Oldie but a goldie: How a family-run restaurant charmed my family with classics like Hakka minced patties and Cantonese steamed fish
KUALA LUMPUR, July 11 — My parents were in town and they weren’t happy about it.
Or rather, being the livelong and loyal Melakans that they were, every time they had to trek up to KL for a medical check-up or some other function it felt like a disruption to their bucolic lives back home.
Perhaps unnerved would be a more accurate description of their sensibilities. Gone was the slower pace of life in Melaka; suddenly there were traffic jams and high-density condominiums everywhere they turned.
My niece and I, being the two renegades in our family (moving to KL is but one of our mutinous acts), took it upon ourselves to cheer them up.
Instead of dining inside one of the innumerable malls, in an indistinguishable outlet of some restaurant chain, my niece suggested a partially open-air option albeit still in the heart of the capital.
She suggested Hakka Restaurant, purportedly the oldest family-run Hakka restaurant in KL.
A simple plate of 'kangkung belacan'.
Established in 1956 by Lee Siew Chin and Chong Ngam Sen in Ipoh, the restaurant had moved several times in the past six decades before settling in their current location in Jalan Raja Chulan.
As I understand, Hakka Restaurant is now run by the third generation of owners, something I value greatly given there are three generations in our small dinner party too.
Certainly my parents appreciated the familiar trappings — the round tables and plastic chairs, the pots of Chinese tea and buckets of ice cubes — even as high-rises towered all around us.
The giant retractable awning mirrored the smaller one at their neighbourhood haunt (kopitiam by day, dai chow at night).
My niece is a genius; our dinner venue was an inspired choice, putting my parents at ease immediately.
They were charmed by how many classic Chinese dishes they recognised in the menu; they probably imagined the two of us subsisting on croissants and ramen in KL.
The less commonly available Thai style fiddlehead ferns ('pucuk paku').
Which is not to say everything was smooth-flowing. Every dish we selected was the result of intense debate and vigorous negotiation.
Unlike many families, we always begin with the greens rather than meat or seafood. Did we want Hong Kong kailan, wok-fried Hakka style with minced pork? Or perhaps a "Hakka Duet” of celery, dried squid, pork and bamboo shoots?
We settled on a simple plate of kangkung belacan, for our parents craved something spicy and pungent, and also the less commonly available tàishì bāgǔ cài (Thai style fiddlehead ferns), a tangy take on blanched pucuk paku.
Egg or tofu? My mother thought the latter would be a better option as my father always needed some gravy to go with his rice. An easy pick: the claypot tofu, strewn with leek, cabbage, mushrooms and morsels of siu yoke.
Meat, next. My niece reckoned the mui choy kao yoke, the restaurant’s signature Hakka stewed sliced pork belly with preserved vegetables, sounded good, especially with steamed mantou to soak up the unctuous, dark sauce.
Or perhaps another menu highlight, their Hakka pork ribs? A minimum wait time of 20 minutes was the deal breaker for my parents, however.
Claypot tofu, strewn with leek, cabbage, mushrooms and morsels of 'siu yoke'.
In the end, we settled on the xián yú jiān ròu bǐng or crispy Hakka minced pork and salted fish patties. The crunch was pleasing, the savoury flavours deeply satisfying.
The pièce de résistance was the fish. We are a Cantonese family, so rather than worry ourselves with prawns (these need peeling, though their names — "ha” - promise laughter) or crabs (cracking required, messy too), we always opt for fish.
But not just any type of preparation. Fish for my family, especially my father, means steamed fish. There is no hiding the freshness of fish (or lack thereof), unlike when it’s deep-fried or grilled, my father has asserted many times over the decades.
He has never been more Cantonese than when he insists on this, and I suppose I have inherited his pertinacity (and not only in the matter of fish cooking methods, if I were to be honest).
His late father-in-law, my maternal grandfather, was a fishmonger so my father knew the value of freshly caught fish. Even today my parents get their supply of fish in Melaka from a regular fishmonger who reserves the catch of the day for them.
Which is all to say this last course — the main course, if you will (though unless it’s a wedding banquet, the concept of courses sounds odd to a Chinese family sitting down to a shared meal) — ought to have been the most straightforward.
The 'xián yú jiān ròu bǐng' or crispy Hakka minced pork and salted fish patties.
Nothing deep-fried, pan-fried or braised. Only steamed fish would do.
Yet even here disagreements abound. My father asked about the soon hock (marble goby); my mother thought patin (silver catfish) might be better. My niece suggested cod, clean and buttery.
No, no, and no. Soon hock and patin are river fish, I said, and therefore sometimes too brackish in flavour for my liking. Cod might be too rich for my parents, who have a more delicate constitution now that they are older.
No, the fish we wanted was sek baan or grouper. A proper saltwater fish, with sweet flesh the better to cherish the gentle dousing of light soy sauce.
Everyone agreed. They say family is about unconditional love; I say it’s about biding your time and choosing your battles wisely. Meat, greens and tofu don’t matter; it’s the fish I care the most about.
At least in terms of our menu this evening.
What truly mattered was that we were assembled together, far from where we all grew up, three generations having dinner, grumbling and gossiping and guffawing, the way all families do.
Cantonese style steamed fish with light soy sauce requires the freshest of fish.
Hakka Restaurant
90 Jalan Raja Chulan, KL
Open daily 11:30am-2:30 pm and 5:30pm-10:30pm
Phone: 03-2143 1908
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