“Covering a full spectrum of cuisine from Portuguese, Arab and Indian to Chinese, Thai and Indonesian, Malaysian food is a fascinating journey of all that is ‘truly Asia’ in one nation.” ~ Norman Musa
Penang Island and its UNESCO World Heritage city, Georgetown, are known to have some of the best street food in Southeast Asia. We heard many people even go as far as to say the very best. With how much we love Chiang Mai for its street food scene, we decided to do this island justice and stay for 6 weeks so that we could check out as many of the popular street food spots as we could while also throwing in some special dinners. Malaysia is a melting pot of Southeast Asia with many immigrants coming from China, India, and the Middle East. The blending of cultures here has created a diverse, unique cuisine with endless options. We fell in love with the cuisine while in Kuala Lumpur, but mostly through popular restaurants and a beloved local hawker market. The popular street food spots were overly touristy and disappointing compared to Thailand, so we were anxious to see how Penang Island would stack up.
Lorong Baru and Kimberly Street night markets
Lorong Baru was the first street food night market that we hit up in Georgetown, and I must say we were not disappointed. Many of the popular street food items on our must-try list were being served up by vendors whipping up their specialty.
We started off our culinary journey with a popiah, a Teachow-Fujianese style spring roll, filled with fresh, crisp vegetables stuffed in a thin, soft, paper-like crepe made from wheat flour. The best one we had while in Malaysia was topped with chicken floss (dried chicken) at a hawker stand in Kuala Lumpur, but this one was a close second.
To get a bit of protein in our diet, we grabbed a bunch of tiny chicken and beef skewers that were also quite delicious. Our third dish called otak-otak was certainly not the most attractive, and I admit we were a bit scared to take a bite of what looked like a gelatinous mess.
But, wow, this ended up being our favorite food of the night. Otak-otak is a fish curry steamed in a banana leaf. The fish was delicate and enveloped in creamy yellow curry with coconut milk and a hint of lemongrass. Our fourth dish is a very popular breakfast food for the Chinese Malays called chee cheong fun. The main ingredient of chee chong fun is the special rice noodle rolls. The Malaysian Penang style is traditionally served with a drizzle of shrimp paste on top. Ours was topped with crispy onions and came with a variety of sauces, the shrimp paste plus sesame, soy, and hoisin sauce.
For dessert, we had been eyeing a local treat, pandan-filled pineapple buns, and a nearby pastry and candy shop was selling them.
They are served warm, so the pandan is nice and gooey in the middle of the warm pineapple bun. These definitely became a favorite dessert of ours, and when we realized this shop was a chain, we couldn’t help but stop in and grab a treat whenever we walked by one.
Next up, Kimberly Street night market, one of the most popular in Georgetown, and while we thought the number of vendors was not impressive, what they lacked in options was certainly made up for with quality. Char koay teow is an iconic Malaysian dish that is served all over town, but the street vendor here is special. He has been serving up delicious char koay teow for over 40 years on this street, and now he is training his son to take over his business.
Char koay teow is a stir-fried dish made with flat rice noodles, shrimp, bean sprouts, egg, and fish cake. Overall, we thought it tasted very similar to pad thai, but don’t ever tell a Malaysian that. It is not the same. The stand owner sat down with us while we enjoyed our meal and was so proud to show us the appearances that he has had on multiple TV shows. We noticed that, when we left the night market, his stand was highlighted on one of the street art installments for that neighborhood.
The other local specialty that we came to this market to try was the duck kway chap. This stand was known to have some of the best in the city and has been serving up their family recipe for over 30 years. Duck kway chap is a savory soup filled with perfectly roasted duck pieces, thick chewy rice noodle rolls, and herbs in an umami-rich broth.
I’ve always been a huge fan of duck, and this was one of the most unique versions of duck that I have had. The dark brown broth had a wonderful depth of flavor, and the thick noodle rolls absorbed the delicious broth and provided a chewy texture to the soup. And, of course, the tender pieces of duck melted in your mouth. Loved it!
Lastly, we have to give a huge shout out to the traveling vendors at the weekday markets located in different suburbs around Penang Island each day of the week. Our first visit was to the Wednesday market in Farlim, and when we realized our favorite vendors also came to the largest of the week on Friday just a block away from our Airbnb in Jelutong, we couldn’t help but go multiple times. Our favorite vendor was Bill Love biscuiterie. While this was certainly not a traditional Malaysian treat, we were impressed by the uniqueness of their specialty, Volcanic Puffs. Both sweet and savory flambéed puff pastries were offered by these young entrepreneurs.
Over multiple visits, we tried the savory garlic cream cheese, the sweet chocolate cream cheese, and the caramel coffee cream cheese. The flavor was reminiscent of crème brulee with both soft and crunchy aspects with a carmelized sugar on top.
The local specialty that impressed us the most was the salted fish bao served by an older husband and wife team.
We were a little hesitant to try the fish bao as we generally prefer pork bao and have probably never had a fish bao until now, but we had read several bloggers highly recommend them as one of the best vendors at the market. And sure enough, we agreed and are now fans of salted fish bao. They actually had quite a familiar Chinese flavor profile and reminded us of shrimp dumplings.
Another famous vendor at this market was known for their duck rice, another very popular Malaysian dish. Very simple roasted duck over white rice with a soy and hoisin-based sauce. Simple yet so delicious.
Lastly, for dessert, we got a Malaysian peanut pandan pancake.
We were huge fans of this style of Malaysian pancake. While I mentioned that we were disappointed with the street food scene in KL, we must give a shout-out to this elderly gentleman who has been serving these on the streets for decades and made the very best one we ate while in Malaysia.
At first, we were surprised that the large Friday night street market in Jelutong did not shut down to vehicular traffic unlike many street markets that we have enjoyed in Thailand, so it didn’t make for as pleasant of an eating experience. However, we noticed that the market is mostly popular with locals, and many of them pull up (on their scooters) to the vendors’ carts and trucks on the street, grab their meals and go home to eat all the goodies.
Fine Dining Restaurants
Michelin came to town and awarded a simple Malaysian restaurant run by a 69-year-old Nyonya Auntie the first Michelin star in town. Auntie Gaik Lean’s old school eatery is a local legend serving up Peranakan cuisine.
The humble restaurant did a big remodel to elevate their look now that they have become Michelin-star famous, but they still serve the secret family recipes that made them popular to begin with. Our friend, Jen Jordan, came to visit us for the last few days we were living in Penang, so she joined us on this culinary adventure in keeping with our travel tradition of going to a Michelin star restaurant in each location with her.
For appetizers, we got the top hats, crispy tart shells filled with sweet julienned vegetables and chicken, and lor bak, deep-fried braised chicken roll.
For the mains, we shared her signature dish, a hand tossed rice with 10 herbs and salted kurau fish, and a chicken curry.
We greatly enjoyed the traditional homestyle cuisine, and the relaxed ambience (with AC!) was a nice change of pace from the street food stands and hawker stalls that we primarily visited.
The most elegant setting that we had for a dinner was at Kebaya in the colonial-style Seven Terraces hotel. The restaurant gives a modern flare to traditional Indo and Straits Chinese Nyonya dishes. Kebaya applies innovative cooking methods using traditional Malaysia flavors, Vietnamese lightness, Thai spiciness, and French cooking styles.
We went with the tasting menu to sample as much as we could. For starters, we tried the seabass pastry puff and the croque monsieur beef rendang. Remember the not-so-pretty street food otak-otak from earlier in the blog. The puff pastry is the elevated version of that traditional dish.
Lots of lemongrass and yellow curry flavors in a fun pastry that the server recommended that we eat like a sandwich. It was perfect! And we were shocked how much we loved the blue cheese beef rendang. We aren’t huge fans of blue cheese, but the chef paired a mild blue cheese perfectly with the beef rendang for a unique take on the traditional French croque monsieur.
For main dishes, we shared the plum duck confit with mandarin oranges and the succulent beef oyster confit, which had similar flavor to mild beef rendang with the texture of perfectly cooked short rib. The elevated side dishes included eggplant with chili paste and whitebait, which reminded us of Nasi Lemak, and coconut-peanut sauce green beans.
For dessert, we had pandan creme brulee and warm coconut milk over rice balls.
All around, Kebaya was a fantastic experience from the romantic, elegant ambience to the well-presented, delicious food with unique twists on traditional cuisine.
Specialty shops
Multiple spots in Georgetown are in a class all their own. Partly street food, partly restaurant. 100% some of the best food in town. Let’s start with Line Clear. In an alley between two buildings, this canteen-style spot has been serving up some of the best Nasi Kandar in Malaysia since 1930 and has won numerous accolades including top 10 on the world street food list.
Nasi Kandar is an Indian-Malay dish that originated in Penang. It’s essentially any curried meat on top of rice. The queue was long to get to the counter where large silver serving dishes were full of a wide assortment of meats and vegetables.
We had no idea how to order, but the serving staff was incredibly friendly and could obviously tell we were tourists. One of the guys at the counter asked if we wanted the chicken, and we said yes. He then proceeded to pile a ton of food onto our plate.
We took our trays to the cafeteria-style long tables set up under the makeshift tin roof. With just one bite, we were in love. One of the tastiest (and messiest) meals we ate during our stay in Penang. The curry chicken was juicy and so flavorful. The green beans were probably the best green beans we’ve ever had. The rice soaked up all the flavorful juices, and the slices of cucumber added a crisp, refreshing element to balance the mildly spicy curry.
Another Malaysian dish that originated from Penang is Asam Laksa. There are multiple different variations of Malaysian Laksa. Asam means sour. So the Penang Asam Laksa is a sour and spicy fish soup. One of the most popular spots in town to try this soup is at Penang Road Famous Laksa, which recently was given a nod by the Michelin guide.
Two carts sit at the front of the shop. One is for serving up the assam laksa, and the other is for stir-frying char kuay teow. The small shop is always packed with people, but the service is fast and friendly.
While we enjoyed the Asam laksa, the flavor profile is quite peculiar especially for a Western palate. The shrimp paste broth is seasoned with lemongrass and chilies and topped with an eclectic assortment of green coral lettuce, mint, pineapple, onions, cucumber, and ginger. Shocking to us, this soup was ranked by CNN as 7th on the World’s Best 50 foods list. We will certainly give it the most unique with both sour and spicy elements. But our favorite Asian soups are still Chiang Mai’s khao soi and Hanoi’s bun cha. We did go a second time to take Jen with us, and let’s just say that she was not a fan.
On the same side street as Penang Famous Laksa is Penang Road Famous Teochew Chendol. This vendor has a cart out on the street and cafeteria-style seating in a building behind it. The queue is long, but the staff works hard to sling the delicious dessert “soup” into plastic tubs for hungry patrons.
Cendol is an iced Malaysian dessert with pandan rice flour jellies topped with coconut milk, palm sugar, and red sweetened Azuki beans.
For Westerners, this may seem like another odd combination, but we enjoy Asian-style desserts and pretty much love anything with coconut milk. We found this dessert refreshing on a typical hot Malaysian day and a perfect treat after a hot, spicy soup.
Breakfast
Kaya toast is one of the most traditional breakfasts for Malaysians and Singaporeans. Kaya is a coconut spread that is traditionally served on toasted and buttered bread. The bread is then dipped in a soft-boiled egg and soy sauce mixture. We also enjoyed the steamed bread version as well as the pandan-flavored kaya.
We fell in love with kaya and were pumped to find it in jars at the local food markets. One of our favorite ways to eat it at home was actually in our oatmeal! We turned Jen into an addict as well when she came to visit us.
One of the best brunch spots in Penang is Tai Tong Restaurant, a traditional Cantonese dim sum spot. Cantonese servers pushed around the traditional dim sum carts with some common and some unrecognizable offerings being served. I wish we could tell you that due to our extensive travel, we ordered with confidence and knew everything set in front of us. But that was certainly not the case given the servers spoke barely any English. We had no idea what was on each plate, but we did our best to point to plates that we thought would be within our palate range. We think we started with traditional pork and shrimp dumplings and soup dumplings.
We also had one that was crispy, fried and served with an aioli-style sauce.
After the cart service, we moved on to the steam buns, which were ordered from a server in the back of the restaurant near all the specialty steam ovens. We got our favorite pork buns but also their specialty buns, stuffed with chicken and sausage, and their sweet pandan buns.
Afternoon Tea
Given the British influence in Malaysia, afternoon tea is quite popular, and one is spoilt for choice in Penang. We couldn’t pass up the opportunity to have high tea at the majestic Blue Mansion. In the late 19th century, Chinese industrialist and politician Cheong Fatt Tze, often referred to as the “Rockefeller of China”, built the Blue Mansion with the help of leading Feng Shui masters and the top artisans in China.
Prior to our high tea, we enjoyed cocktails in the tranquil blue lounge. We loved this place so much for the relaxed, elegant vibe that we came back three separate times during our stay in Penang. We just had to bring Jen here too.
High tea was served in the beautiful main courtyard.
If any of these pics look familiar, this part of the Blue Mansion was recently used as the picturesque setting for the pivotal mahjong scene in the movie Crazy Rich Asians.
Our second high tea experience was on top of Penang Hill at David Brown’s Hilltop Garden restaurant. Panoramic views over Penang, a beautiful courtyard, and great food pretty much sums up an incredible afternoon tea experience.
Malaysian food museum
Lastly, we thought it was quite hilarious that Penang had a food experience museum, and Jimmy and I had no intention of going. But after a few drinks (at the Blue Mansion, of course), Jen convinced us that ridiculous pics of us with larger-than-life food was a spectacular way to end our foodie adventure in Penang. We ended up being pleasantly surprised by the quality of the exhibits and narration at the museum. The artistic ability to build giant replicas of every traditional Malaysian dish was impressive, and we posed by some of our favorite re-creations including cendol and roti canai.
One of the exhibits was re-creations of the most expensive foods ever created, such as the $1100 golden hamburger.
The finale was a Mona Lisa created out of food, which only was visible at a certain angle.
Jen bought this cute refrigerator magnet as a souvenir to immortalize her “love” for Asam Laksa.
Overall, we were incredibly impressed with Penang and agree that it deserved the title of a foodie paradise. As you can tell by the length of the blog, the options are endless from street food to fancy restaurants and high teas. We can’t wait to go back and continue our exploring of the diverse Malaysian cuisine.
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