George Town, Penang

As I noted yesterday, food in Penang is a big deal. It seems that most people are eating something most of the time. The delicatessen opposite our guesthouse has a sign that reads "Never Ever Hungry". This must be a maxim for Penangites.

Yippee! Jam!

Given the abundance of food, the guesthouse proprietor has wisely chosen not to provide an enormous breakfast. It is simple toast and jam, which with a mug of tea was a comforting reminder of home breakfasts and leaves one's stomach ready for the smörgåsbord of delights on the streets of Penang.

After the quiet island roads of Langkawi, orienting ourselves on the busier streets of George Town was our first challenge. It pays to know the difference between Jalan (road), Lebuh (street), and Lorong (lane), as many names appear several times in different combinations. We are staying on Lorong Macalister, logically connecting to Jalan Macalister, but Jalan Penang and Lebuh Panang run parallel to one another over a kilometre apart, causing much confusion. Still, the traffic is nothing when compared to Ho Chi Minh City, which helps when navigating from a map. The oddest aspect of the town planning is that many roads are split into two one-way sections, funnelling traffic from opposing ends directly into each other and then expecting them to take off in a third (or even fourth) direction without incident.

View from the north coast of Penang island

Our orientation walk this morning took us up to the north coast of Penang through the 'buffer zone' and into the heart of the heritage zone. In this part of town, the architecture is as mixed as the cultures that reside there. We walked through Chinatown and Little India, passing Nyonya restaurants, Buddhist temples, Islamic mosques, Chinese clan houses, and pungent spice shops. Alongside this, the colonial influence is still very much in evidence, especially in official buildings, such as the city hall, which boasts a clean white Edwardian style that wouldn't look out of place among the early 20th-century buildings of London.

Penang City Hall: If it ain't baroque, don't fix it

China House is an eclectic and artsy space in a long heritage building stretching all the way from Beach Street to Victoria Street and providing three different places to eat and drink, plus an art gallery. Intending only to rest in the air-conditioned cool and drink a coffee, we soon spotted the cake table.

China House table of plenty

30 different cakes are prepared daily by 10 bakers to tempt the eye and tooth. Oddly for someone so prone to indecision, I settled almost immediately on the cheesecake.

Cashew caramel cheesecake

This was a delectable slab of baked richness with a gooey cashew and caramel topping. K had a tall slice of cake covered in chocolate and liberally studded with Maltesers, which was similarly toothsome.

Suitably revived, we continued our investigation of George Town, including the ornate Chinese kongsi (clan houses) and street art.

Kopi 'O'

Several of George Town's streets boast a wireframe cartoon fashioned from iron that describes their historical significance (similar, if more whimsical, to the British blue plaques). The above example plays on the fact that orders for fancy European-style coffees will simply be met with a cup of 'kopi o' (black coffee). While this may have been true once upon a time, cafés have moved on and now latte art is as much a legitimate form as its canvas-based cousin. So much so, in fact, that some cafés offer '3D coffee art', in which the cappuccino foam is sculpted into tiny bears and such peeping over the lip of the coffee cup. Still others will print an image of one's choosing (a 'selfie' perhaps) directly onto the foam with edible inks. Remarkable.

Köpitiam

At Köpitiam (kopi tiam being the term for an old-fashioned coffee shop), housed in a beautifully restored heritage building, the coffee is still served in traditional Hainanese style.

Coddled eggs and toast

A traditional coffee set comes with two very soft-boiled eggs (called telur separuh masak, meaning half-boiled, but essentially coddled) served in a cup, and two slices of toast (roti bakar, crusts removed) sandwiching a layer of sweet kaya (coconut jam). The result is like the most indulgent egg soldiers - crunchy toast, soft egg, salty with a few drops of soy sauce, and sweet jam. It is typically eaten for breakfast, but we tucked in as an afternoon snack.

As well as a proliferation of general eating establishments, George Town is also replete with purely vegetarian restaurants. We picked a nearby one from the many in the vicinity for dinner.

At Coya, we were tempted by the no-gluten meat analogues, because it isn't every day that we get to eat that meatiest of meat dishes, belly pork, and one called "salted vampire".

Belly 'pork' and salted 'vampire'

The attention to detail on the belly pork was impressive, with the layers of 'fat' between the soya meat being fashioned from konjac jelly. Sadly, the 'vampire' turned out to be mock salted fish with fried ginger (姜丝炒咸鱼), but tasted great spooned over white rice. Both dishes came as a set with sides of mango thinly sliced in a spicy dressing, and a large chunk of fried tofu in a sweet-and-sour sauce. In the spirit of discovery, I tried an olive tea, which was a hot, sweet beverage of lurid green colour (think washing up liquid). While not unpleasant, it had an oleaginous mouthfeel and the taste of a healthy drink that must be doing some good, otherwise why would anyone drink it.