of mojitos and other madness: the true teochew treasure!

this girl is happy to finally put together this much delayed and long awaited post on lee kui. situated in the heart of chinatown, this is another one of those places that i grew up dining at. to be honest, i did not have very good memories of lee kui as i associated it with the then dark and dingy lanes of chinatown....with little furry creatures and flying insects hiding in the dark corners surrounding the then coffeeshop. thank goodness for urbanization and modernization, those dark lanes are now a thing of the past! lee kui has grown into a full fledged chinese restaurant and is easily the main stay along bustling mosque street!

one of the main reasons why we are so in love with lee kui is because it serves up some mean teochew classics. we almost always order the same repertoire of dishes when we eat there but we somehow never get tired or bored with the food. i think it is the simple combination of good ingredients, classic flavors, consistent quality and clean presentation that has kept lee kui a favorite. do be warned though that it is so popular that they manage two sittings for dinner (one at 6.30pm, another at 8pm) and is typically filled with big families or huge groups of fairly loud speaking individuals. i would normally not quite like to dine in such an intense place but somehow with lee kui, it just adds to the whole experience!

the must tries at lee kui (at least according to my family!) are the cold crab and jellyfish salad. i'm not a big fan of cold crab but it is one of lee kui's specialties and the rest of the clan get quite a high from these steamed cold sweet crustaceans, so yes, a definite must try (pre-order is advised!). i do dig the jellyfish salad as they toss some generous pieces of these creatures in a sweet plum sauce mix with lots of sesame and crushed nuts. very appetizing and gets your palate all ready for the meal yet to come.

as for mains, we always have the liver and prawn balls mix and the steamed pomfret. depending on the number of people, we sometimes do indulge in the duck stuffed with yam rice or the roast duck in very yummy thick gravy and beancurd (sorry no piccie!). not one for liver, the prawn balls are sufficient to hit the spot for me. think freshly made prawn paste, rolled into golf-ball sized mounds, served immediately after deep frying. dipped in some nice sweet sauce, you can never just have one ball! the pomfret to me, is another of lee kui's specialties....not sure how they do it but they always steam the fish just right such that it is never over or under cooked. sitting in a yummy pool of fish stock (and chinese wine!), the flavors really augment the sweetness of the fish.

veggie-wise, first choice always goes to a serving of freshly stir-fried serving of chives and prawns. think fresh chives and fresh prawns in a creamy part garlic, part salted fish, part oyster sauce based gravy. should we have a bigger crowd or just want to have more greens, second choice for veggies will go to the simple baby kale in garlic. very fresh and fragrant, it even gets a nod from non-veggie lovers!

the meal at lee kui must (and i really mean must!) conclude with a serving of orh ni and jiu jia baos. if i had it my way, i would vote for the jiu jia baos over the orh ni, but given the huge fan base to the smooth, creamy, pumpkin and gingko nut filled yam paste dessert, i would recommend saving space for both desserts. the baos come in both sweet and savory flavors and are honestly quite hard to find now given the amount of effort needed to whip up the skin, mix up the fillings, assemble and then steam and pan fry them! so again, i always indulge, especially with the savory ones as they are fantastic with a touch of homemade sambal!