Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

As a disclaimer, please bear in mind that the three days we spent in Kuala Lumpur were characterized more by misadventures than by for-the-win gastronomic discoveries. This also means that that places we tried were chosen mostly based on convenience and their proximity to our hotel, rather than on our desire to try new places that would be representative of Malaysia?s generally hot and spicy culinary philosophy.

We were unable to visit Jalan Alor, which we heard to be Kuala Lumpur?s branch of food paradise. Supposedly the heart of the city?s local cuisine, the entire stretch of food establishments and hawker stands would have made the ideal destination for a Malaysian food trip. However, with the erratic and frustratingly uncooperative weather ? melting in 35 degrees of pure solar power during the day and at night, getting rained on by cats, dogs and we reckon even cows ? bingeing on local favorites like grilled chicken wings, satay and char kway teow in tables sprawled out on the street became, to our dismay, an impossibility.

Luckily for us though, Kuala Lumpur?s gastronomic finds aren?t limited to a line of food stalls in some side street a few hundred meters from the city?s shopping center. To our surprise, even the food stalls located in the Food Republic food court in the high-end shopping mall across our hotel have something delicious (and equally affordable) to offer. And at least, we disovered, germaphobes will be able to eat at ease, with the probability of contracting hepatitis or expediting a visit to the crapper reduced by about 20%.

On our first night, after an entire day of forging life-altering friendships with the mites that have established residence in three of Asia?s airports, we lugged our exhausted behinds to the mall across our hotel for a quick bite before settling down. While crossing the street, we saw two signs ? one that read to beware of snatchers, and another one from one of the mall?s windows that read ?HERMES?. Our initial reaction was, after a couple of mild expletives, that we may have to shell out a little more than budgeted if we were to eat in this kind of neighborhood for the next three days. But, to our surprise, the choices at Food Republic were very affordable at an average of 10 MYR (loosely exchanged to 140 PHP) per dish, and as diverse as the cuisines in Southeast Asia. So wide-ranging are the choices indeed that we received the shock of our lives ? well we weren?t that shocked, but we surely got excited ? to see an outlet of Manila institution Pancake House.

We lost Manila?s only source of chicken chop rice when Cavana closed shop in Megamall last year, so we made sure that our first meal in Malaysia was chicken chop. Unfortunately for us, LA MIAN .i HK Deli had already run out of rice by the time we got there, so instead we tried the chicken chop with noodle soup. The poor chicken, filleted, breaded and fried to a crispy end, was served pleasantly spicy, as most Malaysians like their food, and so crunchy that even a dousing in hot soup wasn?t enough to soften it. It was like eating southern fried chicken without having to worry about the bones. The soup on the other hand was so rich and flavorful that it was pretty difficult to imagine its humble origins as water. It was so good in fact that noodle-slurping became excusable.

We had allotted our first full day in Kuala Lumpur for going around the city and checking out its tourist attractions. On the top of our agenda was a visit to the Petronas towers, which have become symbolic of the modernization embraced by the city in the better half of the century. We had brunch at the food court in KLCC, which is located at the base of the skyscrapers. Strangely enough, our choice wasn?t Malaysian at all; it wasn?t even from Southeast Asia. It was Japanese ? wasabi chicken from Hachigo. It was served on a cute little disposable bento box, with lovely miso soup on the side. The chicken was grilled with a sweet, almost teriyaki-like glaze, and then smothered with wasabi mayonnaise. The meat itself was cooked and seasoned very well, but the wasabi mayonnaise wasn?t as spicy as we expected. Perhaps it was 99.999% mayonnaise and 0.001% wasabi.

We?d rather not mention all the misadventures that befell us after brunch, like how our tour bus was stalled in the highway for nearly an hour or how we were unable to explore the KL tower because of a sudden downpour, so we?ll skip that and move on to our next meal, which was at the Rainforest Cafe in KL tower. This was at around three in the afternoon, a good five hours after brunch, so naturally we were starving and cranky ? so cranky in fact that we don?t even remember what we ordered and if we liked it at all. What?s important to note though is that, ironically in spite of its location, this cafe is not tourist-friendly at all, unless your complexion says that you?re obviously not from Asia. The waiters tend to prioritize Caucasians by giving them tables first and serving them first, which is strange because we Asians struggled with the language barrier, since the waiters could barely put four English words together to form a cohesive sentence.

For dinner, we treated ourselves to xiao long bao heaven at Din Tai Fung. Obviously not Malaysian, but we feel so deprived being from one of the last few Asian countries without a Din Tai Fung presence, so every trip out of the country must include a meal at the revered Taiwanese institution. Considering what we had spent on our other meals in the city, this Din Tai Fung dinner definitely qualified as an indulgence. We ordered the usual ? pork xiao long bao, pork and shrimp xiao long bao, pork chop and fried rice, and for dessert, red bean paos. And as expected, Din Tai Fung didn?t fail us.

To satisfy our sweet cravings, we tried Jco, which is the region?s version of Dunkin Donuts. With cute and kitschy flavors like Alcapone, Miss Green T, Da Vin Cheez, and Mona Pisa, we struggled to decide on a donut to choose, but we eventually settled on Don Mochino. This pastry, oozing with Belgian chocolate, is as rich and greasy as any self-respecting donut should be. Personally, we prefer the sinfulness of Dunkin Donuts, but hey, whatever floats your boat, right?

On our last night in the beautiful Malaysian capital, we found ourselves back in that mall across our hotel, where our great Kuala Lumpur food trip began. We returned to Food Republic, for another round of chicken chop rice. Since that place from our first night was already out of rice, we ended up in another food stall. The chicken wasn?t as crispy and flavorful as what we had on our first night, but we reckon carbohydrate-lovers would appreciate that the bowl is filled with rice enough to feed about five construction workers. Since fate prevented us from visiting Jalan Alor, we checked out Serai Satay Bar, the lone Satay stall located in the far end of the food court. We had six sticks of chicken satay and a pair of skewered vegetables, packed in a tall cup with a small container of peanut sauce hanging from the cup?s rim, like the snack Yan-Yan. One thing that Filipinos will appreciate about authentic Malaysian satay (or Indonesian or Singaporean for that matter) is that the peanut sauce is not made from nuked peanut butter. In most mall-based or cheap Filipino restaurants, the sauce is basically just local peanut butter heated in the microwave for a couple seconds. But here, it is rich, nutty, oily and yes, spicy.

At the end of our three days in Kuala Lumpur, we realized that, even though we were unable to zip line from the KL tower, the food we tried totally made this a trip to remember. The New York Times was right ? this is definitely a must-visit city, not just for the tourist attractions, but for the gastronomic epiphanies that one can make in this culturally diverse and rich place.