Fried Noodles, Russian Market, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

The Russian Markets don't sell anything Russian, it's called that because the Russians built it years ago.  These days it's a market that caters for locals and tourists, so you can get t-shirts, souvenirs, silverware, fruits as well as some great snacks/lunch in the central food section.

We came at lunch time and the food area was lit naturally by openings in the roof, I'm guessing this keeps  electricity costs and temperature down.

We had the most delicious rice noodles, these were about 5cm long and stirred fried with vegetables and in our case beef and with a fried egg on top.  But it's the wonderful sauce and residue flavour that comes from cooking hundreds of bowls a day in the same wok that makes the noodles so delicious.

Here's the video of my noodle lady making me lunch.

Temasek, Malaysian, Parramatta

I had a dinner with family before my big Asia eating tour, I got to chose the venue and instantly selected Temasek, it's been too long between drinks.

And I got to chose the food as well... prawn laksa of course, creamy, the prawn works perfectly.

Probably my favourite dish when I travel anywhere, hai nam chicken... gosh surely it's put hai nam province on the map by now!  The chicken was perfectly cooked through, but not tough and was incredibly white.  It came with hai nam rice... god, I love hai nam rice.

Hai nam rice is the rice cooked in chicken broth, basically absorbing the flavour into the rice.

The beef rendang was much better than I remembered it. Of course the curry flavour was dominant but at the same time smooth, it's the melt in your mouth beef that did it for me.

The fried noodles was also a treat.  The whole dinner was just perfect, great company and delicious Temasek that I've been missing for so long.

Temasek
71 George St, Parramatta
(02) 9633 9926

New Shanghai Chinese, Ashfield

Although I was dying to go back to Shanghai Food House, we thought we should try somewhere different and so headed into New Shanghai... which was literally next door.

While our order was pretty standard for us, we did try something new - Shandong Shredded Chicken to be precise, which was melt in your mouth delicious.  The skin is particularly tasty.  Although the chilli wasn't very hot.

The other dishes were standard orders for us, pork dumplings (above), and my favourite dish at this restaurant, garlic cucumber (below); it looks plain but the crispy cucumber in sweet vinegar and sesame oil garlic sauce was divine.

The fried noodles weren't bad either, although I prefer next door's for this dish and the pork dumplings.

Overall, the meal was pretty good value, less than $40 for the two of us.