Nan Yang Dao Char Kuey Teow

Nan Yang Dao is a char chan teng concept specialising in Malaysian (with a focus on Penang) delicacies. There were a few attempts by PappaRich and others to jumpstart the cross border culinary scene on this little red dot - to no avail, until now. Nan Yang Dao came bursting onto the scene and very soon, the big boy (Oriental) will open stores some say in very gentrified locations. Strange you might think, but somehow taste palates don’t translate ; taste buds may have gone divergent since 1965. It almost seems like a mirror universe (peppery bkt, sweet ckt, and white hokkien mee).

Not until today did I get to try Nan Yang Dao - they’ve opened close to a year now - but the queues have been Apple Store-esque). Thanks to my daughter who had classes nearby , and my wife who remembered I was hankering (always!) for authentic Malaysian hawker fare.

We walked in at 9 am, and even then, only a few tables were vacant. This shop does brisk business daily.

I couldn’t decide what to eat - the menu was pretty extensive. The decisioning was simple ; the rarest vs most distant, polarised versions of similar dishes available on both sides of the causeway. It would either be a ckt, a curry mee, or a nasi lemak for me. These are dishes that taste most different (to me)

Then using recency bias - I settled on the Penang CKT option. It was a 7 for me! The best we’ve had on this Little Rock was the Malaysia Chiak! chain and specifically the one at Tangs in Orchard. Today’s could have been a 7.25 if another older chef took to the wok. They’ve 2 woks on and it seems the younger sous chef took our order.

We were spying the same dishes on other tables - by the older chef - and it looked slightly more appealing. We were to share a single plate of ckt the both of us - but I slurped it all
Up on my own. Washed it all down with an iced yuan yang. Enough said

The dish didn’t come with hum - but I suspect it would be customisable as their curry dishes all featured this surreptitiously included. That’s why the curry mee was a close second in my mind - but there’s only that much I could take in on a single seating.

Their fried chicken also looked legit - the berempah type featured at Village Park. Should be legit. Then there’s the petai fried rice that most are raving about. Nan Yang Dao is a no regrets move if you’re hankering for Malaysian food. At least until Oriental hits our shores.

SGD15 for a plate of Char Kuey Teow and a drink.