Cuisine and culture collide in Penang’s new walking tour for street food: When Mark Ng talks about Penang’s char kway teow, nasi kandar and curry mee, your instinctive reaction is to pay attention. Ng seems to know it all – the kopitiams where customers can savour George Town’s top temptations, the history of various vendors, and what makes each recipe so memorably enjoyable. Ng, who grew up in George Town, launched the tour in Penang’s capital city this past year. The affable 32-year-old personally guides each group, which roams George Town’s streets for four hours on any given morning.
Our first destination for breakfast was Lebuh Bishop’s Kedai Kopi Melo, which illustrated how George Town’s gastronomic heritage is shared among the city’s ethnic communities. We not only gobbled up a classic Penang Chinese favourite of toast slathered with kaya alongside half-boiled eggs for dunking, but also hungrily eyed the fried chicken and fish at the kopitiam’s nasi kandar stall run by Indian Muslim operators.“We’ll build up our flavours as we go along,” Ng promised after enlightening us on how kaya is made, and he proved true to his word.
Before long, we were feasting on fresh, fluffy nasi lemak in all its aromatic glory, served warm with hints of ginger and a spicy shrimp sambal, and hearty beef noodles with robust nuances at the Sri Weld hawker centre in Lebuh Pantai. While savvy travellers can probably find these culinary hotspots on their own, Ng adds an extra dimension to the journey, peppering the roughly four-kilometre walk with fascinating detours, personal anecdotes and historical trivia. Ng is determined to help travellers absorb not only Penang’s authentic cuisine but its culture as well.
In between sampling at least 10 dishes of different flavours, Ng will inform you that there are more than 8,000 shop-houses in George Town, and he’ll explain how they evolved as places where people worked downstairs and lived upstairs. He’ll elaborate on how to gauge whether a shop-house once belonged to wealthy residents based on its façade and tiles. Ng will tell you how Penang has changed over time and how some roads obtained their names. He’ll point out landmarks like the Kapitan Keling Mosque, St George’s Church and Kuan Yin Teng Temple, where his grandmother brought him to pray for good examination results in the 1990s. Weaving through alleys, he might take you to meet an 88-year-old joss stick maker (who’ll show you how he creates his craft by hand) and toddy sellers who’ve plied their traditional trades for decades.
“It’s not what the regular tourists might see,” Ng says, as he hands us wet wipes after we finish our final satisfying meal of smoky char kway teow and nutmeg juice on Carnarvon Street. “These are places that I would bring my friends to when they visit. This is my hometown, so let me show you around.” The Penang Harmony Food Trail tour costs 250 ringgit per person, or 50 ringgit per child, which includes the cost of food and beverages. The itinerary can be customised according to what visitors are looking for, with dietary restrictions noted. Advance bookings are required, with each walk limited to a maximum of eight people to ensure that Ng can interact with everyone.
Simply Enak website: simplyenak.com
The Eat Drink KL mobile app is now available, connecting restaurants & customers to promote a positive spirit of community.
Every restaurant on this app rewards users with a 6 percent discount, instantly & conveniently, everyday, all day long.
In return, users share photos of their experiences at these eateries, creating a new community of restaurant lovers.
For every transaction, at least RM0.20 will be channelled to a charity of the month.
Stay up to date: The Eat Drink KL newsletter is sent by email to subscribers every Monday; it's the Klang Valley's foremost weekly round-up of new restaurant openings, F&B promotions & other tasty tidbits.
Subscribe to Eat Drink KL Weekly for free via this following link:
Note to subscribers on Gmail: The newsletter will be in the Promotions folder of your inbox.
Check out the latest edition of Eat Drink KL: 100 Favourites, with 100 recommended restaurants for Jan-Mar 2016. This eBook is available to read or download at this link: http://issuu.com/eatdrinkkl/docs/ebook
Buckle your seatbelts: Eat Drink KL is partnering with Uber to take restaurant lovers on new adventures across KL & Selangor!
If you haven't used Uber yet, it's time to begin! For new users, just follow the steps below to redeem free rides:
1. Download the Uber app from the App Store, Play Store or Windows Store - and register your Uber account.
2. Apply the code EATDRINKKL as your first promotional code & you'll receive 2 Free Rides worth RM30 each.
3. Request a ride through the app and ride for free to any destination (with two ride values of up to RM30 each).
