A nostalgic trip to Central Market and Petaling Street

After a failed trip to Hibiscus Garden (Taman Bunga Raya) in Taman Tasik Perdana which was closed for 2 days, 20-21 Sept for Hari Raya. We decided to head over to Central Market, the local centre for handicrafts, batiks and souvenirs, which is just about 1 km away. Driving in the city is relaxing on public holiday morning, when there were merely a handful of cars on the road.

It was still early, barely 10am, the centre has not fully woken up yet. As Max complained he was hungry, despite having oats and milk for breakfast this morning at 8am, we stopped by Old Town Central Market for breakfast part 2.

We ordered a Double Oldtown Toast with butter & kaya (4 pcs) for Max and thought of trying out Nan Yang Kopi ‘O’ and Rendang Chicken Rice.

The toast is crispy, toast crunch with real buttery (Old Town has partnered with pure butter, SCS) and sweet kaya spread. Max finished 2 slices and was starting on his 3^rd when he spied the Rendang Chicken rice his Dad was just tucking in. Sweetly, he said, “Dad, can I try your rice?” … and that’s it! He happily finished the spicy rendang and sambal, leaving red lips but no moanings of too spicy hot. So, Dad and Mom finished his toasts instead.

In the next couple of hours, we could hear roller-shutters rolling up signaling a busy business day ahead with more tourists coming in. Some could be seen selecting souvenirs, trying out beautiful & colorful batik outfits, Chinese cheongsams, silver trinkets and ladies accessories, wooden handicrafts & traditional musical instruments, hand-made kites, local delicacies & tid-bits.

Being Hari Raya weekend, some stalls are not opened. I bought an interesting interlocking wooden puzzle egg toy for Max to unravel. I love browsing thru’ the stall in search of some gifts and home decorative items.

I re-visited the bookstore that I used to frequent many years ago during my college days. The proprietor told me they have been around for 20 over years. I got to read Tom Clancy's, John Grisham's and Sydney Sheldon's book here to name a few. They sell new magazines too. You can buy these 2^nd hand books for a certain price and re-sell back to them within 1 month for a lower price after reading or you can choose to keep these 2^nd hand books. Being an avid reader especially novels, I find this an excellent arrangement without my bookshelves groaning and books littering everywhere in the house.

Next, we walked over to Petaling Street, the Chinatown bazaar with lots of bargains and yummilicious food. There were fresh fruits stalls, fresh roasted chestnuts, apparels, bags, watches, traditional cookies & biscuits, tid-bits, fresh flowers, roasted duck & goose, curry puffs, dried meat & meat floss, Nike & Adidas shoes…and so much more. There’s a charm about this place that draws the crowd, both local and foreign, not just the bargain items and mooncakes or lanterns as it’s nearing Mid-Autumn (or Mooncake) Festival...

We stopped by for a must-have at Chee-Cheong-Kai, the local Chinese called it (Petaling Street), Koon Kee’s Wantan Noodle. We finished the noodle before remembering to take pictures. The springy noodle with special thick dark soy sauce accompanied by the char-siew is our favourite and right in front of the partially hidden shop is an old man selling fresh-made Chinese pancake, some called it “Apam balik”, a flat 16” (diameter) large hot plate cooked batter liberally sprinkled with sugar and coarsely chopped peanuts, folded and cut in to smaller pieces, sold for RM0.70 each. He has been there for as long as I can remember.

A couple of stalls down, we bought our favorite “Shat-ke-ma”, which is basically crispy fried bits of batter, coated with thick maltose, cooled and cut in blocks. These were my grand-mother's favorite too.

We bought a lantern in the shape of Spiderman (RM8.00) for Max and a “Choo-chai paeng” (Basket piglet) for RM1.00 from Loong Kee, all in the spirit of the coming Mid-Autmn festival. We just couldn’t resist the variety of mouth-watering pastries from Foong Wong, and bought some egg-tarts, siew-paus and plain lotus-seed mooncakes.

We left mid-afternoon when the sun was just too hot, for the cool interiors of Central Market again, then drove home, the parking came to RM9.00 for the few hours. We snacked on the yummy & very satisfying pastries we bought, on the way home.

It’s been an enjoyable family day though we couldn’t visit Hibiscus Garden but we’ll try that again another day.