Exploring Penang
I sometimes develop a massive soft spot for a particular place I’ve travelled to, either linked to fond memories or perhaps an irrational feeling of attachment.
There’s Berlin - the first trip I planned with school friends (and without adult supervision!), and probably the city i’ve returned to most over the years, excluding Dortmund of course.
Boston - with it’s beautiful buildings, rich heritage and AMAZING lobster rolls, I remembered how much I loved it when I returned for a flying business visit and have been longing to go back ever since.
Paris - cliched, I know, but for someone who’s pretty obsessed with food it’s an easy weekend get away to munch on macaroons, galettes and proper, crispy baguettes with saucisson and cheese. And then try and carry as much back on the Eurostar as you can.
By the end of my first full day in Penang, I was pretty sure I’d be adding Georgetown to my list.
I arrived at my guest house on Friday night after a short flight from Singapore. After checking in and asking where I could go to grab a quick bite, the lady on reception pointed me in the direction of some street food carts a few blocks away. Twenty minutes later I was tucking into a plate of Char Kway Teow, fried noodles with seafood, all for the princely sum of £1.
The next morning I’d booked to go on a cooking class with Pearly Kee, a local Peranakan cooking teacher. I had a simple breakfast in the hotel and in the daylight was able to appreciate the industrial chic interiors of where I was staying!
Pearly picked me up from the end of the road and we went to the E&O (posh hotel) to pick up the other guests. We stopped off at a local market for a quick tour, a few snacks and to learn about the local ingredients such as different types of fresh ginger, herbs, vegetables, fish and meats. There was butchery going on in the market, which was a bit too graphic for one of the other participants (my opinion being, if you don’t like how it’s raised and killed, don’t eat it). Luckily we swiftly moved onto the coconut stall where they were making shredded coconut in what looks like a mini wood shredder and fresh coconut milk.
After the market we drove to Pearly’s house where there were individual cooking stations set up for all of us. We started off making a pineapple and brinjal (a thin purple aubergine) patchree, which is similar to a sweet curry. I chopped up fresh tumeric, onions and chilli, and whizzed it up with some cloves, coriander powder and chilli powder to make the paste. We cooked this in a claypot over the gas hob until it darkened and smelt great, then added coconut milk and the pineapple and aubergine and left it to cook.
Whilst we were waiting for that, we also made pork rolls called Lor Bak, which were filled with water chestnuts, spring onions, chinese 5 spice, wrapped in bean curd skin and then deep fried.
We also made a sour prawn soup, flavoured with assam (tamarind), lemongrass, garlic, shallots, galangal and shrimp paste, garnished with prawns and a bright pink ginger flower - something I’d never come across before!
After the morning’s excitement i was dropped off back at the hotel, where I had a chance to plan my next activity - a walking tour of Penang’s street art. I was staying on the edge of the heritage centre of Georgetown, so the majority were all within easy reach. Which was lucky, as it was scorching!
I took lots of snaps along the way. This would be a fun thing to do with a friend and then you could pose for pictures at some of the 3D ones!
I headed back to the hotel to get ready for my evening food tour. There were 7 of us on the tour and we piled into a minibus and headed off to our first stop for Penang Laksa and Cendol! Now, as you know I’m very fond of the creamy coconut Singapore version of Laksa. Truth be told, I’m not really big on savoury sour flavours so the Penang version made with tamarind wasn’t really floating my boat even though it was pretty tasty. Next we tried cendol, which is a traditional dessert made from shaved ice, coconut milk, palm sugar (gula melaka), green rice flour jelly flavoured with pandan leaves and...red kidney beans. Despite the slightly random ingredient list, I actually really enjoyed this and can see why it’s so popular.
We bundled back into the minibus for our next stop by the clan jetties, so called because each of the 6 remaining jetties were established by Chinese immigrants who shared a name or lineage. Here I tried Lor Bak (for the second time in one day) and other fried things, with a chilli sambal dip made with calamansi limes. We walked back along the jetties and stopped off at another wooden hut selling Nian Gao, or fried yam cake. For reference, 1 RM is roughly 20p.
Next we drove to a HDB housing estate, which housed a number of fixed stalls and carts in the centre. We got to try chinese pancakes, some traditional sweet sponge cakes as well as a few other bits and pieces.
For our fourth stop, we headed back across town to Lorong Baru which was starting to get busy with the dinner trade. Here we stopped for a while, sat in the kopitiam and waited whilst our guide ordered dishes from several of the stalls there. I tried nutmeg juice here, which was pretty sweet although nice and refreshing. We tried chicken wings, mee goreng, hokkien mee, char kway teow. By this point I was getting rather full!
For our final stop we headed to an indian restaurant for some lime juice and a glorious towering dosa, which was quite the spectacle!
After the tour I decided to go off in search of a well deserved drink. There was a heritage festival on in Penang the weekend I was there, so I chanced across a shaolin martial arts performance by local school kids, wielding all kinds of weapons. I finally wound up in China House in their cocktail den and ordered myself a negroni to cap the night off.
The next day, after a slow start and a decidedly bad brunch choice, I decided to take the tourist ‘hop on, hop off’ bus to the other side of the island. It followed the coast road so I got some very scenic shots from the top of the open deck bus. I was headed for the Tropical Spice Gardens and when I got there they doused me in insect repellent to help me avoid being bitten. It worked. To a certain extent.
Armed with my audio guide I toured the garden and saw pineapples, kaffir limes, lemongrass, bananas, pepper, kaffir lime and all sorts. There was the odd pot with a few dead twigs in, so I used the audio guide and my imagination to picture what should have been there. It was a pretty chilled out way to spend the afternoon.
After that it was time to go, so I headed back to the hotel to pick up my rucksack and headed off to the airport after a gloriously foodie weekend.
Goodbye Penang, until next time!