Day 225 On the trail of Malaysian cuisine

Today, I strolled through Kuala Lumpur without a specific destination in mind, as I had already seen the main attractions. The reason I haven't moved on yet is because the hostel organized a food tour of Malaysian cuisine in Kuala Lumpur tonight. So, I sat in the park in front of the Petronas Towers and enjoyed the sun.

Later, I took a walk through Chinatown and visited the Central Market.

In the evening at 5 p.m., the food tour started. We walked around Kuala Lumpur and learned about Malaysian cuisine. The Indian and Chinese influences were hard to miss. Malaysians eat an average of 6 times a day. I think I need to change my nationality. Our first meal on the tour was rice with fried coconut flakes.

followed by a soup or stew with vegetables and meat. Afterwards, we found out that the meat was goat's tongue. If you don't know, it doesn't taste as strange. For drinks, there was a kind of syrup.

From this restaurant, we made our way to the farmers market. In the meat section, we learned that the whole animal is used and nothing is wasted. Here, you can even buy whole cow heads, in addition to tongues and organs.

The smell here was also quite unique, so everyone was relieved when we moved on to the fruit and vegetable section.

We got to try several fruits here, including durian, the stinky fruit. I had already tried it in Indonesia and found it terrible, and it doesn't taste any better here in Malaysia.

We also learned about the spices and herbs used for seasoning. After the market, we visited 4 more restaurants or food stalls and tried all sorts of things, from the special Malaysian burger to satay skewers and pancakes. In the end, we spent about 3 hours mostly just eating. Full and a bit sleepy, we took the metro back to the hostel. Except for the durian, I really enjoyed everything and it was difficult for me to choose a favorite. Fortunately, the others felt the same way.