Cambodia: Siem Reap - Siem Reap Street Foods and Lucky Mall

John always say i don't have guts, because i refuse to eat most of the street/local food when i was travelling. (Hello at least i eat raw octopus leg man!)

I got a reason for that, because i don't wanna ruin the trip by getting myself food poisoning (i have weak stomach ever since i come back to Malaysia. Ok you may say i'm getting old so my immune system gone bad).

I had a very bad food poisoning in my Nepal trip last year end, that really killing me and spoil my birthday trip. I shall blog it out after Siem Reap and Pai.

Back to this post, this is the last Siem Reap post and all about street foods and the street.

Lets start with the food, and later the street.

1. Bamboo Sticky Rice

Malaysia has bamboo rice as well but we're really curious what is the different between Malaysia and Cambodia bamboo rice, so we let the driver stop and give a try on the way we went to remote temple.

You can find this along the way to go out from town, lot of stall that selling bamboo rice on the road side.

we don't even get out from car, just wave the window down and make the purchase. 

I do have some photo but blur, luckily we took down a video and you might wanna see it how the rice look like.

This is not exactly same with Malaysia version of bamboo rice, the rice mix with black/red bean so taste like a dessert more than a main dishes.

The rice smells nice, i think they put in some coconut juice in it to make it taste rice.

I don't remember the price but this is not expensive at all, probably like RM2 for one, and one bamboo portion is big enough.

2. Fried Spring Onion Cake

This is not the first time we see it, I believe you have seen this in Malaysia or Thailand, just like us.

We saw this on the roadside of Pub Street, we were hungry and John wanted to try.

The juice on the plastic plate taste sour, go well with the oily salty cake. I must say the square cake is nicer than the round one, crispy on the outside and soft in the inside, the spring onion smell really good.

While the round one is just okay, thick glutinous rice flour cover some spring onion, i feel kinda oily.

If not mistaken, about RM2 or RM3 for 3 pieces, you can choose all square one or mix with round one.

3. Baguettes 

FYI, Cambodia was French colonial country, you can still found alot of French-style building in the town, some very old Cambodian people can even speak French there.

Baguettes is important for Cambodian, just as important for the French. You can see baguettes selling everywhere, and you can find baguettes in the local market.

Stall that selling baguettes is very common on the street, people buy it for either breakfast, lunch, dinner or tea.

Of course Cambodia baguettes is not eat it with butter or jam, and ham or cheese, they localize to Cambodian style and i think its worth to try it.

You can choose to go with local hot and sour salad or grill pork with salad, but the pork looks a bit freaky for us.

Local baguettes stall

this is the pork, its look like cooked pork with red coloring. 

and this is local salad. Refreshing.

Baguettes is cheap here, with RM2 to RM4 you can easily fill your stomach, we had at least 5 baguettes in the whole trip and tasted differently. Every stall has their secret receipt for the sauce and salad.

Here come to the end of street food. Now we move on to the street.

Siem Reap has only one or two shopping center, we when to the one named Lucky Mall.

In this Lucky Mall, you will find Lucky Fast Food, Lucky Supermarket, Lucky Bookstore and Lucky Restaurant, all under Lucky Group, haha.

We wanted to get some local product as sourvenir so we stepped into this Lucky Mall, and we actually had our lunch in this Lucky Fast Food (FYI Siem Reap has no any international fast food chain).

Lucky Mall.

Lucky Fast Food

We got 2 pieces of fried chicken and coconut pie, $2.90

John later add on a hamburger and sausage roll.

The food is okay but i really like this coconut pie, so damn yummy yet not too sweet! Why McDonald is not selling this?!

And then we went to Lucky Supermarket to get some souvenir and survey what is selling in the local supermarket.

And we found few interesting things.

This is scorpion and snake drink. Look so freaky. I think the scorpion and snake are real. 

Variety of beer, and so darn cheap!!!!!

John say: "Hey look at the Apple latest product, iMee!" =.="

I have seen egg in white, yellow, brown and even black, but i never see raw red color egg. 

We stepped out the supermarket with some local instant noodle (i love trying local instand noodle) and walk back to the hotel.

Below are some street / interesting photos that we snapped on the way back.

The street is not too busy

dog ride a tuk tuk :D

ultraman milk make him a happy boy.

this is petrol station, i'm serious.

this damn crocodile freak me out =.=

"The world is a book, people who don't travel only get to read one page. " I cant agree anymore. =)

Here come the end of Siem Reap post, i'm goin start ChiangMai and Pai soon. Then Nepal and Samui are following.

Yea, i just got back from Samui and Koh Tao yesterday. I wonder when can i finish all my trip post T.T

Okay la bai bai!

130308, 0904am

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Rach in lack of sleep mood.

Cambodia: Siem Reap - Samaki Market

As i blogged in the previous post, i spend 3 days in remote temples, Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom, and left one whole day to explore the town.

Frankly speaking, Siem Reap itself doesn't have much attraction, but to explore the local lifestyle is my all time favorite thing to do in other country, so i decided to keep a whole day to walk in the town.

Yes, you see it right, walk. =D

Temple is not the main in my walking day, i skip all the temple in the town to go the local market, Samaki Market, or the local called it Sa Leu.

Samaki Market is the place where local people buy their grocery and foods, just like the morning market in western country, but Samaki is operating from 8am to 6pm.

Samaki Market is not too far away from where we stay (in fact everywhere is not too far away because Siem Reap is a small town), but we still decided to take tuk-tuk to the market, and walk back to the hotel later. 

Red is starting point, and green is end point for the walking day.

We went out around 10am, right after our breakfast and the morning swim in the hotel.

By the time we reached, the market was full of people already. 

Local people take 'van', i wanted to try but communication failed =(

Full of people

Bread and cake are important for them

Not to forget the baguette too. 

and fried insects....... 

we guess this is dessert. 

The front part of the market is all about food and grocery, we then walked further in and saw the wet market.

By the way, we're the only tourist at that time, at least we didn't see any foreigners, and we did make the local people surprise for a while, some people actually follow us just to see us =.=

Wet market

pick your chicken and the vendor will just kill it on the spot. >,<

as well as fish. :(

marinated seafood.

sitting on the table, so she is on selling too?

this tiny cute little watermelon make my day, so damn cute! And we don't know what this is still. haha.

monkey favourite 

my favourite <3 td="">

I was thinking to make the walking day in one post but too many photos, so i decided to make it into 2 post.

Next post will be some place in the town and funny things that we saw in the town.

Come back soon ya!







Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
20130217, 1011pm
Rach in pray the sky mood

Cambodia: Siem Reap - Siem Reap Restaurants Review: Cambodian BBQ, The Soup Dragon, FCC Angkor and Angkor Mondial Restaurant.

Food is John's biggest interest in his life.

Cambodian cuisine aka Khemer cuisine, mixture of Thai, Vietnam, Chinese style of cooking, famous with Amok (yellow curry with vege and meat), BBQ and steamboat.

The activities that John most looked forward was hunt some food in the Pub Street (mostly all the famous restaurant located in this street), we tried a couples and i decided to write the review of few recommended restaurant. 

This is the main restaurant and tourist area, full of restaurant and pub.

i'm sure if you have done the research, you will come across Khemer Kitchen, Red Piano and few other famous restaurant in the town.

We've tried Khemer Kitchen and Blue Pumpkin, so i won't go into detail on these two restaurant. Both serve good food but not so big portion (we are Asia and we don't eat big portion, but we feel the portion is really small), and money that we paid is not worth the portion and taste. 

But i have to admit that, Khemer Kitchen serves real good Amok, almost the best among those that we tried. If you want to try the real Khemer taste, Khemer Kitchen might be one of your choice in term of taste, but not price. 

In this post, i will go through the review of The Soup Dragon, Cambodian BBQ, FCC Angkor and Angkor Mondial Restaurant. 

1. Cambodian BBQ 

Cambodian BBQ and the Soup Dragon is actually located in the same area. 

Click for bigger imagine

We went to Cambodian BBQ as dinner in one night, we picked this restaurant randomly and turn out to be a good try.

Cambodian BBQ served meal in a set, we picked the dinner for 2 sets, come with 5 kinds of meat, (snake, chicken, beef, crocodile and prawn), vege, noodle and rice, drink is not included.

Vege, noodle and rice is unlimited refill but not to meat.

John is mutton person so he added a plate of goat meat, we got the bill of $25 and we're satisfied.

The meats, the yellow cup in the middle is egg york, up to you to mix it with your beef, so your beef is cover by a coat of egg and taste nicer.

the thai's steamboat pot and the meal. 

This is my first time to have snake meat, i had crocodile since i'm small because i'm a asthma patient and Chinese believes crocodile and herb soup could cure.

Instead of BBQ, i'd rather called this as BBQ + steamboat meal, as you can see from the picture above, you will be given a pork skin cube so you can melt before you put the raw meat on the hot pot which the soup doesn't covered.

If you want to boil your meat, vege and noodle, there are soup on the lower part of the pot, just like thai's hot pot.

Meats are fresh, vege and noodle can be refill until you drop, good environment and friendly service, special meat and real Khemer taste, $25 might be a little bit expensive in the first sign but do consider we were getting 6 kinds of meat and all fresh, good deal.

If you're from the western and think crocodile or snake meat are horrible, you can actually choose the other meat to replace it (eg, 2 portions of chicken).

But hey, i don't think western countries will see crocodile or snake meat very often, since you're in Asia why not give a try.

Crocodile meat is a little chewy and smell like fish, not my favourite but snake meat is tender and taste like chicken, very nice taste.

Price: 3/5
Taste: 4/5
Environment: 3/5 (by the road side so a bit noisy)
Service: 4/5

2. The Soup Dragon

Cambodian BBQ and the Soup Dragon is actually located in the same area with Cambodian BBQ, this is Vietnamese restaurant and famous with the hotpot. 

FYI, Cambodian is very much influenced by the French culture (people eat baguettes everyday), also the culture of Cambodia's neighbor, eg Vietnam and Thailand (lots people can speak fluently Vietnamese and Thai).

We chose soup dragon in a raining night, John's a soup person so we walked in to this restaurant and decided want so hotpot (other Vietnamese food is available, eg beef noodle and etc).

Hotpot come with a set, we got 2 people set which including vege, noodle, meat ball, one kind of meat (we choose beef), egg and fried tofu skin.

We then later added another plate of beef, fried tofu skin (this is the nicest tofu skin aka fu chook that i ever eat, must try!), meat ball, fried spring roll and beer.

Bill, $24, including 3 beers. The Soup Dragon is the best restaurant that we dined in Siem Reap.

Oh not to forget the soup of the hotpot, not clear soup but soup with rich flavor, we still missed the tasty soup now.

Picture from John's angle.

crispy and nice, good to have it with beer!

A table of food. 

We didn't take the food picture because we were so damn cold and hungry. Above picture is the only one that can see all the foods on the table.

John did took a short clip, showing the waiter is serving the meat that mix with egg for us.

We choose to sit on the 2nd floor, because less noise.

After finished all the food, we enjoyed beer while seeing people passing by on the 2nd floor, very nice experience indeed.

The fat.

Sky turns dark and the street turns bright. 

Price: 4/5
Taste: 5/5
Environment: 4/5 
Service: 4/5

The Soup Dragon is worth to try if you want some hot soup in the cold night. Strongly recommended.

3. FCC Angkor

FCC Angkor is a hotel with medium high class restaurant in the town, not located in the pub street area but be by the river side. 

We don't actually dine there but we had tea there. 

Menu only for main course, salad and soup, no menu for tea set. You can only tell them how many person you are, and choose the tea you want.

We got tea set for 2 persons, $18.

Sandwiches, fruit and scone.

Empty restaurant, we're the only customer.

Although we're the only table to served, but we actually got our tea and food slow, we wait for 20 minutes to 30 minutes to got our tea and foods.

$18 for 2 pots of tea and foods might be a bit expensive, but do consider this is high-class hotel and they do charge extra for the service. So that's actually alright.

Sandwich is nice and freshly made, scone isn't the best and fruit is chill and refreshing.

If you have a noon to spend at no where, perhaps you can consider FCC Angkor for tea or light meal, while looking at the river in front of the hotel.


Price: 3/5
Taste: 3/5
Environment: 5/5 
Service: 4/5


4. Angkor Mondial Restaurant 


Siem Reap was John's birthday celebration trip, so on his birthday i brought him to Angkor Mondial Restaurant for buffet dinner with traditional dancing show.

Angkor Mondial Restaurant is not the only buffet restaurant with show in the town, but this is the one that our tuk tuk driver recommended.

Although John is not happy that this is a tourist restaurant, but i must say the show is really good.

Not too far from pub street.

We were sent to this restaurant in the noon time after our visit in Angkor Wat for table booking, we don't understand why the driver couldn't just calla and book us a table at first, but later we only know that you have to choose your own seat and pay advance.

The restaurant is huge, about 100 tables and when the time we reached, mostly front seats were taken. We choose the seat on the right hand side which near the food bar, pay $24 ($12 per person) and tell them we will come back by 7pm.

Restaurant name.

Us

The show last for an hour, great show.

We didn't take much photos in the restaurant, but the are lots of different sections of food, eg salad bar, main course, BBQ bar, dessert, noodle soup bar and etc.

For me, $12 per person is worth the money, the variety of foods and show are nice, although the restaurant might be a little bit noisy and full of asian (especially china chinese that make great loud), but i'm good with this, because the music is louder than their voice, haha.

Price: 4/5
Taste: 3/5
Environment: 2/5 
Service: 3/5

And there end my restaurant review, the next and last Cambodia post will still be foods, but snack that we found on the street and the local market.

ok bai!

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

20130212, 0841am

Rach in Happy CNY mood.