Kuala Lumpur food tour covers city's many cuisines: Arrive with an empty stomach

Nasi lemak.Credit: iStock

"If you're hungry after this, you'll get a refund," says the leader of our pack, Kingston Khoo as he boots his classic Vespa GTS to life. I hop aboard and, along with five other scooter-mounted pairs we weave through the night traffic of Cooler Lumpur, aka Kuala Lumpur, heading for Glutton Street.

We're all first-timers on Kingston's unique Cooler Lumpur by Night food tour. First course on this three-culture degustation run is at a traffic-free zone known as Pudu Hawker Street. "Or just plain Glutton Street," says Kingston as we wind our way amid of hawker carts and open-air tables.

Malaysians, predominantly ethnic Chinese, come here nightly to wolf down fabled hawker fare like "four-eyed boy fried chicken" and "pork innards porridge", plus the local favourite char kway teow. Once dubbed "the mother of all sinful street food", char kway teow consists of stir-fried rice noodles with salted egg yolk, plus taste-bomb morsels of meat, bean sprouts, green onions and random chilli depth-charges.

Our "Vesperado" guides.

We find a table. This is commando dining. No tablecloths, stealable silver or fawning waiters, just naked Formica, plastic plates and quick-draw service. And food to drool for. Wan tons arrive first, then beer, cokes and sugarcane juice, and char kway teow, of course, followed onde-onde palm sugar dessert.

"Please arrive with an empty stomach," had been the pre-departure advice. I pace myself. This first stop is so good it could easily be the last. The temptation is to go the whole hog on pork dumplings, vesuvian soups and other thrills that hawkers have dished here nightly for more than 50 years.

Kingston herds us back to the scooters where our "Vesperado" guides are revving. He started Vespalicious tours in 2019, employing his scooter-riding buddies as driver-guides. Their streetsmart insights are a welcome alternative to KL's too-often bland tours of malls and towers, towers and malls.

We're on a food cruise but, surprisingly, our next stop is a bookshop. The RexKL BookXcess on Jalan Sultan is a revelation, a converted 1970s cinema ("my parents first dated here," says one guide) that has roared back to life as a knock-out, architect-designed bookstore. The books, all remainders, are displayed face-out in tall, wall-wide shelving. Large gaps in those shelves allow eager selfie-seekers to pose among the tomes like over-excited bibliophiles, making BookXcess now one of KL's most "Insta-worthy" spots. Some even buy books.

Our next photo op, a century-old lane called Kwai Chai Hong is a flashback to KL's Chinatown of the 1960s. Its Cantonese name means Little Demon Alley. Once a hide-out for the Dragon Tiger Clan and its hoods, molls and dealers, it is now reformed as an eat-and-drink street.

Crossing the red entry bridge, we're amid an outdoor gallery of beautiful murals that depict the alley's former residents, albeit much scrubbed-up, as they gossip, have a haircut, do laundry, get romantic and even solicit. A couple of new hole-in-the-wall bars look tempting but it's time for our progressive feast to do progress further.

Brickfields owes its name to its origins as a brick-making area that employed Indian labourers. The clay kilns are long gone but the Indians remained to turn Brickfields into a KL version of the subcontinent, minus the millions. The colonnaded streets of their Little India are home to an ongoing jumble sale of saris, bangles, shirts, electronics and curiously-named imports like Artificial True-Blue Dye.

Hardly hungry, we're at Brickfields for more food. Our cottage-cheese dosa, lassi, roti, idli and more arrive hot and fast across the Formica at Chat Masala restaurant. Sluicing it down with tangy chai tarek, we do justice to Hindustan grazing while being serenaded by the plaintive warbling of Bollywood songbirds.

Two cultures down, one to go. We're back in the pillion saddles and heading to the city's Malay heartland, Kampung Baru. But first, a few last photo ops — beautiful Saloma bridge, a durian market and the inevitable towers.

It's 10pm and the giant halal eatery, Nasi Lemak Wanjo is going off with Malay family groups out for a late snack on the national speciality, nasi lemak. Think, coconut or jasmine rice with your choice of chicken styles, plus egg, sambal or tempeh. I go for the tender rendang chicken option. Perfect, with rose syrup milk as a nightcap.

THE DETAILS

The Vespalicious Cooler Lumpur by Night tour runs nightly from 7 to 11pm. The price, from 500 Malaysian ringgit (around $163) a head includes hotel pick-up, helmet, English-speaking guide, meals and drinks. All guests ride pillion. Readers are advised to check their travel insurance for policies regarding riding on motorcycles and mopeds. Information: www.vespalicious.com. Bookings: www.viator.com/tours/Kuala-Lumpur/Cooler-Lumpur-by-Night-Vespa-Food-Tour-by-Vespalicious/d335-147241P1