Gerai Mei Wah, Tawau

I believe many people heard of Crispy Fried Noodle "Heong Dai Mai Fun". It was done by firstly deep fried the rice noodle until crispy and then poured on with delicious gravy.

What so special about Gerai Mei Wah's Crispy Fried Noodle is that the noodle is deep fried covered with eggs to make tastier. Not only that, the gravy was slowly cooked until you can see small pieces of meat floss in the gravy.

Gerai Mei Wah is located at the Sabindo food strips next to the Tawau-Kota Kinabalu bus station in Tawau. However, there are other stalls that sell similar noodle with different styles of cooking. I still prefer Gerai Mei Wah which is situated at the corner nearest to the bus station. Give it a try and leave you comment. Enjoy!

Confusing Menu

After touching down from Labuan, my friends and I went to a popular restaurant to have our lunch. Looking at the menu, I can't find one of the popular dish in the menu...the Steamed Fish Head in Black Bean Sauce. Then I asked one of my friend and she pointed out at the Chinese Characters which does not translate to what I wanted. As I cannot read Chinese, she double checked by reading out the Chinese Characters to me and suprisingly it's the dish I wanted to order which the English name wrongly transalated to "Black Pepper Steam Fish Head". hmmm.....

After we thoroughly studied the menu, we found more wrongly translated dish names. See if you can regconise it:

I don't have a good English either, however wrong translation here is too much. If will be very dangerous for a person who cannot read Chinese to dine here as the chances of ordering the wrong food is very high. I believe it is very important to get the menu right for all the customers both Chinese educated and English educated.

The Boss Fast Food & Juice House, Sandakan

Sandakan, frequently referred to the town of good food. After few months stopped blogging, today I am going to introduce you, The Boss Fast Food & Juice House. Situated in Bandar Indah, Sandakan, this restaurant serves variety of selection normally served only in restaurant's main dish menu; like Fried Prawn with Salted Eggs; but with single individual portion. Even you go there alone, you are still able to order dishes usually for above 2 person without leftover.

Thus, it is popular among working class who love good food but have limited lunch break.

I have tried a variety of their dishes like Hainanese Chicken Rice, Fried Rice, Fried Noodle, Fried Egg Plants, Fried Prawn with Salted Eggs, Rice with Prawn Omelet, tom yam soup and etc... All reasonably good taste and reasonably priced.

My favourite dessert will always be their Mixed Fruits and Jelly ABC. The crushed ice serves with fresh local fruits combined with jelly and red beans, topped with sweetened milk simply irresistible especially on a hot afternoon. However, make sure to order a "less sweet" or "kurang manis" version unless you really like sweet stuff.

Not much to comment as all food are averagely good. Worth to give it a try.

Nam Chai Restaurant Bah Kut Teh, Sandakan

Bak Kut Teh, Malaysia's own invention, is where pork is cooked with Chinese herbal soup. There are various styles of cooking. The most popular is the Klang styles where the soup is darker in colour and usually less soup compared to the KL styles.

In Sabah, people will prefer more soup. Ordering extra soup is the most common thing we will do when eating Bak Kut Teh. The style of cooking is a bit different from the one from West Malaysia. Not only more soup, its also milder in taste.

However, Sandakan is one of the popular place for its unique style of Bak Kut Teh in Sabah. The most popular is the white pepper soup base. Not only that, being cooked with seafood also make it unique.

Sandakan's Seafood Bak Kut Teh is cooked using a selection of fresh seafood in white pepper soup base. Customer have the choice of prawn, fish fillet, rabbit fish, fish ball and etc. All are served in individual serving/bowl. Thus, you can either order single selection in a bowl or mix it e.g. fish fillet and prawn.

The seafood being served are not only fresh, they are of good quality too. e.g. big prawn.

If you don't like seafood, they also serve traditional Bak Kut Teh selections like pork ribs, pork belly, pork intestine, pork kidney and etc. Sounds normal but with the white pepper soup base, its something special and worth a try.

My personal preference, I think their cook the best Bak Kut Teh pork ribs. It was cooked at the right timing where the meat is still tender and smooth. Not the over cooked rough type. They also uses only spare ribs not pork bones for soup. That also make it taste better as spare ribs has a smoother texture compared to soup bones.

Another special thing about Sandakan Bak Kut Teh, customer can either enjoy their delicious Bak Kut Teh with rice like normal, or they can choose to eat with noodle. My favourite is rice noodle. They too are cooked with Bak Kut Teh soup.

There are various popular Bak Kut Teh places in Sandakan. One of my favourite is Nam Chai Restaurant Bah Kut Teh situated at Bandar Nam Tung (Tanah Merah).

Bak Kut Teh in Sandakan is served both for lunch and dinner. Please try and give your feedback.

Syn Ming Hing Cafe & Cake, Sandakan

Many Sabahans like to "Yum Cha" or having a drink at coffee shops. Usually around 3-5pm, to have a break or simply building rapport with clients. People usually will go for kopi (coffee), teh (tea) and etc... and most of the time will complement it with confectioneries or pastries like roti kawin (bread with butter and kaya), cakes and etc.

Syn Ming Hing in Sandakan is one of the popular place for "Yum Cha". Located in the city centre, it is popular for its delicious cakes and pastry. Its something like restaurants and cafes standards but served at coffee shop at affordable price.

My favourite is their cakes, especially those with sponge cake base and chiffon, where it very soft and spongy. To my experience, this the place that serves the best coffee shop cakes.

If you want to try, please go before 4pm for better variety as its going fast.

Taiwan Restaurant, Kinarut

Many people does not realise the existence of a Taiwanese restaurant along the way to Papar from Kinarut. When heading to Papar from Kota Kinabalu, there is a small signboard on the right-hand side with the name "Taiwan Restaurant" pointing to the direction of a small junction leading to the restaurant.

Many people when reaching the car park, are surprised with the uniquely simple design of the restaurant. It's an opened concept with no fancy layout, furniture and even without air conditioning. All it has is natural sea breeze as it's situated on the beach front.

Well, anyway, who cares about the design and layout if it serves good food. Well, the serve ONLY good food. Service? No way! Don't expect any good services except good food in this restaurant. Surprisingly, many people are willing to tolerate the type of services for the exchange of good food. One of them is me, myself.

The most popular dishes they serves is the Braised Pork Trotter. Slowly cooked for hours until all the sauce being soaked into the meat makes every bites a sensational taste. Uniquely, it is cooked with pineapple to gives a bit of extra kick in the flavouring. Best served with steamed rice.

If you planned to go and try their pork trotter, make sure you go with at least 4 person; else, the owner will REFUSE to serve you. Reason being you can't finish the big portion and you will waste the food. Funny isn't it? No matter how you argue, or telling them you are big eater, she just won't serve you the amount of food she thinks you cannot finish. That is why I cannot show you the pictures of more delicious food from this restaurant like their popular Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup, Stir Fried Fragrance Mushroom and etc.

Well, want to try strange services with good food? Just pay a visit on the way to Papar, Beaufort or Sipitang. Last but not least, I also found their blended chilies are unique too. They added in preserved soya bean in the mixture of chilies.

Lok Kyun Restaurant, Tuaran

During my outstation trip to Kota Belud, I usually stop by Tuaran town for lunch. Tuaran is the town for the popular Tuaran Mee (a hand made egg noodle). Tuaran Mee is not only popular among the locals, many of my friends from West Malaysia, Sarawak and Brunei like it very much too.

Tuaran Mee is a hand made egg flat noodle. The texture is tender and usually fried to covered with eggs. It's usually cooked with simple ingredients like BBQ Pork (char siew), eggs roll, veggies and pork. Some stalls might use a more expensive ingredients like prawns.

Although it's very popular, many people when asked, are unsure of the origins of this Tuaran Noodle (the shop that invented it) because too many people are selling it due to its popularity. However, when one visited Tuaran town, many will be introduced to Lok Kyun Restaurant. It's noodle is hand made by their own restaurant. This restaurant has been visited by Jason Yeoh (Ah Sien), the host of Astro AEC's Taste With Jason which introduce good food around Malaysia. When one visited the restaurant, one can see all the pictures taken with Jason and posters around.