Malaysia/Penang food review with map and GPS

Last week I visited Tonkibento Restaurant at Lintang Burmah Road and noticed a ramen shop there called Ramen Wang. This Friday, I visited the place and ordered one XO sauce seafood ramen. XO sauce, even though sound like a wine name, is actually made of dried prawn and chili. It is mild spicy (luckily). I added RM5.00 to include one smoothie namely “Tropical Paradise” (crunched with mango juice, pineapple, banana and vanilla), a Shui Gao Soup, and a Gui Lin Gao. According to the advertisement, the noodle is made on the spot using a machine (the machine is displayed near drink counter). The ramen is kind of small for my stomach since it is fried ramen. With soup, it should be “full tank”. Luckily I ordered a fried gyoza. It tastes great with vinegar and ginger slices.

There is even an abalone ramen costs RM45! Would visit again in future.

Restaurant Ramen Wang
11-A, Lintang Burmah Road, Penang, Malaysia.
Tel: 04-2277298

My friend gave me a brochure on a Japanese restaurant called Tonki Bento near Pulau Tikus (Lintang Burmah Road, to be exact), so I decided to try it out this Friday. The place is hard to find if you are not familiar with the road there (note that it is not Lorong Burmah Road). Fortunately it is kind of smooth in finding the place. The menu is similar to the one my friend gave me (you can download it below). Other than providing dine-in service, the shop also provides delivery service. I tried to order one Sushi Bento but unfortunately they are unable to make it due to high delivery order (DUH!). As a result, I ordered Chicken and Salmon Teppanyaki set worth RM15.00. Both chicken and salmon taste excellent. A funny thing is that even though I am dining in, the plate and miso soup’s cup are served by take out plastic container. Perhaps this is also a “delivery service”…. to my table.

Anyway, the environment is nicely decorated. There is even a book shelf full of Japanese magazines (excluding *ehem* one). I took a Crayon Shin Chan comic and read while waiting for the lunch to be ready… even though I dunno Japanese.

Tonki Bento Menu

Tonki Bento Restaurant
No. 2, Lintang Burmah, Pulau Tikus, 10250 Penang, Malaysia.
Lunch time: 11.00am – 1.30pm
Dinner time: 6.00pm – 8.30pm
Tel: 017-4757100/016-4390606

I like sushi but sometimes just can’t afford to enjoy it at expensive sushi shops out there. Some hypermarkets do provide sushi counter but the taste is just average, or simply not fresh. So far, only Carrefour and Jusco provides better sushi. Since Jusco is just nearby my house, I used to get one RM10 sushi set as my dinner while performing grocery shopping there. The box also comes with small wasabi and soy sauce packs. Perhaps one of the reasons why Jusco has bigger sushi counter is that the retail outlet is backed by a Japanese company.

Personally I don’t like the biggest Pizza chain stores in Malaysia – namely “Pizza Nut”, even though it is widely available. One of the reasons is that the pizza base is simply too thick with less topping. Most of the time I feel that I am eating bread instead of pizza. US Pizza, even though is not new in Malaysia, provide thicker topping hence thinner base. During my first visit, I ordered one pizza set lunch (Tomyam Chicken favor) worth RM31.49 served with drinks, bread sticks and chicken wings. The chicken wings are recommended but the bread stick is kind of hard (plus it does not come with soup).

A drawback is that the shop is located in a less strategic place, which is nearby Gembira Parade, Green Lane (left of the mall, last shop of a row of shoplots). It may be difficult to find at first if you are less familar with the area there. As a whole, if you are looking for alternative for “Pizza Nut”, you may try US Pizza.