One of the things I really miss about Kuala Lumpur is eating mee goreng (5.00 MYR) along its many side streets; cheap, freshly cooked, stir fried and thick super spicy noodles paired with a cold, cold glass of kopi ice (2.00 MYR). Heaven.
That dish is actually the first thing we looked for during our last trip to KL. We’ve been dreaming about it through the whole four-hour flight from Manila and when we finally hit the streets of Kuala Lumpur along with our heavy backpacks, we knew exactly where our first stop would be.
Jalan Alor is a street along the Bukit Bintang District of Kuala Lumpur and it is where we had the best mee goreng during our several trips to the city.
The area is unassuming during the day; just a strip of sleepy restaurants lining a street. But as the sun sets and evening arrives, it slowly comes to life. Chairs and tables spread into the sidewalks, until eventually, it invades the whole road. Overhead, lamps light up one after another, until the whole strip is sparkling like a cabaret.
Jalan Alor is usually where we spend our evenings while in KL. Well, after shooting the KL Tower and the Petronas Towers that is.
With our hotel of choice, Apple Hotel, literally just a few steps away from our favorite noodle vendor who allows us to buy our Tigers from the nearby convenience store, it wasn’t that hard to drink the night away. No fear of being smashed to high heavens and not finding our way back to our hotel.
But yeah, Jalan Alor can also be a place to simply eat your guts out. Well, okay it’s really more of that than a beer-drinker’s haven, it just so happened that most restaurants and stalls also serve beer and there are a few convenience store where you can score them at a cheaper price.
So there, that’s our excuse for making it our very own street bar every night.
Besides mee goreng, we also (reluctantly) tried out other dishes being served at Jalan Alor. There are the usual street fares like the grilled chicken satay with its thick, slightly sweet peanut dip; but we also found some new interesting ones to go along with our kopi ice and Tiger beer (surprisingly, Malaysia’s local Jaz beer is quite hard to find).
Grudgingly, I tried the char kway teow (5.00 MYR) just so I can say I’ve tried another noodle dish from Kuala Lumpur besides mee goreng (although I think this is more famous in Penang than in KL).
From what I can see, it’s made up of really heavily-sauced, wide stir-fried noodles and bean sprouts. I like bean sprouts and I like stir-fried noodles, so I’m guessing there’s really nothing not to like about it. I love its rich flavorful taste but not the consistency of its flat noodles.
We also sampled a couple of rice dishes at Jalan Alor; one, a mish mash of veggies which looked surprisingly like chop seuy paired with fried rice, and another, a mix of chicken and I-really-don’t-have-no-idea-what, topped with fried egg and some strips of cucumber.
We both find them to be average and forgettable if not for the fried chicken we paired them with.
Malaysia has a different twist when it comes to fried chickens. They call them ayam goreng berempah, which translates to spiced fried chicken. From its color alone, which is on the orangey side due to the numerous spices it’s infused with, you definitely know that it is pretty spicy.
It works quite well paired with rice meals, but I also found it to be a good threesome partner with my all-time favorite pair of mee goreng and kopi ice.
And that my friend, just made my mouth water. There’s nothing I’d absolutely want right now than a plate of mee goreng, a pair of ayam goreng berempah and a brain-freeze inducing glass of kopi ice.
Take me back to KL’s Jalan Alor right now, please.
Jalan Alor Food Street
Address: Jalan Alor, Bukit Bintang,
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
GPS Coordinates: 3°08'44.9"N 101°42'31.7"E