Kee Kee Bentong Chicken Rice has one of the tastiest renditions of the Hainanese-style chicken rice which Iโd found in Kuala Lumpur. The best in KL is still, far & away, Loke Yun in Ampang New Village.
However, the more accessible Kee Kee Bentong, situated next to the LDP expressway in Kelana Jaya, offers a nice rendition of the dish, replete with chicken livers/gizzards and the harder-to-find chicken intestines.
Come early - as parking can be a pain, and the reputation of this eatery has travelled far & wide in the KL/Klang Valley region, so you do need to contend with the lunch-time crowds each day.
Kee Kee Bentong sources its corn-fed chicken from the mountain village of Bentong in neighbouring Pahang state. Firm-fleshed, and with a more intense โchickenโ flavour, the fowl used here is well-suited to the poaching technique used for producing Hainanese-style chicken rice. The chicken is chopped up and served on the bone, dressed in a mix of soysauce-sesame oil-chicken fat.
What I also really liked about Kee Kee Bentong is that they also served the harder-to-find boiled chicken intestines, besides the must-have chicken livers and gizzards.
Hainanese chicken rice served in Singapore & Malaysia, and even in Thailand (where itโs called khao mun gai) tend to be oily, flavoured with chicken fat and cooked using the stock with which the chicken were poached in, which also contained ginger and scallions. A knot of pandanus leaves is also usually added to the rice pot as itโs cooking to further perfume the rice. Ironically, this method of serving Hainanese chicken rice is unique to Singapore, Malaysia & Thailand, whereas on Hainan Island itself, poached chicken is served with minced ginger-salt on plain steamed rice.
This is one of only 2 places in KL (besides Loke Yun) where Iโd have my Hainanese chicken rice fix. I find all other KL places to be simply dreadful in terms of the rice offered, unlike the fragrant ones which one takes for granted in Singapore.
Address
Kee Kee Bentong Chicken Rice
Yat Yeh Hing Restaurant, 33, Jalan SS4D/2,Taman Peopleโs Park, 47301 Petaling Jaya, Malaysia
Tel: +6016 251 8787/+6012 629 4807
Operating hours: 11am-3pm daily, while stocks last.
Note that it closes on one Tuesday a month - all ahead to enquire.
