my hunger: A cheese sandwich and French fries with mayonnaise.

It was here that I was introduced to a great cold drink that I was destined to have more of during the stay in Kuching: Teh C ‘Special’. It had three levels of different teas. The bottom was richly sweet and caramelly and gradually you worked your way up to the less sweet upper layer. It is a really special drink.

Kuching: A Kolo Mee at Carpenter Street

Carpenter Street

One day in Kuching we walked along the rather wonderful Carpenter Street. Once apparently a small lane, Coffin Lane, led from here where you had coffins made. Nowadays the street is largely the street to go to find furniture. There’s a large number of furniture streets along its length.

We stopped at the old Chinese Opera Theatre. The stage seems to have been retained standing grandly there, but in front where the audience would have been are now tables and chairs and food stalls.

My partner wanted to renew acquaintance with some of the food eaten as a child in Kuching so we decided to eat there. It is incredibly difficult to obtain vegetarian food at the local food stalls. However at one stand the lady said she would make me a dry Kolo Mee, that is, I could have the noodles without the meat broth.

That suited me so I was able to have the Kolo Mee. The noodles were fresh and subtly flavoured. They were topped with crunchy bean sprouts and greens. I thoroughly enjoyed my plate of noodles at the Chinese Opera.

Trip to Kuching

Kuching Trip: Permai

I’ve had a couple of weeks break from cooking as I went to Kuching in Sarawak, the Malaysian part of Borneo. So this is a report of the vegetarian meals I was able to obtain while on holidays.

Though Kuching was our main centre for the visit we spent the first five nights at the Permai Rainforest Resort in Santubong. This resort is ecofriendly and so cars are parked outside and you have to lug your belongings in. But it’s well worth it.

There are cabins, longhouse dorms and tree houses in which to stay. We booked a tree house that was excellent accommodation. About three stories high it was right in the treetops and a few metres off the ocean. It had a bedroom, kitchen and bathroom. The room was air conditioned and very comfortable. Sitting on the balcony you could look out at the squirrels in the trees and the occasional monkey.

There was a café on site which meant you didn’t have to go looking for meals elsewhere or carry your own foodstuffs in. Though not amazing in its meals the café was convenient, had pleasant staff and suited us for keeping the holiday low key and relaxing.

The vegetarian selection, as usual, was not extensive but it did the trick, though I was through it and had had enough of it by the end of the five days.

On the night we arrived we were hungry enough to order more than we usually would. We began with two fruit cocktails and they were really refreshing. Unfortunately on the second night we decided to have them again but, rather oddly, the fruit they used had been left out in the heat and the drinks had not been made cool so we had fruit cocktails that had been made with hot fruit. Unpleasant.

I then had a vegetable soup that, though edible, I knew I didn’t want to have again.

For mains I had a cheese omelette. It came with chips, cucumber and two sauces. The omelette was not too tasty. I think the cheese was one that didn’t go well with the eggs. The sauces were sweet; one was a plum sauce that clashed with the omelette.

All in all, though the first meal was not wonderful it was satisfying and we could hardly have expected haute cuisine in a reasonably isolated resort. And the setting was exceptional. The café had open walls so that we sat looking out through the trees to the ocean. After the hot muggy day the evening temperature was comfortable. With a situation like that the meal was somehow secondary.

On the following days for breakfast I had waffles with kaya

a mixed grill (giving the sausages to my partner)

pancakes and honey

and buffet (one day it was help-yourself buffet and this was all I could find that was clearly vegetarian).

The main meals that I had on subsequent nights were:

spaghetti napolitaine (rather like a tinned tomato soup with pasta and some vegetables added but quite tasty)

a vegetable omelette (somewhat like the cheese one but much better)

and another spaghetti napolitaine (much better than the first one—quite tasty—perhaps there was a different chef on that night).

On the final night we decided to go to the next door up-market Damai Hotel Resort for a slap-up meal.

To begin we had cocktails. These looked quite good and tasted reasonable though they were very light on the alcohol.

For an entrée I had vegetarian spring rolls. They looked attractive on the plate and were pleasant enough to eat even though they had very little filling.

My main course was an absolute disaster. I decided to have a pizza. There were several pizzas on the menu so I selected a margarita. It looked fine. The first bite proved to be very doughy. I tried a couple more and then gave up and scraped the filling away with the intention of possibly eating that. When the base was uncovered it was clear that the base was still raw. Yecch! My complaint to the staff brought no response at all. So I just ate the topping and left the thick, raw base.

When I compare the two eating places, Permai Resort and Damai Resort, I got far more pleasure from eating at the cafe where the casual style and pleasant staff, the view and the reasonable meals far outshone the over sophisticated, over priced poor quality meals at the Damai Resort next door.