Kuantan is famous for their curry mee. So, we tried 3 curry mee places (plus a lot of other dishes) during our three day trip to Kuantan.
Curry mee is comfort food in Kuantan in the same way as bak chor mee in Singapore, Teochew kway teow noodle soup in Johor Bahru, bak kut teh in Klang, you get the idea.
Of the three we visited during this trip, my personal favourite is at Teng Haw Kedai Kopi. The other two have their own loyal following and are popular too - I shall cover them in future posts.
Teng Haw is an one stall kopitiam and it was full house on this Monday morning. That tells us a lot about THE ONE stall in Teng Haw.
The rustic kopitiam atmosphere was welcoming and friendly - what do I mean? I went around taking photos of other people's food and all welcome me warmly 🙏
Menu - curry mee and the usual drinks. One dish is enough to pack the kopitiam everyday for over five decades.
Teng Haw is run by the friendly Foo family who are Hainanese. They have been in this business for more than fifty years. Teng Haw blend and fry their own spicy hot rempah.
So, not surprisingly, Teng Haw is famous for their chicken curry mee.
As there are many Hakka people in Kuantan, the version loaded with yong tau foo pieces seems to be the most popular.
This was the version we had for this round. We bought one bowl and requested utensils for four people to share. They were busy but didn't mind us doing that at all. We explained that we were on a dawn to midnight food trail 😂
Curry is the heart and soul of curry mee, and I super love the curry at Teng Haw.
It tastes sweet, umami savoury and spicy hot, with the heat burning through the coconut milk sweetness and ikan bilis stock umami. I like it that the curry was not overly thick, being diluted by umami loaded anchovy stock.
Complex yet clean tasting and the sweet, umami, spicy layers were nicely discernible.
All the essentials in the curry, like coconut, anchovy and hot chili pepper are locally grown and sourced - fresh and carry that unique local flavour.
The noodles and yong tau foo pieces just carry the curry flavour (huh 😅 carry the curry favour.... so nice 🙄), and makes for a filling, satisfying, delicious meal.
Unfortunately, by the time we got here they had ran out of blood cockles, so we didn't have any 🙄
The sambal adds more umami spicy kick but I am happy enough already with the curry as served.
Teng Haw set our Kuantan curry mee hunt off on a good start. We caught an early daybreak flight to Kuantan, and this curry mee really energised us for the long day of eating, sightseeing, and shopping ahead in Kuantan.
I love to come back to Teng Haw.
Stall name: Teng Haw Kedai Kopi 祥和茶室
Address: A1128, Jalan Teluk Sisek, 25050 Kuantan, Pahang, Malaysia
Tel: +6013 928 3538
Hours: 6am - 12 noon (Thurs off)
got a kick to it. catches the throat a bit. nice. not silky smooth luxurious.
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