Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Cari more makan

Penang is a food heaven. The treasure hunt took us to Penang for the weekend. There were more than 45 cars joined the hunt. The hunters were on the prowl for good food after the hunt. While many were heading for the-best-in-town nasi kandar, I was heading to another location for this supposedly best in town cendol near Chowrasta Market in Penang Road.


After giving this cendol a try, I thought it was overrated. I didn't understand why some many people crowded around the stall. Maybe it used to be good before, but I felt that the quality has degraded.

There was another Penang Assam Laksa stall just besides the cendol stall. I was told that the assam laksa there was also quite good. So I tapau 2 packets back to KL for dinner/supper.


Then, my team headed to Sri Ananda Bahwan Restaurant for this banana leaf rice. The location is at the junction of Lebuh Penang and Lebuh China.


I must say I am quite skillful when eating banana leaf rice with my hand. And I like Indian food as well. Raj sometimes jokes with me that I am a half-Indian.

Anyway, on the way back to KL, Prasath recommended a better cendol in Taiping. So off we detoured to Taiping for this Ansari Famous Cendol.


This Ansari Famous Cendol has been around for 3 generations. This cendol was better than the Penang one. So it was definitely worth the detour for our afternoon tea time.

If you are interested to know the exact location of the good food above, you can drop a comment here.

Cari Makan Trail to Penang


Last weekend, I went on a treasure hunt organised by our company's sports club. I was on business trip since last Thursday and just returned home 8 hours before the flag-off. I wasn't sure I would be able to make it. But I did. The destination: Penang. The theme: Cari Makan Trail.

It was the first time since the last theSun Motor Hunt that I went treasure hunting. This time Raj & Doug couldn't join. So Prasath & I teamed up with Harin and Alex for this hunt. The CoC is Time Out Solutions.

Leg 1 was before Penang and Leg 2 was in Penang. Leg 2 was around Lebuh China, Lebuh Penang, Lebuh Campbell, Chowrasta Market and Jalan Kapitan Keiling. There were two challenges. Challenge 1: Make roti canai. Challenge 2: Eat Yau Char Kuay with wasabi topping.

After doing the same challenge in the Food Hunt last year, I knew I have to let my team mate to do Challenge 1. Prasath stepped up and did his best. Now I really appreciate the mamak that make us roti canai. It is not an easy job to make a perfect roti canai.

Anyway I did the second challenge which was eat Yau Char Kuay (crunchy type, not the soft type ok? Very hard to chew and swallow in short time) with wasabi topping in 90 seconds. As long as you finished eating, you would score some points. But it was not clear the scoring mechanics, i.e. how to score 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10. So after completing the challenge in slightly more than 90 seconds, I have little clue on how well I did.

Anywhere, fast forward to the results. We did quite poorly for the challenges, scored 11 out of possible 20. That resulted us to tie on points with the runner-up. We won on tie-break on Leg 1 score.

One interesting road safety question to share, worth 1 point.

Q4: Setelah lulus ujian amali calon dikehendaki memohon lesen memandu dalam tempoh:

A) 3 bulan
B) 2 tahun
C) 1 tahun

Pick your choice. Answer later.

Apparently now, there is a requirement to have one officer from the Road Safety Department to give a talk on road safety in the pre-hunt briefing two days prior the hunt. I didn't attend that as I was on business trip in Jakarta. But my team mate told me that it was not a pleasant presentation as the guy showed photos and video of fatal accidents. Not very pleasant indeed. I don't need to elaborate.

One more road question to share. A simple one really. Worth 3 points.

Q25. Which street used to be called the street of the "new maidens"?

Answer can be found in the sign below. Click the photo below for a larger image.


Anyway, I would like to say that the hotel that we stayed was Parkroyal Hotel in Batu Ferringhi. It was a nice hotel with good food and a nice beach. We enjoyed our stay very much.