Day 3 afternoon - Iced Kachang

Ice Kachang:

Ayer Itam is the home of the Temple of Eternal Happiness (Kate Lok See.) This is a very popular tourist attraction. Of course, we are not going to act like tourists today, so we just hop into the car and started home.
On the way home, we took Green Lane, drove past the MacDonald's (burger place), and Seng may have teased Theng2 about soft ice cream at MacDonald, one of Theng2's favorite food. Theng2 said "we will get that after the iced kachang."

As if on command, we turned into Bata Lanchang Road, and a few minutes later, we arrived at a hawker center. This is a minor hawker center, but Seng knows of a good iced kachang vendor here.
After we found a table (of which, there were plenty available, thus proving it is not a very popular food center. The good ones are usually full, standing room only. You wait until someone leaves the table, then make a jump to claim the table.)
Ann and the children went about to get some kuays (cakes and light snacks). Seng may have gone to order iced kachang. I walked around the stalls to see what else is available. I am pretty full by now, so I did not order anything. A couple of things that caught my eyes, and maybe if we come back here again some day, I may order the Po-Pia, a roll of cooked turnips with dried shrimps, rolled in a very thin cooked dough skin, and presented on a plate, usually in twos, with hoy sin sauce, and sweet chili sauce. Both Becky and i love this. Becky tried it in Singapore, and I know she may want to see it again.

On the way back, I was accosted by a coffee-shop girl. She wanted me to order my drinks from her. I know she belongs to the section of the food section I had just moved through, and coffee vendors are very territorial. You order your drinks from the vendor in your section. She is clearly not supposed to stop me there. She was telling me "You can order your drinks from me. We all share the same profits." I don't believe that. She will get me the drinks, but if confronted, will put the blame on me. I don't want to start a coffee war, so I just said I am going to wait.

The children came back with a couple of bags full of snacks. this is not the potato chips and cheese curls kind of snacks. These are cakes and steamed rice flour cakes, very uniquely Asian. There are so many varieties, I will need to explain them one at a time, when we meet. A interesting one is the coconut balls. A dough ball, with brown sugar inside, covered with shaved coconut pieces. You pop the dough ball into your mouth and squeeze, and the brown melted sugar oozes out to mix with the coconut shavings, and the blandness of the dough, to give you a very refreshing taste.

Another interesting one, and because of us brothers' fondness with bathroom jokes, is called amongst ourselves, the toilet cake. A brown cake, with a slight indentation in the middle. You open the bag of coconut shavings, and pour it into the center of the cake, and take a big bite out of it. I do not particularly like this, but it makes for a good tease.

The iced kachang came. It is actually chen-do, a green noodle-like pieces, with red beans (the kachang), and sometimes creamed cone, and a lot of shaved iced on top, dripped with flavored (usually red) syrup. Optionally, for additional cost, a small scoop of vanilla iced cream is added on top. The children appear to love this concoction. Theng2 ordered another bowl after finishing the first one.