Spice and everything nice at Herba & Rempah
Almost every other Nyonya resto offers Melaka-style Peranakan food so it was a nice change to find Herba & Rempah offering flavours that’s Penang influenced instead. Owner/cook Jay Mee, formerly a PR consultant, started her online biz during MCO which transitioned into a physical shop early this year. Recipes are all her grandmother’s and she does a great job of melding the herbs and spices together to create rich, complex flavours.
The colourful roti jala which went viral for its creative Malaysian flag-inspired design, was as good as it looked, paired with a creamy santan rich chicken curry. All natural vegetable colouring were used. Another popular starter was the pie tee in which Jay Mee offers a 2-in-1, with jiu hu char for filling instead of just jicama. Gotta eat this fast as the shells get soft real fast.
Our fav was the delicious salted fish Vegetable Curry. Deep flavours that resonated with our palates, perfect with rice. Could have eaten a whole bowl of blue pea flower coloured rice too, especially with the sambal hae bee (shrimp) and petai. The rendang tok, a Perak Malay specialty, was also nicely done. Seems Jay Mee’s grandmother had a penchant for Malay dishes and included a number of staples to her list of fav.
Seafood dishes have to be ordered 2 days in advance for now as Jay Mee wants to keep her food fresh, and they’re a little shorthanded as well. So if you wanna try stuff like pineapple longan prawn curry and kerabu sotong, will need to call ahead.
Individual rice sets are available, enough for lunch for one. Choices range from curry chicken, rendang tok to salted fish vegetable curry that come with a bowl of blue rice and some kangkong.
For dessert, we tried bubur cha cha, Sago gula melaka and or nee (yam paste). Tastewise they were all great, except the yam and sweet potato pieces could be chunkier, and I prefer my fav sago gula melaka without nangka.
Found the food here above average and most enjoyable though my biggest personal quibble was that it lacked that spicy kick. Apparently Klang Valley people have low tolerance for spiciness so the taste here is gentle on the tongue and doesn’t burn. But I guess if you do want it spicy, it can be arranged.
Herba & Rempah is now open for lunch week days and both lunch/dinner for weekends.
Add: 13-1, Block i, Jalan PJU 1/37, Dataran Prima, Petaling Jaya. Hp: 017-2091898
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