Taipan USJ re-visited

It’s been more than 6 months since we moved out from USJ and we missed the food at Taipan. So, last weekend we decided to re-acquaint ourselves with some of our favourite hawker offerings there.

The Yat Wo coffee-shop in Taipan (at the corner facing RHB Bank) has always been our firm favourite. Previously it was known as Hup Yik. We ordered our usual gastronomic delights:

Pan Mee
I always go for the “pinched” version, ie pieces of pan mee torn with the fingers, vs the strips-type rolled out from the machine. This stall serves one of the best versions. The pan mee is smooth and thin enough. What’s even better is their very flavourful soup which was the result of pork stock and cha choy. It comes with generous portions of sliced mushrooms, minced pork and lots of sweet pucuk ubi. The fried ikan bilis (very fresh & crunchy) is served separately in a sauce dish, next to their sambal belacan. I like it that the ikan bilis is not dumped into the pan mee, which most people do, as I get to savour the crunchiness of it. Each bowl of pan mee costs RM3.50

Curry Chee-Cheong-Fun
This stall is manned by a husband and wife team. I usually go for their variety of fuchooks (beancurd rolls), bittergourd and chee-pei (porkskin). The curry sauce is very tasty, with sufficient santan and when soaked in the smooth chee-cheong-fun, it’s just heavenly. The price of the yong taufus varies from RM0.80-RM1.00 per piece and the chee-cheong-fun is RM1.20 per sheet.

Fried Kway Teow
This may not be the best fried kway teow in the country but it’s certainly one of the most meticulous ones! You can see that their crunchy fat taugeh have had the tails removed! This may be a common practice in a 5-star hotel outlet (maybe) but which hawker stall bothers to do this?? For that, I think they deserve being commended. Each plate costs RM3.50.

Roast Pork
The chicken rice stall serves chicken (of course), both steamed & roasted types, cha siew and roast pork. Their roast pork is done to perfection - crispy skin and the meat just nice (not too fat or too lean). A single portion of roast pork is RM3.50.

Fish Village Steamboat

Fish Village Steamboat Restaurant

28 & 30 Jalan Bandar 13

Pusat Bandar Puchong

47100 Selangor

Tel: 58822838/012-3775439

This steamboat place is one of our favourites. We have been going there for years now. It's located in one of the row of shops in the Tesco Puchong commercial area.

Their ingredients are all seafood-based - there is no meat served. Their fishballs and different variations of fishpaste are all very fresh and succulent. Besides steamboat, they do serve fried meehoon with either fish fillet, lala or crabs.

Additional portions of Fishcake & Fishpaste

Their steamboat set is RM12 per head. It comes with enough fishballs & fishpaste, fresh prawns, fish fillet, sui kow, foochook, white tofu, vegetables, egg and crispy noodles.



We ordered 2 fresh crabs (RM36) and after we have dunked them in the soup, the soup was really one helluva delicious! The crabs were fat with roe and when boiled in the soup till just right, the roe and crabmeat just melt in the mouth!

See how succulent the crab is?!

My favourite Young Coconut

Banana Leaf Rice @ Paandi

Restaurant Sri Paandi PJ
37 Jalan 11/4
46200 Petaling Jaya
Tel: 7960 0576



Hot on the trail of Banana Leaf Rice, we decided to give Restaurant Sri Paandi a try. This restaurant was reported to be in some kind of rivalry with its neighbour some time ago... it was all reported in the papers!

The purple-clad service crew were all very efficient. The moment we were seated, the banana leaves appeared and several pairs of hands then served the vegetables, crackers, rice and curry in lightning speed. Besides the papadam, they served us some tapioca crackers. There were at least 3 different type of vegetables. We declined the sour rasam.

The service crew then came by with a tray on which were small plates of all kinds of dishes (kinda like the dim sum trays) and we chose the fried sotong, fried bittergourd and dry mutton curry.


We also ordered a piece of fried tenggiri and chicken thigh.



The portions were all more than generous and we could hardly finish all the vegetables. The fried tenggiri and chicken were well-marinated and fried crispy on the outside but tender inside.

The fried sotong would have tasted better if it had been freshly fried - it was cold by the time we had it.


The bittergourd did not disappoint and I polished off the whole plate.


For all those dishes for 2 persons, with unlimited rice and iced water, the bill came up to RM29.50.

Nasi Lemak from Kemuning Pasar Malam

Every Wednesday and Saturday there is a pasar malam at the Anggerik Vanilla town area. One of the star stalls there is the Nasi Lemak vendor which always has a long queue. The innovative stall owner has even put up proper queue signages for the customers!

You can't miss the stall - just look out for the long queue and follow your nose - they fry their chicken at the stall!

They have a whole range of dishes to go with their fragrant rice - besides the fried chicken, they have rendang ayam & daging, sambal sotong, kerang etc. Our favourites are the fried chicken, rendang daging and sambal kerang.

What is also good is that they pack the sambal separately for you. Their sambal is a bit on the sweet side but it goes perfectly with the nasi. A standard packet of nasi lemak cost RM1.50 and the dishes can be anything above RM2.

Dim Sum @ Yuk Mun Lao

Yuk Mun Lao Hongkong Dim Sum
67-69 Jalan Batu Nilam 5
Bandar Bukit Tinggi
41200 Klang


Bandar Bukit Tinggi in Klang is a bustling township and full of eateries. It seems a new outlet mushrooms there every week! With hypermarkets like Giant and Tesco in the vicinity, the place crawls with traffic at all hours of the day.

Yuk Mun Lao HK Dim Sum is located just across from Giant hypermarket and parking can be quite a challenge along this busy road.

We were there on a public holiday, just after 9am and the place was full. Their service staff were dashing all over the place, clearing tables, bringing food, topping-up teapots etc. We got a table fairly quickly and once seated, the steaming baskets of goodies immediately appeared. Very soon our tables were overladen with plates and plates of good stuff.

Yuk Man Lao serves the usual gamut of dim sum. Particularly good are their Egg Tarts, which just melt in the mouth;

their Loh Mai Kai which was very “full-bodied” with lots of ingredients;

their Yam Puffs - crispy skin/batter, fluffy yam paste and delightful fillings;

their Fried Sesame Balls - crispy yet chewy skin and very generous amount of lotus paste filling;

Fish Paste Beancurd Roll...

and their Steamed Pork Ribs (tender juicy morsels well-marinated steamed with black beans and green chillies). The only item we had to wait quite a bit was their Radish Cake Fried with Taugeh. It was well worth the wait as the delicious Radish Cake was fried with generous amounts of taugeh, eggs and choypoh.

Cha Siew Rice in Sect.17 PJ

Choon Yien Coffeeshop


This Cha Siew Rice outlet in Section 17 PJ has many followers. It's located in a corner coffeeshop - Choo Yien is the name - beneath the flats in Jalan 17/13 (which is nesxt to the SK Sri Damai). The place starts getting busy as early as 11.30am for lunch and if you go there after 12.30pm, you can be sure the place is not only full, but almost every table will have people waiting for it! It's run by 2 brothers, one who chops the meats and the other is the order-taker cum promotions manager! This guy is very vocal, mingling and joking with the customers besides attending to their orders.


Their Cha Siew is their mainstay dish. It's not hard to see why. The strips of roasted meats drip with their sweet mollasces which had completely infused the tender meat. The layer of fat in the meat practically melts in the mouth. Very often the customers order double portions and some even tapau them. For bigger orders, it's wise to call the promotions manager to book the meat first.



Besides Cha Siew, they also have roast chicken and roast pork. The chickens are roasted at the back and they come to your table with their crispy skin still hot! The roast pork disappears very fast as the crispy skin is obviously a great delight to the customers.



They use the chicken bones etc to cook the Sour Vegetables. All the left-over meats are boiled with mustard leaves (kai choy), dried chillies and assam pieces. The resultant sour stew is a great appetizer. Besides this sour veg, they also have the obligatory boiled greens like sawi with oyster sauce.


Their prices are not exactly cheap. One long strip of Cha Siew goes for RM14. For 2 persons, cha siew + roast chicken + roast prok platter costs RM14 too. Sour vegetables is RM3 for a single portion.

Fu Yuen - simple dinner

Fu Yuen Seafood Restaurant
No.37 & 39 Jalan Anggerik Aranda C 31/C
Kota Kemuning
40460 Shah Alam
Tel: 51228290


Fu Yuen Seafood Restaurant looks like just another neighbourhood joint. Their tables are decked out in the typical pink tablecloths and the must-have red chinese lanterns streamed across one end of the room.

Service was fast. The Fried Rice with Salted Fish appeared just after it was ordered. The portion for 2 was very generous. The fried salted fish (also very generous amount) were sprinkled on top of the rice, which was full of "wok hei" and very flavourful with cha siew, eggs and long beans. This is one fried rice you can be sure I'll go back for!


The Crispy Fried Squid was encased in a very crunchy batter and the squid was succulent, not at all chewy, which is very important. Chewy texture would spoil this dish!

Their house speciality - Beancurd with Minced Meat was very nice indeed. The square slab of beancurd was fried crispy on the outside by slippery smooth inside. This was topped with minced meat and choy poh with a light sauce poured over it.

We had a plain vegetable dish - Kangkong with Garlic. Nothing extraordinary about this dish but I liked the plainness of the flavours.

Fried Glass Noodles was the last dish. It was tossed in sotong, eggs, taugeh, cabbage, chinese celery - very fragrant. The noodles were a bit chewy though - they need to soak it a bit longer, I guess. By this time we were quite stuffed so we had to tapau it back home.

The bill didn't give itemised prices. For all the above dishes, for 2 persons plus chinese tea, the total was RM49.90.