Kolo Mee. Kolomee. Kolok Mee. Kolongmee. However you pronounce it, this is my personal all-time favourite Kuching original. Nobody really knows what ‘kolo’ or ‘kolok’ means. The Chinese script for it doesn’t hold a lot of meaning. But what it is is a bowl of egg noodles lightly marinated in pork oil heated with garlic and garnished with barbequed pork slices, a few sprigs of lightly blanched greens, fresh shallots, and, if you like, wontons. But wait, kolo mee isn’t just noodles. It’s a lifestyle. There’s more to it than the noodle that meets the eye.
There’s about 2 million ways to have kolo mee, it’s quite wonderful really. It’s a bit like ordering a low-fat decaf double sugar Americano with triple cream on the side at Starbucks or some other faceless giant, but this is kolo mee at the little stall round the corner - completely original and with a personal touch. There is a choice of straight noodles (tit mee), curly noodles (kiu mee), flat noodles (mee pok), fat rice noodles (kueh tiaw), thin rice noodles (mee hoon), and the most neglected subject of kolomee-dom – the rats’ tail noodles (lou shir fan), cursed with an unsavoury name because of they are short, white and stubby. Seriously though, what respectable rat has a short, white and stubby tail? But there you go.
Ah, but I am not done yet. Once you’ve selected your choice of noodle (you could even have combinations), there’s the choice of having it red (originally, from the red of the barbecued pork oil), black and sour from black vinegar, lightly tinged with a strawberry blondey kind of light pink from chilli sauce, a beautiful sleek off-black from black soy sauce or just plain beautiful original yellow from the colour of the noodles.
You can add stuff to it, like wontons, or fish, fishballs, liver and prawns. Need the protein on the carbs, people.
Or you can have it soupy, or slightly wetter than normal; or without the oil, for recuperating invalids who would rather die than not have their fix. There are shops who do plain noodles accompanied by a clear soup of fresh leafy greens, fish slices, prawns, liver and pig’s blood. I personally don’t go for the blood but the rest is fair game.
My personal favourite is straight noodles with the works in chilli sauce. I have mine at a friend’s place in the middle of town, and I have it extra large. Like RM5.50 large. A normal bowl ranges from RM2.50 to RM3.50. Extras are extra, of course. That’s a slathering, lavish, to-die-for mouthful of good, solid, original Kuching for less than USD1.
I’m hungry. Where’s my kolo mee?
