Birthday Celebrations @ Restoran Malaysia

For a dear friend's birthday celebration, we chose Malaysia for some Southern Asian comfort food. This time around, we tried a couple of new things to mix in with our old favourites. To start off, we had roti and curry beef, which was a lot better than the vegetarian version because the curry is more robust. I don't really care for the meat, and just the sauce and roti was sufficient to satisfy me.

We also shared an appetizer platter, featuring satay beef, satay chicken, fish cakes, and spring rolls, served with plum sauce and peanut sauce. Everything was tasty, but my favourite was the fish cake.

Nasi Ayam Melayu- roasted crispy-skin chicken with a side of steamed chicken rice- was spectacular. The chicken was tender and flavourful, and the crispy chicken skin made it all the more scrumptious! I particularly enjoyed the spicy dipping sauce for the chicken, which added a wonderful kick to the meat. And of course, the steamed chicken rice (same ones used for Singaporean chicken rice) was simply divine. This was my favourite dish of the meal.

Instead of ordering pad thai, we opted for something new: Masak Debal (Angel's Fire) with Ayam (Chicken). According to the description, the sauce has chili, mustard, shallot, turmeric, and spices, which sounded like a good combination to me. But most of all, I was intrigued by the name "angel's fire" and the promised heat (it had three chilis!). Unfortunately, this didn't turn out to be very spicy at all, even though the flavours were quite powerful. As well, the meat was tough and didn't quite measure up to the chicken from the previous dish.

Almost immediately after placing our orders, I regretted the choice of Wat Tan Ho: Wok-tossed flat rice noodle topped with thick seafood, chicken, vegetable and egg sauce. That was because the description sounded delicious, but as soon as I said the name - Wat Tan Ho - out loud, I knew what it was: 滑蛋河. It wasn't bad, but just too Chinese-like for me. I felt like I could have ordered this at a Chinese diner.