Christmas 2010 in Taiping

This year, the family decided to go to Taiping for Christmas. Taiping, if you are not aware, is the town of "eternal peace". Peace and quiet was what we were looking for so we all agreed to head north this year. Another compelling reason (and also the main reason for Gd, Ros and myself ;-) was the famed Taiping food. We were keen to try the Taiping popiah (vegetable roll), cendol (a sweet dessert drink using palm sugar), char kuey teow (fried flat rice noodles) and chee cheong fan (flat rice noodles in a sweet or spicy sauce). Well we managed to try all except the chee cheong fan and all were pretty good.

From our 3 days in Taiping, worth a mention were:-

• The popiah from the stall at the Peace Hotel which we found to be better than the one from the famous Taiping Ais Kacang shop.
  
  
• The Bismillah cendol was a little too sweet for us and we preferred the Ansari one instead which although less sweet, had a better overall taste. The Bismillah red beans also had a distinct burnt smell
  
  
• Restoran 8383 at Pokok Assam. Ros and myself had been here once before in 2007 with some friends from Taiping and we were keen to return to try more dishes. From my notes (yes, I do keep notes about the food places I have visited J) their signature dishes were a fried kerapu fish in a type of curry sauce and a chicken in tauchu (fermented soy bean) sauce with chili padi. Look out for the full review in a separate posting.
  
• Xin Seafood Restaurant at Kuala Sepetang (Port Weld). Where else could you get fresh seafood – straight off the fishing boats ? Everything was super fresh – crabs, fish, prawns and squids. We'll post on this place separately too.
  

Taiping was indeed a good break for us. Special mention to our eldest brother Joe who made the rounds to ta-pau (pack) most of the hawker food we tried.
Finally, thanks for following us in 2010. Look out for more updates in 2011 and do keep the feedback coming.
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2011 AND HAPPY EATING !