Malaysia Days #9-10

Hi again to everyone who is still following along with our journey in Southeast Asia! Things are definitely not as exciting as the first two weeks of our trip, but we are still finding a lot of unique things to eat that we don't normally get in the US.

On Saturday, Derren's uncle from Kuala Lumpur was in town, so he took us out to lunch to Indian food. No one else in Derren's family will eat Indian food, so we rely on Uncle Chee Yeng to take us to one of the many Indian options! Derren's dad came along with us too, since he is willing to try Indian food too!

Here's a picture of the Indian restaurant that we ate at. It was actually somewhat expensive compared to the rest of the food that we have been eating in Ipoh - about 50 ringgitt ($16) for four people.

Here's another picture of the restaurant, with Derren, Francois, and Uncle Chee Yeng talking to the waiter about which curries we were going to order.

To accompany our lunch we had "teh tarik" (or pulled tea) which is an Indian tea. It was very sweet, and ice cold, and tasted delicious with the spicy Indian food. Derren and I had already had a cup of coffee at home before this, and then we actually went out for a cup of coffee after lunch. Needless to say, Derren and I couldn't fall asleep on Saturday night!!

And here is some of the curries that we ate. Starting from the left is dal (a vegetarian garbanzo bean curry), some meat curry (Derren doesn't even know what it was), then another vegetarian curry, then sweet and sour cauliflower, and finally on the right is a fake mutton (vegetarian) spicy curry. The crunchy chip things are a free appetizer to dip in the curries.

And to go with our curry we had garlic naan. This was hot and yummy. Not as thick as much of the naan I've eaten before.

On Saturday night, we finally made the trip to go get what Derren calls "old man noodles." This little wonton noodle restaurant has been around for a very long time, and in the front of the restaurant the "old man" is featured, making the bowls of noodle. The noodle is homemade, and this old guy makes every freaking bowl. People go there just to watch him. We had come here four years ago, and this is one of Derren's favorite places to eat. I recorded the old man making the bowls of noodles:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtUnBuEsNNc&feature=youtu.be
We had to wait more than 30 minutes for our noodles because this guys is so popular!

While we were waiting for our food, Derren and I got soy milk with grass jelly. The grass jelly doesn't have a lot of flavor, and is less chewy than tapioca balls that you get in boba drinks.
And of course, our bowls of preserved green chillis to eat with the noodle (not very spicy!) Yum!

This is what the noodles looks like. This is Derren's bowl (you can see a little bit of pork on it), but mine looked almost identical, minus the meat of course! At this restaurant you can do a "single" order of noodles, a "1 1/2 order" or a double. Derren's was a double of course!

And to go with the noodles, everyone else besides me eats these wonton noodles. Derren ate about twelve wontons just by himself. He really loves this place!

Then for breakfast on Sunday morning, we were woken up early to go out to eat with Derren's Uncle Chee Yeng, and the rest of the family. We went to this noodle restaurant which was quite busy.

Not only do they have noodle soup, but they have a similar "yong tau foo" set-up, where everyone shares the fried fish paste things (you can see all of the options on the left side of the picture).

Derren had curry noodle soup - it looks so spicy to have for breakfast, but Derren really enjoyed it!

And of course, I got plain noodles. These are the "rat tail" noodles - very thick and chewy.

 
And here's the stuff that everyone shared - fried bean curd and fish paste.

Since we had such a filling breakfast, for lunch we had Derren's Aunt Wendy's homemade dessert soup. I took a picture of Derren's mom and aunt, and Derren in the kitchen before we ate the soup.

This soup was made with LOTS of coconut milk and little balls of wheat (it basically looked and tasted like barley). It was very rich and delicious. I engorged in three small bowls, knowing that I probably would never get it again for a VERY long time, and it was one of my favorite things that I've eaten this trip!
Thanks to his aunt for making this famous recipe of hers!

And for dinner we went back to a restaurant that we ate at earlier in the week. We had to drive more than 30 minutes to get to this place, but it was Derren's uncle from Australia's last night in town, so he wanted to go all the way there for the homemade noodles. So for dinner...more noodles and fried bean curd with fishballs.

And for dessert, I had another helping of kaya rice waiting for me at home.I finally remembered to take a picture of this tasty delicacy before I devoured it. Unfortunately this is an ugly looking kaya rice - they usually aren't all smashed, but this one was more than a day old, so it wasn't as pretty. :( It still tasted pretty good though!

Derren and I have only one more week in Ipoh, and then will head back to Kuala Lumpur for a couple of days before our flight leaves next Tuesday. Derren is making a mental list of all of the places he wants to make sure to go before we leave town. So lots more to come! We miss you all! Please keep in touch and leave us comments to tell us what you think! I miss hearing from everyone. :)

Ashley & Derren