Week 11 - Malaysian

We love going out for Malaysian food, but it was challenging figuring out what to make for Week 11 because we didn't have easy access to a lot of the ingredients and didn't have time to get out to Queens just to look for them. Eventually I decided to make mee goreng based on a recipe from Rasa Malaysia, since we really like mee goreng and it had a doable list of ingredients.

I adapted the ingredients list a little bit for what we had and what we could find at the store, so here's what we used:

- 3 bundles of refrigerated Asian style noodles (maybe a little over a lb) ($2.40)
- a tbsp or so of canola oil ($0.20)
- 2 eggs ($0.33)
- 5 cloves of garlic, minced ($0.08)
- a couple cups of bean sprouts ($0.45)
- 1 long Napa cabbage, chopped in rounds and then in half ($1.94)
- 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts, chopped ($3)
- 1 small onion, chopped ($0.21)
- 1 bunch of scallions, about 1/4 of it thinly sliced for garnish and the rest sliced thickly on the diagonal ($0.67)
- 2 tbsp shaoxing wine ($0.10)
- 1/2 tsp white pepper ($0.05)
- fried onion for garnish ($0.30)

For the sauce (all amounts were a slight bit more than what was listed to make sure we had enough once we saw how much other stuff we had):
- 2 tbsp sriracha ($0.15)
- 1 tsp dark soy sauce ($0.10)
- 1 tsp sugar ($0.05)
- pinch of salt ($0.02)
- 3 tbsp oyster sauce ($0.70)
- 3 tbsp ketchup ($0.12)

That added up to approximately $10.87. It did make quite a few servings though, with leftovers for a couple of lunches, so that's not really a bad overall cost.

The steps for making the mee goreng (adapted from the original) were:

1. Prep - chop chicken, onion, garlic, cabbage, scallions, and rinse bean sprouts. Set a large pot of water on the stove to boil.

2. Add oil to wok over high heat and scramble the eggs until they are just setting.

3. During that time, cook the noodles. (Not sure how long since we might have done it a little too long, but even if we didn't, I still don't think it would have had the same texture as what we think of for mee goreng. More on that later.)

4. Add garlic, noodles, bean sprouts, onion, cabbage, chicken, and 3/4 cup of water to wok and stir-fry until everything is cooked.

5. Mix sauce ingredients (A thankfully did this so I could concentrate on the stir-frying) while the ingredients are cooking in the wok.

The stir-frying took much longer than the recipe said it would, but I think that was because we had way more stuff in the wok. For example, instead of 1/2 cup of shredded cabbage, we had 2 bowls. It took a while for everything, especially the chicken to finish cooking. It was worth it though to not skimp on the vegetables as they were the healthiest part of dinner.

6. Once everything is just about done, add the larger amount of scallions (the ones sliced on the diagonal).

7. After stir-frying for a minute or so, add the sauce and stir well. (At this point, our noodle mixture had gotten very thick. These noodles were so starchy that you wouldn't need any corn starch to thicken the sauce at all.)

8. Add shaoxing wine and white pepper, and mix together well.

9. Take off heat and add the remaining scallions.

10. Serve in bowls and add fried onion for garnish.

While this recipe was tasty as an Asian noodle dish, it didn't taste like any mee goreng we'd had before at restaurants. There was just some flavor in those versions that didn't find its way in here. I'm not really sure what that is, but maybe something like squid sauce or fish sauce since that was what was used in a restaurant version of mee goreng we talked about previously on the blog. That said, if you didn't think of it as mee goreng like we know it, but just as some spicy Asian noodles, they were pretty good. We liked the flavors, especially the nice kick to the sauce, and the adjustments I made to add onions, a lot more cabbage, and more scallions gave us a good amount of vegetables to balance out those starchy noodles.

As for the noodles, these are clearly not the noodles you would use for mee goreng but we couldn't find those in the refrigerated case at the Chinese grocery store and I certainly wasn't about to make my own noodles at home. The recipe called for fresh egg noodles, and the ones we got ended up being much thicker and more starchy. I kind of liked the noodles though, and used the rest up in another Asian noodle dish later, this time combining it with the Korean braised tofu from the previous challenge (which I made again; told you I make it a lot). It turned out pretty well there too. I would get the noodles again. I just wouldn't expect them to turn into mee goreng as we know it. All in all, this was a tasty experiment, even if it didn't turn out how we expected.

Coco Asian Cuisine

Midtown really needs a good Malaysian restaurant. I'm always craving Malaysian flavors yet there isn't anywhere really close by to get delicious dishes like mee goreng, Buddhist yam pot or rendang. One year ago today, we were out in central Jersey, and it was the perfect opportunity to grab some Malaysian food for lunch at Coco Asian Cuisine in Edison. (Coco apparently has a branch in Elmhurst as well but we didn't know that when we went. They also have Thai food but we (and everyone else we saw there) were there for the Malaysian food.)

The one thing we knew for sure that we were getting at lunch was roti canai, our favorite Malaysian appetizer.

Roti canai is a "Malaysian crispy Indian style pancake served with curry chicken and potato dipping sauce." The chicken here arrived a little more "whole" than some other places but was tender and easily broke up in the curry sauce. The curry was delicious, but wasn't as rich as some of the others we've had and it was thinner as well. The pancake was crispy and chewy in parts, and that soft chewy texture is one of the delights of roti canai (at least for us).

We debated between getting noodles or the $7.95 lunch special. The lunch special had a variety of dishes (mostly rice dishes), which came with soup as part of the special. We decided on the specials.

The soup was a simple vegetable soup - a flavorful broth with some cabbage and carrots. It was mild but good.

A chose the Hainanese chicken, described on the menu as a steamed half chicken with bone in at room temperature with chef's special soy sauce. We had tried Hainanese chicken in Singapore years ago and found it to be a really fresh and delicious dish.

Although I like steamed chicken like this, I was glad that A chose this instead of me because of how roughly they cut the chicken and how much skin there was. Not my type of thing. A was really disappointed with the chicken itself. Normal Hainanese chicken comes with a minimum of two sauces, and this came with one. A even emailed a picture to his brother and sister-in-law (who is from Singapore) and they both agreed that sauces were missing. The chicken was cooked okay, but the lack of sauces was really noticeable.

The rice that came with the Hainanese chicken was really nice, though. It was nice and rich, and the chicken flavor was very evident. The chicken stock also made the rice nice and fluffy.

I went with the string bean belacan with chicken, which was sauteed chicken with string beans, red and green peppers, and shrimp paste chili sauce.

It had been quite some time since I'd had belacan (the Malaysian shrimp paste) in a dish, mostly because we rarely get to go for Malaysian food. When we were living in Chicago and regularly visiting the late Penang (which sadly burned down after we left), we often got vegetable dishes that used belacan as one of the ingredients, and really enjoyed the pungent unique flavor. I was happy with this. It had great flavor and tasted healthy from all the vegetables. I would love to be able to make this at home.

Malaysian cuisine is a bit scarce in Manhattan and I'm not sure why. It's so delicious. With all the Thai restaurants everywhere in Hell's Kitchen, couldn't we just make one of them a Malaysian place? That would be amazing.

Coco Asian Cuisine is located at 1803 Lincoln Highway (Rte 27) in Edison, New Jersey.

Mee Goreng

Last week Malaysia Kitchen (the folks behind the food truck a couple of years ago) hosted a winter market at Bryant Park, bringing a number of Malaysian food vendors to Midtown.

Malaysian cuisine is hard to find in Midtown.  The closest places I know of are probably the Upper West Side branch of Penang and Singapura in Murray Hill, and then there are a few more spots in Chinatown. Considering how long the lines were at the winter market (so long that I didn't end up getting lunch there on the second day of the market as the lines were out the door), I think people were craving those unique flavors as much as I was. 

Even though some vendors had come a great distance (like Bentara from New Haven, a restaurant I loved there), I ended up getting lunch from Penang. A reasonable line, a reasonable price, and a reasonable portion size were important factors for me. (For the curious, the longest lines when I was there were for Nyonya (even though that's easy to get to in Chinatown) and Auria's Malaysian Kitchen (which made sense since it's much harder to get that - and they had chili crab sliders!))

Penang was offering mee goreng (Indian style pan fried egg noodles in squid sauce with egg, tofu, chicken, bean sprouts, fried onion and potato) for $6. It was tasty and was a good fix for my Malaysian flavor cravings, even though I have had better mee goreng at Penang itself and other places. Of course freshly made noodles are better. But it was wonderful to have a Malaysian food option at lunch when there currently isn't one. I love mee goreng... maybe a cookbook project is in my future!

Kari Ayam

The Malaysia Kitchen Food Truck is currently out at lunchtime in NYC and will be on the road (during the week) for the next month or so. The aim of the truck is to promote Malaysian food and restaurants, and they are giving out free food at their station each day.

Today I heard they were parked near Bryant Park, so I ventured over around 2. There wasn't much of a line at all since it was on the later side.


Since it's all free samples, they limit you to one per person. Not having more choices and not taking money also helps the line move faster (and it moves quickly). Although free giveaways usually mean a madhouse, this line was fairly short.


They did a great job with the truck itself. If I were doing one of those marketing surveys where you pick which design you like, this would be up there.


The choices for the day, coming from Fatty Crab (which I have always wanted to try but haven't gotten to yet), were between kari ayam (chicken curry) and nasi lemak (coconut rice served with sambal, egg and cucumbers). My first instinct was to get nasi lemak because, well, I like nasi lemak. But I also like chicken curry and thought maybe that would be more flavorful. So I changed my mind and got that.


But the chicken had more skin than it did meat:


The coconut rice was good. The meat that I did get had a very mild flavor but it was good when mixed with the rice. It was just disappointing that it was so much skin and bone, and not much actual meat on the chicken. I should have gone with my first instinct and gotten the nasi lemak. Oh well. But, really, can't complain too much - it's free!

I'll be keeping an eye out for their tweets to see when they're in the neighborhood next. I can't wait to try something else!