Tony Johor Kaki Travels for Food · Heritage · Culture · History

Food Explorer Storyteller with 63 million+ reads 📧 johorkaki@gmail.com

Keng Seng Noodles in Masai Johor Bahru 錦城茶餐室


Went to Restoran Keng Seng 錦城茶餐室 this morning to visit the local favourite noodle and yong tau foo shop in Masai, Johor Bahru. When I ask Johor Kaki readers and friends for suggestions for what to eat in Masai, Keng Seng always come up.

It's 10:00am and inside Keng Seng kopitiam, it was still full house after the breakfast crowd had came and went.
The friendly stall holders were extremely busy. Many regulars grew up with Keng Seng and the shop is now run by the second generation (founder's son). There are different noodles like mee kia, mee pok, and kway teow to choose from. For the accompanying soup, there are also many choices of yong tau foo, fish balls, and pig intestines.

Our order of mee pok came in about 10 minutes despite the crowd.
The generic mee pok was done soft al dente i.e. soft with a slight spring. The dark sauce was mildly savoury and quite flat in flavour. It was not oily. Not very interesting, actually.
The cloudy broth had a nice gentle porcine sweet savoury flavour. I like it - it was highly drinkable as it was neither too salty nor oily.
Most of the yong tau foo, fish balls, fish cake slices etc were generic (e.g. the yong tau foo stuffed with commercial blended fish paste). When put together in the soup with pork intestines, it was actually quite appetising and enjoyable. We liked it enough to order a second set of mee kia with a bowl of soup and yong tau foo.
As we found the dark sauce a bit flat and mild tasting, we added in this sambal chili which came in a small disposable plastic dish. Wooohooo, this mildly spicy sweet savoury sambal chili really transformed the plate of noodles. We love it. Our second helping of the same fully loaded soup with yong tau foo, fish balls, fish cake slices and pork intestines etc which we enjoyed. Our bill came to RM15 altogether.
👉If you are in the Masai or Pasir Gudang area in the morning, you may like to join the local folks for this simple noodle and yong tau foo soup. It's comforting, satisfying and reasonably priced. Restaurant name: Restoran Keng Seng 錦城茶餐室

Address: 74, Jalan Kiambang, Masai, Johor, Malaysia
GPS: 1.486783, 103.888331 / 1°29'12.4"N 103°53'18.0"E
Hours: 6:00am to 2:00pm (Sunday off)
Non Halal
Date visited: 10 Aug 2016
Return to Johor Kaki homepage

6 comments:

  1. Keng Seng is indeed one of the few established brands remaining in Masai. Another old time restaurant you might want to try is the nasi padang at Restaurant Hai Chiew, located along the main road in town, just directly opposite the Chinese temple. Popular dishes start to serve at 11am, are usually ransacked within 1 hour.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Masaiboy. I will definitely visit the nasi padang stall soon :-D Appreciate much.

      Delete
  2. so much liu... looks good!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I love this place. Been going there since I was a child. Definitely a Masai favorite.

    ReplyDelete
  4. If you are going for the nasi parang, a must try is their kambing.

    ReplyDelete
  5. If you are going for the nasi parang, a must try is their kambing.

    ReplyDelete

All comments submitted with genuine identities are published