SIN KHENG AUN - Can do better

I DON'T THINK I'VE EVER BEEN SO BUSY IN ALL MY LIFE ... well certainly not in the past few years anyway. Apart from judging at cooking competitions and various dinners and birthday parties, I'd put aside a week to finish off my second restaurant guide to Penang, but in fact it's over run by another week, and even as I write (or, as is more accurate type), there are still a few more things to finish off.

HOWEVER, it is nearly done, and tomorrow, "Great Dining in Penang 2" will be going to the printer's - HALLELUJAH! - and it will be launched in time for my target date of 30 June.

So in between catching up with all the other things I've ignored including replying to emails and writing my other articles, there's a little bit of time for me to update this poor old blog, because last night I was asked to take 4 US food writers to Sin Kheng Aun in Chulia Lane. They had been flown in by MATRADE to promote Malaysian cooking in America.

Actually, it was my first time there since I was a little girl (and DON'T ask how long ago that was ... !) and it was a revelation. Obviously as everyone in Penang knows they're one of those old, old restaurants that serve colonial Hainanese food which the Brits used to like: Chicken Chops spring to mind, and as in Malaysia that includes a degree of nyonya dishes because many of them used to work for the more affluent households, it was the good old stuff like Assam Tumis. It was packed. In the evenings they only open from 5-8.30pm so people tend to squeeze in which is rather clever of the proprietors - he gets a life at night!

On 2nd generation proprietor the slightly eccentric Ong Chin Hong's suggestions (his father started the place in the 1940s with another man who was the chef), we ordered the must-have curry with pomfret (tow tay but of course), some assam prawns, fried bean sprouts with kiam hoo (salted fish), pork and liver with soya sauce, and trotter with salted veg soup.

The Fish Curry was OK, with the right amount of bungah kantan in it - an absolute must have, as far as I am concerned - but I'm not fond of their trademark coarse ground rempah.

The bean sprouts were rather oily, and the pork and liver was actually left relatively untouched cos not many of us really liked it: I prefer it without the ngor hiong hoon. We also had some Chicken Chop which was quite gooey, and the Fried Noodles were OK although the sambal belacan was a bit too wet and tasteless.

Presentation-wise, I think they could have done a bit better too; although I know we Malaysians don't care as long as the food is good, these dishes seemed to have almost been deliberately slapped on to the plates as haphazardly as possible. No effort was made to tidy up the plates before they were brought out at all.

However, before we ordered I made very clear to Ong that one of the journalists Joanna is allergic to MSG so NONE of the food had to contain any of it - he seemed to understand what I was saying, repeating that he would make sure none of the food would be prepared with it. Unfortunately Joanna seemed to think there was some, and I rather wondered how he could make the soup without MSG. I do hope she's OK.

One of the diners was Penang photographer extraordinaire Albert Foo who was busy snapping away for Matrade - that's him above next to Joanna - and as you can see from the two pixes below, one taken by me and one by him, why he's a photographer extraordinaire and not me!!

In my defense, I prefer not to use a flash!!

You can see how popular the place is though - their reputation precedes them - and like locusts hitting a wheat field, families just sweep in and clear them out. By 8 last night it had emptied out, leaving behind just blank plates for the staff to clear up behind them.

That lot plus 3 large bottles of Tiger Beer cost RM202. As I wasn't paying for it I didn't query it but I thought it was rather pricey for what we had had.

The journalists were suitably impressed with the food, with the exception of Joanna's reaction, which I was thankful for. However, next time round, I think I might recommend somewhere else.