So I left Saigon for Cambodia about three weeks ago. I was on a definite food high by then, having found more local stalls and treats around Saigon and also making my first and only restaurant stop in Vietnam. The restaurant was pretty damn good, and not expensive at all. I had some amazing tuna steak cooked with lemongrass and prawns in satay sauce that were unbelievably tasty. More than that though what really struck me was the freshness of the ingredients and how simply they were cooked, with no pretention or attempt at disguising anything - just simple recipes cooked well and with fairly copious portions considering.
As I said before I wasn’t quite sure what to expect in Cambodia, of all the spots I was hitting it was the one place which cuisine I didn’t know much about. As it turned out it wasn’t the most amazing, though I did find some interesting things. Cambodian cuisine seems to be primarily Khmer in origin, which would make sense. But it’s quite different to its Thai neighbour, also Khmer in origin. Thing is there wasn’t that many Khmer spots around.
While in Sihanoukville I didn’t really see any traditional Khmer spots, and I had to wait till I got back to Phnomn Penh for a real taste of traditional Khmer cuisine. Still I indulged while on the coast. I hit a couple of street spots which were interesting. One offered a noodle soup not too dissimilar to Vietnamese Pho, but with a slightly different broth which was a little less tasty. The other spot I hit was a kind of road side grill, positioned right by the town’s main roundabout not even a meter from the road. That didn’t seem to bother the locals who I noticed were all gathered around the 3 or 4 stalls until late at night, eating and drinking. So the next day I checked it for myself and found it was just a simple grill stall with an old woman cooking up all sorts of skewers, including what looked like chicken feet (or some sort of feathered animal’s feet). I knew about cooked chicken feet but never actually saw them grilled. I wasn’t particularly feeling adventurous and didn’t like feet when I first had them so I didn’t try my luck, but the rest of the grilled meat was pretty tasty. The skewers were done in a very simple manner, which seems to be the main thing with most street stalls in South East Asia and personally I like that. They had a bit of a marinade/rub on them and were grilled to your taste with a plate of herbs and salad to eat with. Not the most exciting but definitely one of the best street grilled food I had in my time in Asia.
The main thing Sihanoukville was good for was the seafood and fish. Spending days on the beach doing sweet nothing, you’d see locals walking up and down with little portable bbqs and offering freshly caught squid and shrimp for like a dollar or two. I tried the squid which was ok, again done really simply. The thing though was that they don’t clean them out before cooking them, so you need to remove the inside of the squid’s upper part, which when you don’t know is a bit of a shock on the first bite! The main daytime food in my time there was actually spring rolls, ironically enough. There was this one woman selling a selection of fresh, fried and grilled rolls for a dollar a pop with sauce and garnish. A winner and it meant I could continue to indulge in my spring roll addiction. They weren’t as nice as the Vietnamese ones but definitely worth it.
In the evenings is when the real food attraction started, as all the beach bars started their own bbq and happy hours, offering fresh fish and seafood (as well as meat but why would you want that when sitting on a beach) grills for a couple of dollars and beer for 50 cents. The kind of winning combination that is irresistible. The grills weren’t anything crazy, continuing the whole simplistic approach to cooking, but again the ingredients is what made it. Fresh fish and shellfish cooked on a big grill and served with salad and potatoes. Definitely some of the nicest grilled fish I’ve had. I tried the red snapper on my first night and it was delicious, really tasty even without any spices or herbs.
Overall the south coast was definitely a nice continuation of my culinary adventures, just a little less exciting than Vietnam and with a lot less choice. I headed back to Phnomn Penh for a few days, hoping to be able to indulge in some more interesting and fascinating eats, only to be denied by a nasty stomach bug. It was all my fault though. I stopped at a street stall a few hours after arriving in town, and decided to grab a roll and some fish cakes, which were deep fried. Big mistake, and I guess the fact that giant cockroaches were walking underneath the stall should have set off some sort of alarms in my head. Ah well, the fried food sent me off a few hours later and I spent the next 4/5 days unable to really enjoy much of the food. But that didn’t stop me. I checked out the night market in Phnomn Penh, which looked pretty good and very similar to what you get in Vietnam in terms of street stalls. The next day though, despite feeling rough and sick I went to this restaurant which did Thai and Khmer food. My only taste of traditional Khmer cuisine ended up being a pretty tasty and surprising salad of banana blossoms and chicken. I’m still not quite sure what the banana blossom actually was, but overall the salad was really nice. Fresh, colourful and tasty, the blossoms and leaves were mixed with chicken, peanuts and fresh herbs. Shame I couldn’t enjoy it as much as I normally would thanks to the bug. Ah well.
I left Cambodia sick and pissed off and headed to Malaysia and Borneo for about 9 days. In between bouts of being severely fucked off with this bug, I was intent on finding and enjoying some traditional Malay food. I stopped over in Kuala Lumpur on my way to Borneo, but without enough time to really get my food on or explore too much. Once in Borneo though, what I got was very different to what I expected.
Instead of Malay cuisine, or what I expected to be Malay cuisine, I found a lot of Indian and Chinese cuisine with a Malay/Borneo twist, which mainly included using a lot of fish and seafood instead of meat. As I mentioned in the other post about Borneo, I got past the surprise pretty quickly when I realised that Borneo’s population was such a varied mix of ethnic groups, and decided that if I couldn’t have what I thought was traditional Malay food I might as well make the most of what was around me. So in the end I spent most of the week eating Indian food, which was nice as I haven’t actually had a lot of the more traditional Indian dishes since leaving Europe nearly 2 years ago. I indulged in plenty of rhoti, which was delicious, as well as various curries including a cuttlefish one which was really nice. I’ve never really done fish curry before, but this one was not only tasty, it was actually really interesting as the cuttlefish feels more like squid meat than fish meat, giving it a rubbery texture that’s nicely balanced by the mild but flavoursome curry. Another thing I discovered while there was thosai, a kind of Indian crepe stuffed with lentils and rice. When I actually got it, it reminded me of galletes more than crepes, with a darker look on the outside and stronger taste than your usual crepes. The simple stuffing I had, which I think was a sort of rice and lentils paste, complimented it perfectly as did the little side dips.
I also tried some of the Chinese dishes while there, but I should have heeded the warnings of someone who said it was pretty average. I tried a fish dish which turned out to be possibly the worst thing I’ve had on the whole trip, really bland and unappetizing and what’s more it looked like they’d cooked the cheapest and nastiest kind of fish possible too. In the end my week in Borneo ended up being mostly about Indian food which was unexpected but really enjoyable. I didn’t try the local breakfast which is a shame, as I’m told it’s pretty interesting. Thosai can be eaten for breakfast too if you’re ever out there I recommend it, and I did have rhoti in the mornings a couple of times as well.
I headed back to Kuala Lumpur with two days to check out the town and food. As luck would have it, the weather was crappy and my attempts at finding Malay food were continuously thwarted by only finding Chinese, Indian and various other Asian stalls and restaurants. I had a nice noodle soup and more Indian/Malay dishes but it wasn’t quite what I was after. And then I actually had the presence of mind to ask at the hostel for a local joint on my last night (always the case) only to be told there were two great Malay spots within a minute of my hostel. I had a lot to make up for so I headed out and over indulged at this little local spot that was just great. Much to the amusement of the locals I ate enough to feed a family, continuously pointing at various dishes people were eating and asking the waiter what it was before ordering it for myself. It turned to be the nicest meal I had in Malaysia by far. I had the fried rice, which Malaysia is pretty famous for and which I remembered from having some Malay food in London. It’s nothing like the dirty fried rice you get in Chinese take away spots back in Europe, instead it’s a really tasty dish with lots of meat, fish and seafood fried with herbs and of course rice.
The fried rice is actually a meal on its own but I had it with 3 sides of what looked like various Malay curries, including a really nice and mild potato one and a really spicy chicken one. I’m normally pretty bad with spicy foods, I can handle mustards and wasabi and the likes, but peppers and other real fiery spices don’t always work for me. This little dish turned out fine though, once you got past the spicy kick, the sauce was actually delicious, a thick gravy like red sauce with plenty of flavour and the chicken was pretty good too. To top it all off I also had a bunch of satay skewers, cooked right by me and served with home made satay sauce. All in all it was a worthy feast considering how long I spent looking for an authentic taste of Malay food. I didn’t go for the dried and salted fish, which I know are a pretty standard Malay dish. I’ve never really liked dried fish that much, I struggled with Himono in Japan for a while, and the Malay ones are a lot more daunting than most when you look at them with the whole fish dried and salted or done with herbs. But if you’re into that I definitely would recommend checking it out as it’s supposed to be one of the best local dishes in Malaysia.
I left KL for Hong Kong, with the firm intention to end my time in Asia on a dim sum binge. A friend recommended a spot to check, unfortunately when I got there I was told it was closed for renovation, but it’s not like Hong Kong has a shortage of Dim Sum spots. I ended up in a pretty nice local spot somewhere in the north part of Kowloon instead. Once I’d got past the intensity of the place, a huge restaurant with hundreds of families all eating, talking, kids running around and the likes, I then realised that not only did the staff barely speak any English, they might not have an English menu. Luckily they found one and I got started. I ended up making quite a few funny mistakes, including ordering the same thing twice which my waiter told me was apparently a big no no. I couldn’t help it though, the rice rolls were just too damn tasty. To top it off I was on my own which is also a bit of a no no as Dim Sum is supposed to be shared. Whatever though I was intent on doing it up. The rice rolls were definitely a highlight as was most of it to be honest, including lead-wrapped rice packs, some local steamed raviolis stuffed with meat and peanuts which was a real surprise but worked incredibly well, won tons, meat balls and another surprise in the shape of steamed coconut flavoured buns served with custard. By the end I could barely move, which should always be the way with Dim Sum. Even better, once I went to pay it came to no more than about 6 pounds.
The rest of the day was spent digesting my breakfast/lunch/dinner Dim Sum orgy, I hadn’t eaten anything until then (it was 3pm when I sat down) and I didn’t eat anything until 1am. I considered going back for more as the spots are open pretty late, but instead I opted for a Macanese spot I’d read about in some guide. I was intrigued to say the least, as Macanese cuisine is a pretty unique blend of South Chinese and Portuguese influences and ingredients. I got there before it closed and found a pretty interesting menu, including some roasted pigeon and weird fish dishes. I settled for a simple fried noodle dish that was really good. It was topped with the same kind of garnish I was getting in Vietnam and Cambodia and which I still haven’t figured out. It looks a little like dried, flaky bread or even wood barks, but tastes very dry and not particularly strong. It’s a pretty nice garnish for noodles though, and the whole thing was pretty nice, not too greasy and with the right balance of spices and flavours.
I tried to do Dim Sum in the morning before I left, only to find the spot I’d been to the day before shut down by police and fire fighters. Cameras were hovering around the entrance and people were streaming out. I never quite figured out what the deal was but I guess I should be glad I didn’t make it in before whatever happened happened or I probably wouldn’t have made it to the U.S.
I’m now in North America, on the second leg of my trip. Having left Asia behind the one thing I really miss is the food, its availability and the prices. Ironically it seems that the north American west coast has an abundance of Asian spots, with Vietnamese, Thai, Chinese, Malay and Indian joints everywhere I’ve been. I’m still on the food trail though, and while I don’t mind indulging in a bit of Asian food, I’m really after some more ‘authentic’ American treats, which might sound like a bit of a contradiction. So far I’ve managed ok, and I’m finding that as is the case with English food, there’s a belief that America and Canada don’t have any real outstanding cuisine or dishes, but that’s not the case. More on that later though, I’ve got food to go and get.
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