The Wordsmith

Hak Guan is a strange little eating place in the middle of nowhere. It’s a stand-alone kopitiam at the junction of the 5th Mile traffic lights. It’s easy to miss because it’s so unassuming. The only clue to its presence is the number of cars parked in front of it or along the side of the road. It’s only open for breakfast is always packed.

The handmade kolomee is famous, but everything else is pretty good. There’s kueh chap, bak moi (porridge), lui cha (strictly an acquired taste for hardcore health nuts), the usual must-haves of a good old-fashioned Kuching breakfast.

I had the popiah and laksa this time. Popiah is a healthy spring roll type wrap, with stirfried vegetables, crushed peanuts and a sweet sauce – a pretty good combination. I love that this spring roll is not deep fried but maintains that light oil-free taste. It’s one of the few things in life that both tastes good and is healthy. Laksa is rice noodles, omellette in littel strips, shredded chicken and bean sprouts bathed in a special spice curry gravy, garnished with green coriander. Laksas MUST come with the belacan (prawn paste) and lime. These are the oomph producers. No belacan, no lime, no oomph.

There’s curry laksa, Penang laksa, laksa mee, laksa with clams and every conceivable lak and sa throughout the region. But Kuching laksa is entirely a unique entity. As far as I know, nobody outside of Kuching has been able to reproduce Kuching laksa. Legend tells of an establishment in New York that serves “Borneo Laksa”. What came was a slosh of rice noodles in a sea of milky liquid. It didn’t taste bad. It just wasn’t laksa.

Popiahs are everywhere, but good popiahs are not easy to find. The wrap can be too thick, the filling can be under-cooked, too soppy and the sauce could be too sweet. Twenty things could go wrong in the making of a popiah. The one in Hak Guan is not too bad. One of the better ones around, I’d say.

The sight of those five fresh, large, juicy, sweet-looking prawns on my laksa pretty much put the lak in my sa. However, I felt that the laksa aunty was a little below her usual form that day. There’s usually a little bit more zing to the gravy. I was one of her last customers, though, so I’ll concede that she had to scrape the bottom of her pot for me. Still, I’d go back again anytime.