Very good Hakka lunch at Big Big Bowl Hakka Kitchen yesterday. The well-regarded 17-year-old eatery is run by a friendly mother-and-daughter duo, Nancy Chong and her daughter, Angie Lim.
Nancy Chong hand-stuffing various types of vegetables - bitter-gourd, purple aubergine and red chili peppers - plus large tofu with her typical Hakka force-meat of minced pork and fish-paste.
We tried very good versions of typical Hakka repasts here:
Hakka lei cha (thunder tea rice) - absolutely amazing rendition, absolutely delish and not overly-herbal or bitter as in previous ones we’d tried in Singapore and elsewhere.
More on the history and characteristics of lei cha in a recent Michelin Guide article:
Hakka pan mee (pork noodles) - Hakka noodles have a reputation for being toothsome and stretchy, a departure from the more delicate Hokkien, Teochew and Cantonese noodles here.
Chicken in yellow wine, with ginger and black fungus - well and truly the best version of this dish we’d had anywhere, even surpassing homecooked version by our Hakka relatives! Good, strong Hakka yellow wine, used in copious amounts, together with old ginger, rendered the soup excruciatingly delicious. The bone-in chicken and black fungus were perfectly cooked. Perfection in a bowl.
Pig’s trotters in black vinegar & ginger stew - another very, very well-executed dish. The sweet-sour flavors from the black vinegar and brown sugar used were perfectly balanced, whilst the gelatinous pig’s trotters were also cooked to perfection.
Suan pan ji (Hakka taro “abacus beads”) - tasty version here, although the taro beads were slightly mushier than we’d have liked. But taste-wise, it was amazing.
Nyiong tiew foo (yong tau fu/Hakka tofu and vegetables stuffed with fishpaste-minced pork) - very good version, with a typical very light Hakka broth.
More on the origins and evolution of this Hakka staple in the Michelin Guide article:
It’s been quite a while since we stumbled upon a family-run eatery that offers genuine home-cooked flavors, carefully cooked in small, family-sized portions, with none of the commercialised mass-produced fast food we keep encountering everywhere nowadays. A true hidden gem indeed.
Address
Big Big Bowl Hakka Kitchen
5A, Jalan Desa 2/7, Desa Aman Puri, 52100 Kuala Lumpur, Selangor, Malaysia
Tel: +6012-2115564
Opening hours: 9am to 7.30pm daily.
)
