In the mood for good food: KL Chinatown’s moodmood serves up excellent fresh handmade pasta
KUALA LUMPUR, April 13 — It’s difficult to overstate the seemingly omnipresent nature of pasta in restaurants here, but sometimes that sort of prevalence can be detrimental to the way something is perceived.
After all, pasta is just pasta, isn’t it?
Perhaps not. Opening a restaurant focused heavily on fresh handmade pasta can be a bold, even if not particularly unconventional, decision.
A crosswalk away from the Pasar Seni MRT station is moodmood, a pork-free establishment that opened towards the tail end of last year.
Inside, the dark wooden furniture and exposed brick walls belie the distinctly Italian influence on the food here.
The interior doesn’t exactly scream 'great pasta found here', but don’t let it fool you.
There’s no spaghetti or linguine to be found here, and that’s a good thing. Instead, you’ll find agnolotti, cavaletti and tajarin (a.k.a. tagliolini), all of which are Italian classics that are scarcely found in KL.
As your eyes run through the list, you’ll notice a preference for rich and velvety sauces (the closest you’ll get to aglio olio here is a tajarin vongole) which are traditionally paired with fresh pasta, accentuating the soft, tender and almost silky texture as opposed to al dente dried pasta.
Is it green or blue, the colour of the storefront? All I know is, brilliant pasta awaits inside.
The pasta of the day was tagliatelle, which I had with tomato sauce, basil and Grana Padano (RM35).
The tagliatelle was a brilliant, deep yellow, putting the uovo (egg) in all’uovo (egg pasta), and delightfully springy and smooth in the mouth.
Tagliatelle is perfectly suited for rich, hearty sauces like a pomodoro sauce, so it was an easy decision to make.
The tomato sauce carried a mellow orange hue, almost reminiscent of a vodka sauce, and it perfectly coated every inch of every strand of tagliatelle, as opposed to being a gloppy, heaping mess.
The generous snowing of Grana Padano married it all together; similarly savoury but milder in taste to Parmigiano Reggiano, it was an inspired choice of cheese.
Next was a dish I was most excited to try: Cacio e Pepe (RM38), one of the four traditional Roman pasta.
'Cacio e Pepe': something so deceptively simple, executed to perfection at moodmood.
Traditionally done with Pecorino Romano, black pepper and spaghetti or tonnarelli, this version was done with tajarin, a variety that’s actually native to Piedmont, northwestern Italy.
Despite this, it was every bit as stunning, salty, sharp, rich and peppery as you’d wish. The dish is a stellar display of technique: emulsified pasta water, Pecorino Romano and pepper are key to the luscious texture, and it was buttery smooth.
I think places that specialise in something like pasta live and die by how well they do the simple stuff with minimal ingredients, and moodmood does not disappoint.
For something a little less gluten-laden, the seven-day aged spring chicken with fermented harissa (RM62 for half) is a crispy, succulent and spicy affair that’s a crowd-pleaser. The charred kailan on the side is a nice touch.
Helped by the seven-day ageing, the chicken is succulent and tender despite not being particularly moist.
There’s no denying that a meal here isn’t exactly low-cost, but considering mediocre attempts at carbonara or bolognese in plenty of other places can fetch similar prices, it’s hardly extortionate to pay a little more for the excellent craftsmanship and cooking found here.
Beyond the fresh handmade pasta from scratch, moodmood showcases more than just popular pasta varieties, as well as a virtuosic understanding of flavour, technique and execution in pasta.
I, for one, can’t wait to come back and try the agnolotti.
moodmood
196, Jalan Tun H S Lee, Kuala Lumpur
Open Monday to Sunday, 10am-10pm. Closed on Tuesday.
Tel: 019-332 0988
Instagram:@hi.moodmood
* Follow us on Instagram @eatdrinkmm for more food gems.
