Travel: Malaysia - All about the food.
A few weeks ago i went on an adventure to Malaysia. A place i had wanted to go to for a while. This was a university psychology trip which entailed a lot of work, but also a lot of play. Now i thought about how to structure these Malaysia posts as i have about about a million photos (a bit dramatic but, there is a lot!). I decided the best way to do it was to share all the food first. After all, the blog is named Psychology, FOOD and Fitness for a reason. I love food. Food was one of the main reasons i was excited to visit Malaysia. We've all seen the amazing Instagram posts, all the incredible tropical fruit.. dreamy..
Although, i never did actually realise how much they do eat over there. It is a massive part of their culture! We soon learnt that, got used it and made the most of it. I literally ate everything in sight. I only had 10 days to try everything right? So there were lots of firsts for me.
One of my favourite things was the banana leaf meal which was biryani served with some sides (including bitter melon - a first for me - and rather delicious). Another first was sushi, i have probably tried sushi before but this was my first 'real' time sitting and ordering sushi in a restaurant. I had one with raw salmon which was.. alright, don't think i am a massive sushi fan. I also tried salmon head which was actually delicious. Not pictured is the Malay national dish 'Nasi lemak' which i probably wouldnt eat for breakfast like they do but, it was a very enjoyable tea. But, on the most part, i tended to stick to lots of chicken dishes especially my faithful satay chicken which i have all the time at home (promise i'm not obsessed with peanut butter). Lastly i refused to leave without trying coconut cream in the coconut shell. Proper instagram worthy. Tasted pretty decent too.
After all my excitement about fruit. I was pretty let down. I was so excited to try dragon fruit, probably because it looks so pretty, but there wasn't really much of a taste. I'd also heard lots of good things about Durian but i was not expecting that smell! It was so strong you could smell it a mile off. Think a mix of sewer and sweaty armpits. I think the smell put me off so much i didn't really care what it tasted like. The one fruit i really did enjoy (thanks to Jane for getting this or i doubt i would have tried it) was Mangosteen. So sweet and delicious. I will be trying this again.
And here is some of the not so healthy food i got to try. Green tea kitkat - who knew these existed? Definitely not seen them in the UK. On the bottom left is a banana roti. Roti seems to be very popular in Kuala Lumpur. You can get them plain with curry, with banana (like mine) or with egg and cheese. Mine came served with a side of condensed milk. Oh the sugar rush. Lets not forget to mention the FRIED ICE-CREAM. Forgot the fried mars bar. It is all about the fried ice-cream. It was truly delicious, just like ice-cream encased in a doughnut (my two favourite things - what's not to love?). And of course to add to the sugar high i had to try a Famous Amos & Dunkin' Donuts as we certainly don't get to try them in the UK. Dunkin' Donuts or Krispy Kreme though is the question. What do you think? I think i'm team Krispy Kreme.
Overall my food experience in Malaysia was interesting to say the last. I got to try so many new and different things some of which i loved and some of which i'm happy to leave behind (Durian and Roti). The food is so affordable over there, you can get a decent meal for like £1.50. It was astonishing. How could you resist? The food was a lot different than what i was expecting, a lot more fried, carb heavy and full of sugar. But there was a lot of healthy options if you chose that and we did enough walking to burn it off. I had noticed the university we stayed at was very health focused with motivational quotes printed on the walkway.
Stay tuned for my next Malaysia post where i'll share all the amazing touristy things we got up to.
Have you tried Malaysian cuisine? What is your favourite part?
