The Nonya Diaries: Mum's Birthday at Auntie Gaik Lean's Old School Eatery

Sunday, March 23, 2014

Mum's Birthday at Auntie Gaik Lean's Old School Eatery

Last weekend was my Mum's birthday and since we've been wanting to try this new Nonya restaurant so we figured it was the perfect occasion to go.

I wore this maxi frock from Dorothy Perkins and I love how swishy the skirt feels plus the pretty floral print, which my Mum said reminds her of Vietnam.

You know how people always talk about what a small world is it? It turned out that Auntie Gaik Lean's husband is my Mum's long lost friend that she hadn't seen since the 70s. They didn't have whatsapp/Facebook/e-mail back in the dark ages so they were pretty excited to catch up :) Guess that was a pretty good birthday present for her. For those of you familiar with Penang back in the good ol' days, the shop lots used to belong to BP de Silvia jewelers and you'll be pleased to see that a lot of the original fixtures are kept.

A round up of the more interesting drinks we had that night (left to right) nutmeg punch, ang thng chooi (rose syrup) with chia seeds and check this out: an old school Sprite glass bottle! I asked if we could bring the bottle back but unfortunately, they have to return it back to the distributors. Anyone knows where can I find another one of these? Bubs was mystified with the floating chia seeds (or are they basil seeds?) in the rose drink and kept asking what were they. I told him they were frogspawn and soon, little tadpoles and froggies would swim about in his tummy ;)

We ordered quite a number to sample. There was kerabu rice and kerabu beehoon (my absolute favourites, whenever in doubt at a Nonya restaurant, I always go for these!), we'd a variety of fried and spiced goodies, from inche kabin (marinated fried chicken), otak otak (steamed spicy fish cakes), joo hu char (shredded turnip and cuttlefish stir fry) to a simple onion omelette for Bubs. The food was good, a bit on the pricey side but made up with the fab environment.

For birthday cakes, you can never go wrong with Mon Delice. This time around, we tried their Earl Grey cake and to make it look more celebratory, I plonked a Lego minifig on top of it. This lil Mexican guy is from the Lego Movie (which we brought Bubs to go watch) and Bubs promptly claimed it for himself.