Penang Food Adventures - Hot Wok Restaurant

Hot Wok is another restaurant in Penang which serves nyonya fare.This place first open its doors sometime in 1994 and since then it has built up a pretty good following amongst Penang people. Last I heard, they had opened a branch in Kuala Lumpur.

I was meeting up with my high school girlfriends and this restaurant won the popular vote. Here are some of the dishes we had for lunch.

Jiu Hoo Char - this is a complicated dish consisting stir fried thinly sliced dried squid turnip, carrot, celery, shittake mushroom and pork bits. The Penang way of eating this is to wrap this stir fried combo in a lettuce leaf with a dollop of chilli and following that, pop it into your mouth for an explosion of flavour balanced by the crisp freshness of the lettuce leaf. Yum....

Kiam Chai Ak - Salted vegetable duck soup. This is a very appetizing dish. A top choice as a starter dish to wet the appetite.

Otak otak - This is a dish which consists of fish mixed with garlic, shallots, tumeric, lemon grass, pepper and egg. All of this is then wrapped in a banana leaf before steaming resulting in a very fragrant eggy, fishy dish of which I never get enough of because it is always made in small portions.

Tau Eu Bak - Pork belly cooked at a slow simmer in soy sauce, dark soy and chinese five spice powder. I love how the meat feels like its melting on your tongue. Very yummy. The magic of this dish is in its meat and the sauce. Here it is served with hard boiled egg that has also been simmered in the magic sauce. This is my favourite way to have a hard boiled egg.

Sago Nangka - We had this for dessert. It is chilled sago served with fresh jackfruit and coconut milk. It was refreshing and the coconut milk was of just the right consistency, not watered down or too creamy.

For more details about this restaurant, go to their website. There are directions and contact details with short write ups about its food, atmosphere and history.

cheryl