The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Snacks & Pastries in Malacca

We have officially stepped into the 2nd half of the year. I blame the laziness in me that I have not been updating regularly last month. We started June with a long weekend and before long, July arrived at our doorstep :( We were also busy with engagements during the June weekends, thus I'm really looking forward to a slacking weekend soon to clear some of the backlogs that I have accumulated :) 

After our meal of asam laksa @ Jonker 88, we combed the streets armed with the to-buy list from our parents. Mummy Fling had instructed Fling to buy some pastries - which was like a hybrid between mooncake and 老婆饼. We almost ransacked the shop before the owner said that they do this via special orders. Immediately, Fling placed an order of 100 pieces of the hybrid biscuit, ready for collection the next day. 

 

Old-school mama shop that brought back fond memories! I spotted a lot of childhood snacks that I wanna lug home. But .... must practice constraint, the weighing machine figures don't lie.

 

My nose caught a whiff of freshly baked goodies emerging out from the oven. Instantly, my resounding resolution just crumbled to the ground :( Since good things are meant to be shared, I decided to psycho persuade the sisters to hand over their wallets, heh. 

  

We continued our adventure after a quick stop back to our room to drop off the goodies. This time round, we headed to Mahkota Parade & Dataran Pahlawan for more shopping. It was really humid in Malacca, so imagine the cold gush of air that greeted us as we stepped foot inside this shopping mall. What's even better than air-con? A wide variety of gelatos that looked so inviting #takemymoney

 

3 flavours - mango, chocolate and peppermint - for sharing. A single scoop filled up the entire cup, which was way too much for us, lol! Our best combined effort only saw us finishing the chocolate, reducing mango by 75% and peppermint by half.

Gelato Fruity
Lot No. B-43B, LG Floor Dataran Pahlawan
Jalan Merdeka, Bandar Hilir, 75000 Melaka
Opening Hours: 10am till 10pm
Tel: +60 6281 8059

 Read our Malacca adventures here:

Malacca 2014: 5 things to do in Malacca  

The Jitches: Journey to Malacca

The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Hotel Courtyard @ Heeren and Asam Laksa at Jonker 88
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Conquering Jonker Street
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Geographer Cafe   
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Breakfast, Chicken Rice Balls and Heading Home 

The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Hotel Courtyard @ Heeren and Asam Laksa at Jonker 88

Hello! This week has been extremely busy at work, as I'm covering a colleague who's off to serve the nation. Well, at least I survived the week! In an attempt to reward myself, I think I should ask Leecher to cook my fave Korean soup for dinner tonight, lol! Before I head off to for another ep of drama, I figured that I should continue on the jitches' adventure in Malacca, so I can strike another item off my to-do list :)

 

After the massage, we continued on our journey and arrived at the hotel. Fling got us a lovely room at hotel courtyard @ heeren. We dropped Fling at the front before following the staff to the back of the hotel to park the car. Complimentary parking is available for guests. Since we 走后门, this was the first view that greeted us.

We lugged all our barangs, which was pretty amazing at how much girls need to pack for a weekend trip, to the lobby where Fling was waiting for us. She had already done the check-in & was finished her welcome drink, lol! 

A glass of refreshing fruit punch to quench the thirst. Malacca was really extremely hot and humid, so this served as an awesome drink.
 
The friendly staff who made our stay enjoyable :)

We headed upstairs to check out our bedroom first.  

Tadah! Our lovely room for the night, 2 X queen sized bed to accommodate the 4 of us. Each room design combines the Peranakan style with modern elements. The room was cleaned and fully furnished with the basic necessities. I really adored the peranakan-style floor tiles that we couldn't resist a pic with our weathered pumps/slippers.

 

We lazed around in bed - which was so comfortable that I almost fell asleep - with the air-con at full blast as it was really hot outside. When our stomachs started to protest, we had to pull ourselves out from the comfort zone and headed out in search for food. 

 

Conveniently located in the heart of Malacca, this boutique hotel was transformed from a shop-house where Chinese & Peranakan merchants built their homes. I fell in love with this place at first sight - not only because of its superb location, but also due to the juxtaposition of old and modern elements in this little place. I will be returning for a 2nd visit as I refused to stay anywhere in Malacca apart from here, haha! 

 
A pic before heading out to hunt for food ;)

Finally, a view from the front door. I didn't know that Qian took this until she uploaded it to the whatsapp chat. She said this is very VictoriaBeckham-ish, lol! If only I'm as successful as her!

Courtyard @ Heeren

91 Jalan Tun Tan Cheng Lock,

75200, Melaka, Malaysia

Tel: +606 281 0088

 
The #1 thing to do is to head for a bowl of Asam Laksa at Jonker 88. This place needs no further introduction to those who frequent Malacca. The place is bustling with people from the time their doors open in the morning till closing.

Check out the prying eyes looking for a vacant seat/table. Haha, this reminded me of the "waiting" queue for table during lunch hours for CDB. It was all about strategy and instinct, and to a little extent, luck. Both the ordering and waiting queue were pretty long, so we headed off in 2 groups to get the mission done.

  

The order counter used to be in front of the shop, but they have since moved it inside. While most customers will order the combi: asam laksa with a bowl of chendol, we chose to order just asam laksa instead.

   

Tadah! The prized bowl of asam laksa that we all craved :) It used to be overspilling with ingredients. Now portion seemed to have reduced quite a bit. Well, times are bad and it seemed to show subtly everywhere. 

Jonker 88 ( 大寶小食)

88 Jalan Hang Jebat (Jonker Street)

75200, Malacca, Malaysia 

 Read our Malacca adventures here:

Malacca 2014: 5 things to do in Malacca  

The Jitches: Journey to Malacca 
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Snacks & Pastries in Malacca
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Conquering Jonker Street
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Geographer Cafe  
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Breakfast, Chicken Rice Balls and Heading Home  

The Jitches: Journey to Malacca

On a random day via our whatsapp chat, the Sisters decided that we should embark on our first solo trip. After a quick look through on our availability, we decided on the date & destination. So, this was the starting point of our road trip to Malacca. Fling managed to got us a lovely room at a boutique hotel within a short notice. As I'm typing this entry, I just got "activated" for another Malacca trip with the in-laws later this year ;) 

We debated on the various mode of transport - taking coach/self-drive a rented car etc. Thankfully for us, a kind friend of Fling offered to loan us his car over the weekend for our road trip! 爱死你了;) Thus, Miao & Fling collected the car on the day of departure while Qian & I headed towards Woodlands station for pick up. Clearing the customs was relatively fast - we expected jam of 2h but managed to clear it within 1h. A great start to our trip! We then headed to Fling's place to pick up her barang-barang. 

 

Goofing around while waiting for Fling to get ready. We bought identical aviators, but mine didn't survive the Korea trip so I had to make do with another one. A short 15 min wait spanned to over 1h at the lobby. We tried means and ways to contact her as we couldn't access her floor without an access card. Just when we decided to shout out her name, Fling appeared and turned out that she had a minor crisis with her contact lens, lol! 

Fling took over as the driver and drove us all to Malacca. Before that, we need to top up on fuel for our tummies, as well as the car. We stocked up on snacks and drinks at the petrol kiosk for our journey to Malacca. We even assigned roles for this trip, lol! Qian will be the auditor for taking charge of expenses used on the car. Fling & Miao are the appointed drivers while I'm in charge of our kitty fund + taking pictures. Once the car had its fill, we made a pit stop at Ah Hong Kopitiam for breakfast.

We were all famished and immediately placed our orders! Check out our "hunger" faces, lol :)

I ordered a set which came with mee siam, with otah and chicken wings + drink at RM11.90. The mee siam was quite dry and plain that I had to mix in lots of chilli to get the kick. Nevertheless, I love the crispy chicken wings. We spent around RM46 for breakfast, which worked out to SGD$4.50 per pax.

Ah Hong Kopitiam
60, Jalan Sutera Tanjung 8/4
Taman Sutera Utama 81300
Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia
Tel: +60 12 771 9600

After our breakfast, we were ready to hit the roads. The back-seat passengers (Qian & I) started distributing drinks and snacks to the drivers group. We gossiped for a long while before the sleeping bug took charge. Qian & I concussed at the back while the drivers brought us safely to Malacca. Good job girls, love you *muacks*

We arrived at Topic Healthcare Centre for our massage. Qian & Miao headed for full body massage while Fling & I opted for foot massage. I always find massages are relatively expensive in Singapore, thus I'll head for a massage whenever I'm in BKK/Bali/JB. I love Balinese massages the most ;) The foot massage package that I had was around RM$50 (if I recall correctly). Fling & I chatted for the whole duration that time just flew by us without us knowing it.

Topic Healthcare Centre
177 & 177A, Jalan Merdeka
Taman Melaka Raya, 75000
Melaka, Malaysia
Tel: +60 6281 6957

I will be back with more entries documenting our sister trip, so keep a lookout for it ;) 

*****
 Read our Malacca adventures here:
Malacca 2014: 5 things to do in Malacca  

The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Hotel Courtyard @ Heeren and Asam Laksa at Jonker 88
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Snacks & Pastries in Malacca
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Conquering Jonker Street
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Geographer Cafe  
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Breakfast, Chicken Rice Balls and Heading Home  

Malacca 2014: 5 things to do in Malacca

Malacca, located on the west coast of peninsular Malaysia, is often termed as "The Historic State". Listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the city centre eludes a strong blend of historical and cultural influences from Portuguese, Dutch and British rule. Over the weekend, the Sisters embarked on a road trip to Malacca, braving the infamous Malaysia jam to enjoy a 2D1N sisterly trip!

1. Asam Laksa at Jonker 88

The most famous icon of Jonker Walk, Jonker 88 is no doubt the place to go for a bowl of asam laksa. Based on a home-made recipe, the laksa is served with noodles and tipped with cucumber, onion slices, tofu pok and a spoonful of tuna. Be prepared to brave the queue before you are greeted with a bowl of delish noodles. 

2. Conquer Jonker Street

Conquering Jonker Street on a weekend is no easy feat. This street comes alive at night, bustling with roadside stalls that sell everything under the sun - ranging from tasty snacks to cheap souvenirs. We braved the human crowd (sweaty bodies, arms and all) and walked from one end to the other while sampling tasty snacks along the way!

3. Indulge in Chicken Rice Balls

 

Don't leave Malacca without polishing off a plate of chicken rice balls. These rice balls are so tiny that I could easily eat 10 of it myself. Do not attempt to bounce these off the table, for they are not ping pong balls :)  

4. Fill your tummies with pastries

 

Savour a wide collection of pastries housed under one roof, ranging from 老婆饼 to 豆沙饼. These pastries are freshly baked from the bakeries, we could even smell the fragrance from across the street. Lug some goodies home for the family and spread the love!

5. Chill at a Cafe & enjoy live music

We headed to Geographer's Cafe for a girls' night out. Located at a corner of Jonker Walk, this is the place to be seen! With a drink in hand, we chatted the night away while live music accompanied us in the background. 

Psst .... detailed posts will be linked once completed, stay tuned!  

 ******

 Read our Malacca adventures here:

The Jitches: Journey to Malacca 
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Hotel Courtyard @ Heeren and Asam Laksa at Jonker 88
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Snacks & Pastries in Malacca
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Conquering Jonker Street
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Geographer Cafe  
The Jitches Adventure in Malacca: Breakfast, Chicken Rice Balls and Heading Home  

Roadtrip To Malacca

*I had to let this post jump queue, otherwise my head will be on the chopping board *

The Brother and Sisters finally embarked on our first ever road-trip to Malacca!

Meet up with Qian @ JP, 8.15am to have our breakfast - well, Ryan & Miao are supposed to join us, but the former only touch his bed @ 5am while the latter (who told us to meet @ 8am) only woke up @ 8am after Qian's phone-call, haha.

Ordered Happy Meal - been quite a while since l last tasted Mac Hotcakes. Got the 师父 Kungfu Panda toy for Leecher, to pacify him for staying alone in SG while I am away :)

Qian, feeling kinda tired cuz she just landed from HK the day before

Me - all set and ready for the trip!

Presenting to you - our HANDSOME driver for the day, Ryan (need to buy Mac meal to pacify him, so that he can drive us to Malacca, hee)

Miao - the one who overslept :P

And not forgetting the 2 pretty sisters who woke up bright & early but kena fly kite by the 2 of the above, wa ha ha ..

Before proceeding any further, let us express our gratitude to the following .....

1. Ryan's trusty Mazda CX7, that has the privilege of sending 4 pretty gals to Malacca
2. GPS - which works way better than Joe's natural GPS (insider joke, heehee)

Alright, having said that - let's rock and roll to Malacca ~

As we were on the way to Tuas Customs, we received a very "angry" phonecall from Fling ...
She was supposed to meet us on the highway, after one of the toll @ 10am (which was the timing Ryan told her). However, we were still @ SG at the time, she was already there waiting for us, opps ....

Ryan talked to her on the phone for like 20 sec and threw the phone back to us (Qian & me) at the back-seat .... *sorry fling*
Finally @ the checkpoint - my first time entering Malaysia through Tuas *yeah, i sounds so sua ku rite, bet Leecher nv seen this before, haha .... *
Wow, look at the long queue - but surprising, it only took us like less than 30 min to clear it :)

The sky on the other side

We better speed up and find Fling, who would be reaching her boiling point soon having waited nearly 1 hr.

Their toll station

Yeah, Fling has joined us! Bye Noel, we will take care of her and make sure that you can have some peace w/o her for 2 days, :P
The not-so-environmental friendly car needs some fuel, thus we stopped at the nearest petrol kiosk that we can find ....

Cam-whoring while waiting for the car to be ready ~

Look @ what we found in the petrol kiosk! OMG, brings back fond memories ~ 5 sticks of chocolate just enough for the 5 of us :) (better finish it b4 Joe's arrival)

Think Qian has got a wire loose somewhere ...

With Vpower, CX7 only took around 1hr plus to reach Malacca, making up for our lost time

Waiting for the grand arrival of Mr Joseph @ the toll ...cam-whore while eating the chocolate sticks .. we're kids @ heart, definitely

Finally, the person with so much 魅力 that all of us got to travel almost 200km from SG to Malacca to keep him company over the weekend ... Brother, 有没有感动到流泪?

Can't imagine Joe driving this car ....
Doesn't the colour of the car reminds you of

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Ok, maybe not so green though ....

Our pilot-to-be - who has poor navigation skills on land and gave us a tour of Malacca because he cannot find the resort that we're staying :P We need to thank our lucky stars that we finally reached the hotel after soooooooo long :O
Ya, I seriously think Qian has got a screw loose somewhere. Better leave her alone till her screw is fixed, wa ha ha. *be careful old man, don't say I nv warn you*

Think I should grab Fling instead, she's more normal than Qian ^_^

The lobby of the hotel - quite pretty, but the staff sure got attitude problem. We paid X% for the service charge and yet, we still had to make our own way down to the restaurant for a packet of ice, just because the stupid gal was afraid of making her own way up and claimed that there were no guys around to accompany her. Oh, so does that means that the hotel is not safe that even the staff themselves are afraid? However, when Joe went down - the party of 5 (2 gals & 3 guys) were happily chit-chating behind the counter. Super pissed!

Anyway, this is our room number - we got a room with 2 bedrooms and a living room

Splendid view from the balcony ~

Ryan's astonished look when we told him that he should bunk in with Joe @ his place when the gals discovered that there are only 2 beds in each bedroom and there will be no room for him except the living room or Joe's place. Don't worry Brother, 我们不会过河拆桥的.
Time to head out from lunch - everyone famished from the long journey. Went to search for the chicken rice balls @ my request :P

designated parking area for their customers, not bad sia ~

The sisters, with Qian missing in action ....

cuz she wanna be the flower amongst the grass :P too bad, both grasses are taken - but do leave a comment if interested, there's always room for negotiation :)
Our drinks to kick-start the feast. Surprisingly, the sun is freaking hot in Malacca, even worse than SG.
The famous chicken rice balls - don't think they can bounce like those I watched on the show "yuan zhi wei" hosted by Cai LiLian.

Our feast ~ super full after this meal ... and this meal costs around SGD$6/person (i think)

Bought lots of local products @ this store, spent RM$100 there on titbits for Leecher & family. I didn't even buy anything for myself lo, see Leecher, i so teng you :)

Back to the hotel to change and out to enjoy the sea and the breeze, right @ the back-door of the hotel

Trying to do an artistic pic with our background

that literally translated into the following ....

Turned to face the camera, but we were against the light, so turned out to be slightly dark :(
The beach was pretty small and we soon got bored of it. Thus, back to the room to wash up and head out for dinner @ Jonker Walk - it's like a night market, lots of stuff to eat, i like!

Leaving our footprints @ Jonker Street

More pics while we continued to wait for rest to catch up

Wow, they have this stage in the middle of the road with live performances. People will just grab a chair and sit down to enjoy the music while sipping over a cup of tea or a bottle of beer.

Look @ those buns! oh my freaking god ....

It's almost the same size as my hand lo - wait, whose hand is that? Mine?

This stall sells a lot of 串串 - look @ the huge variety that they have :) reminds me of 士林夜市's stalls.

This curry fishball totally wow-ed me over. This made my trip worthwhile

The rest of the 串串； the chilli sauce damn power but it's the curry sauce that made everything tasty. *poor leecher, can only look and drool - too bad cannot ta bao for u *
We literally had to stand in one corner and eat and do the stuff that we normally can't do in SG

The group without me - idiot rite, leave me out of the pic :(

Tried the Hakka 算盘子. Very chewy, but cannot taste anything except lots of dough.

This is the most famous stall in Jonker Street, super crowded.

The interior of the shop , still basking in the early 1980s era.

The famous Assam laksa, unique taste with slight blend of tuna and tom yam.

All set and ready to dig in!

Mango 'ice kachang' to cool ourselves...

My green apple juice, hopefully this will aid in digestion so that I can take in more food later ;P
Came across this stall selling magnet clogs - I am a sucker for cutie stuff. Got Leecher his present here, a pair of clogs featuring CRABS (no prize for guessing why I choose crabs for him, LOL) and the Chinese bride & groom for our future fridge. Fling spent almost $40 SGD just buying cutie stationaries for work.
When you're at Jonker Street, must watch the performance of this Malaysia Boleh. He is such a seasoned performer - always entertaining the crowd, drawing laughters from them and not forgetting to peddle his ointments.

Preparing his whip to "tear" the newspapers apart ....

Ta-Dah!

Breaking the coconut open ...

After the performance, we ventured to eat the satay lok-lok

Typical Singaporean mentality, look at the queue and you will know that this is a can-make-it-restaurant.

To prove my point further, still got the awards/celebrities decorating the walls!

Fling & Miao were happily posting for picture while waiting for our turn to be seated

Each stick costs RM$0.70 and there were lots of food to choose from.

We took a few sticks cuz we were still pretty full from our earlier food conquests

This is the satay pot. The waitress will come to stir the pot once in a while to prevent the peanuts from getting burnt - to maintain the quality of the satay sauce. Look at the size of the prawns, *drool drool*

Time to head back to the hotel after our food quest! Sorry Joe, food certainly is more tempting than going to the Afamosa (Ryan, it's A-fa-mo-sa, not Ah-Far-mo-sa) water theme park :) Had our usual "bonding" till 4am in the morning - which only evolves around 1 topic. It's pretty amazing how we managed to do it though. *secret*

Checked out the next morning. Poor Joe had to be our porter ...

Our 战利品. I think I bought the most goodies, hence taking up 20% of the space. Luckily CX7 boot is spacious enough to put all our stuff.

All set and ready to rock & roll :O

Had teochew bak kut teh for brunch

They served bak kut teh with meatballs and 金针菇，much to Fling & Miao's delight.

The 4 sisters - we have known each other for 12 yrs! gosh, we sound so old now ...

Fling & me with our shades - my 自拍 pics are pretty good, with all the training I had with Leecher.

Joe decided to try out Miao's shades

and prompted me to think that he looks like this :

We made a trip to Joe's flying school

The planes that Joe flies - a pity we can't get to see the cockpit classroom

It was raining, so we couldn't do much except to take pics, lame excuse rite.... 1st take - all the sisters, except Miao, put on their shades. So, we had to take another one
Ryan had requested for me to mention here that both Qian & Fling were wearing his shades. Fling even forgotten to pass it back to him on her journey back home, haha.

The brothers - strangely, Ryan seems to look very much taller here, hmmmm ..

Bidding Joe goodbye near his house. Take care Bro, we will visit you again!

Ryan put his Vpower to test again, but unfortunately, it was starting to rain ... so we had to slow down :(
I managed to capture the lightning. Fling was so scared of lightning/thunder that she will use both hands to cover her ears and shut her eyes. That's also her excuse for not learning how to drive, haha .....

Our last toll ticket before reaching SG ...

Sent Qian back and had dinner at the 179 bus stop Kopitiam

Chicken wings that used to cost $1/wing has now increased to $1.20/wing, no thanks to inflation & raising food prices.
Home sweet home! My purchases for the trip, 50% for Leecher - that will end up contributing to his waistline :P
PS: Ron, if you're looking @ this entry, sorry, you missed out all the fun. Till the next trip!