Q Wok Nyonya Curry House @ Taman Bayu Mutiara, BM

A recent visit to Q Wok Nyonya Curry House at Taman Bayu Mutiara near Autocity had us delighted over the good and affordable home cooked traditional Nyona dishes. Most of the dishes have three sizes from small to medium to large and the pricing is justified for the clean environment as well as an efficient service (no service charge here!).

Kapitan Chicken (whole leg portion) @ RM7.50 was meaty and tender. Liberal use of coconut milk, belacan and lemongrass made the gravy really thick and flavorful.

One of my personal favorite – Curry Lamb @ RM7 for a small portion. Depending on your luck, you may get either meat or ribs. I guess we were lucky that day as we got two strips of lamb ribs. And better still, they were the soft ones, which you can easily suck out the juicy, tender meat attached. Tasted a little gamey just like it should, delicious.

If you’re having rice then Q Wok’s Sambal Udang (S) @ RM10 is very recommended for its appetizing flavor – the gravy goes very well with rice! I have to admit I was disappointed when the prawns arrived looking miserably small and different from what was shown in the menu. But then we were satisfied with the freshness and taste.

Ngor Hiang, or what we usually refer to as Loh Bak in terms of hawker food was a fair affair. Two rolls cut into eight pieces @ RM3 only.

Kangkung Belacan @ RM6 was very worth it because it came with a lot of prawns. I doubt you actually get any prawns in other restaurants for this kind of pricing. Taste wise it was good but perhaps a little too wet for my liking.

Ais Kacang @ RM3.50 was not impressive despite the generous ingredients given, I wouldn’t really recommend this actually.

Same for the Cendol @ RM2.50, I would only order it again if I have this sudden, uncontrollable crave for cendol lol.

So a lunch like this cost a little over RM40, quite acceptable considering most dishes we had were meat and prawns. The deserts did not impress but overall it was a satisfying meal considering I was able to finish a whole plate of rice just with the Sambal Udang alone.

Then not long after that we returned to try the other dishes during a family dinner. This time we tried some new and unheard of dishes like Cincalok Omelette @ RM6. It was pretty good actually, the sambal and lime juice added kick into the dish by providing the sour and spicy factors. But of course, you gotta like cincalok in the first place to appreciate this.

A famous house-cum-restaurant in Melaka serves Ayam Pongtay and it was very much well-received by many bloggers who tried it. I have never tried it before but I only heard bad things about it from my friends’ own experiences. I was told it tasted so bad they could only manage 1 taste.
So I was kind of skeptical when the waitress suggested us to try their Babi Pongteh @ RM12, which is a dish exclusively available only in the Nyonya community. And luckily it was good – slices of pork with nice distribution of fat cooked in a mild sweet tasting dark soy sauce. I should also mention that it’s not all meat that you are looking at, a lot of sliced potatoes are used as well – maybe a ratio of potatoes to meat at 60-40?

Q Wok highly recommends their Curry Fish Head but we weren’t too keen on that so we had the Claypot Curry Black Shark @ RM25 instead. If you haven’t tried black shark (‘Or Sit’ in Hokkien) before then you are missing out something.
The flesh of black shark is very smooth, almost like stingray’s but much firmer providing a nice biting sensation. I felt the curry was OK because I have had better Curry Black Shark elsewhere.

And lastly a Stir Fried Bean Curd @ RM6 for the vege dish, nothing special here.

Overall Q Wok Nyonya Curry House is one of the better restaurants to go for Nyonya food in the mainland side of Penang, especially if you are not prepared to travel all the way to the island for the even better ones.
Lastly, while ordering do scrutinize the order chit carefully, as there are many dishes listed which are not found in the menu. You might find some surprises there. The Nyonya Curry Duck looked very interesting and we would certainly try it on our next visit.

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