Monday, April 09, 2007

Jonker Dessert, Malacca, Malaysia

As the hot Malaccan sun shone like a raygun down upon us, we knew it was time to chill and what better way is there to do so than with a bowl of ice-cold cendol? Jonker Desserts at 88 Jonker Walk is reputated to serve a pretty mean cendol so here we were.

The ice shavings here are so fine they have a texture similar to the first fresh snowflakes of Winter.

The durian cendol is basically the regular cendol with some durian puree poured on top. Although I tend to appreciate durian, somehow the flavor of the durian sort of adulterated the original cendol flavor.

We saw some people eating bowls of assam laksa so we ordered one as well. Is this similar to Penang laksa? It certainly wasn't the coconut curry based laksa that I'm used to. Nevertheless, the tangy flavor was quite refreshing.

In the end, I decided to order a bowl of regular cendol. Wow, this was pretty kickass. I was right about the durian overtones masking the purity of this traditional dessert. They use two types of gula malacca (unrefined coconut sugar) here, a thinner version as a base and thick gooey kind as a topping; simply heaven in a bowl.

Jonker Desserts also sort of doubles up as a museum for some antiques and knick-knacks and since I'm such a sucker for nostalgia and a good cendol, nothing beats slurping a cool bowl of cendol next to some charcoal-powered irons, a broken phone and some metal typewriter.

D

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