On buildings and food in Penang

As we walked along some of the roads, interesting architectures lined the streets. They reminded me of some of the old colonial buildings along Padang in Singapore. Well, here are two of them with 'character'.

If you can spot them... the first building has a round disc at the centre, with a picture of the bumboat, while the second one with the signage "India House" has a head of the elephant.




I've heard much about some unique cuisines in Penang. Breakfast was mainly settled in the hotel. Hmm... I missed the fragrant salted fish that's supposed to be eaten with porridge. I had that with nasi lemak instead. Equally good! Another unforgettable dish is the fried rice noodles, or char kuay teow. It's unlike what my mom will cook at home. Our version is cooked with dark, sweet sauce with lots of beansprouts, greens, prawns, chicken or roasted pork and eggs. Penang's version is fried mainly with eggs and beansprouts but the noodles are very delicious!














Fans of Penang laksa asked me to give it a go. Well, I tried that at the Eastern and Oriental Hotel (a grand hotel that feels like the Raffles Hotel in Singapore). How do I describe the taste? For someone with a sweet tooth and used to the lemak (coconut milk) version of laksa, this strange sour and spicy new version takes a while to get used to. The first mouthful: the sour assam taste hits your tastebuds first, then the spicy chilli taste, followed by the sweet fragrance from the ginger flower (the same type that is added to rojak occasionally), the minty taste from mint leaves and the pungent raw, sliced shallots. You'll also be munching on thick noodles, crunchy slivers of cucumber and pineapple. As it is buffet style and the soup has gone a bit cold, I risked getting gastric pains and tried a bit more. I added some black, gooey shrimp sauce (not thick enough to be described as paste) but my poor tastebuds got so confused by then I don't think they could figure that out. Anyway, lemak laksa will still be my all time favourite! Apologies for the Penang laksa picture below. We were facing the breezy sea and the sun was very bright that day...













Lastly, I would recommend getting a box of tau sar pia/green bean cookies/tambun biscuits at the airport. I have no idea which brand's the best so I bought two different brands. The one from the airport turned out to be relatively better.