Best thing about traveling is discovering something new, but Malaysian? Never thought I would be eating Malaysian in Philly. I can only name one Malaysian restaurant I've tried in LA, but coworker and I were down to try something new, so for lunch, we walked over to Chinatown, which was about 2 blocks away from the convention center.
Penang
117 N 10th St
Chinatown
Philadelphia, PA 19107
Apparently, Penang is a popular chain on the East Coast. Good Yelp and Zagat rating too.
Our server was this old dude and he recommended us the Roti Canai. Said that it was a must. Very glad we ordered it cause it was damn tasty.
Roti Canai, a Malaysian favorite, is a crispy style pancake from India, and at Penang, they give you a little cup of chicken potato curry as dipping sauce. After I tried the curry, I sorta regretted ordering noodles instead of a curry cause it was fantastic.
But still, I was glad with my Chow Kueh Teow. It's another Malaysian staple: stir fried flat rice noodles with fresh shrimp, squid, bean sprouts, eggs, soy sauce, and chili paste. First time trying it! I got it medium spicy, but totally could have increased the heat level.
Coworker's Mee Goreng, which is Indian style stir-fried egg noodles in a mild dried squid sauce with tofu, potato, shrimp, egg, grounded peanut, and bean sprouts. It was his first time eating anything from Southeast Asia besides Thai food. I tried a little bit and gotta say, it is good. Looks like pad thai, but definitely doesn't taste like it!
After eating at Penang, I've decided to seek out some Malaysian restaurant in LA! A little late to the party, but I liked what I tried in Philly!
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Last time at Philly for the company dinner, we went to Fogo de Chao. While Fogo is good, I wanted something that I can't get in LA, and with me in charge of reserving a restaurant for the company dinner this year, I chose an Italian restaurant, Amis Trattoria, which is about 15-20 minutes walking from the convention.
Oh also, sorry for the pics... since I was with some of our sales rep from other regions and customers, I didn't want to be rude and hold everybody so I tried to take the picture as fast as possible... resulting in some mediocre shots.
Amis Trattoria
412 S 13th St
Washington Square West
Philadelphia, PA 19147
Amis Trattoria.
Menu. Amis' menu is actually pretty modern for an Italian restaurant so some of the guests from the Midwest and the South, they were a little bit confused.
Open kitchen. Very dim everywhere else.
Flying Fish Farmhouse Summer Ale. Decided to go with a beer since our table were more beer folks. Pretty good choice though! Very drinkable Belgian brew from New Jersey.
Since most of the folks didn't know what to order except for their main plate, I ordered a few appetizers and the first to arrive was the Mixed Salumi Plate. It is all made in house!
Mortadella with Hazelnut Honey. Love moradella and that hazelnut honey is perfect with it.
Rabbit Terrine. I think some of the folks at our table was weirded out by the rabbit terrine, but after they tried it, they all liked it! Terrine is sorta like meatloaf, except this one made with rabbit.
Salami del Giorno with marmalade. Very lightly cured.
Meatball with tomato potato. I wanted to try the swordfish meatball but decided that the old fashion meatball is much more familiar to everybody.
Fried cauliflower with Pecorino and salsa rossa. I'm a sucker for cauliflower, especially ones that are fried!
I actually ordered something else as my main, but they messed up so I got the Rotini as my main. Came with a variety of mushrooms and a fresh pea ragu.
Huge fan of the pea ragu and they certainly know their cooking time for the pasta! Perfect texture.
Overall, good dinner, except for the mess up. Luckily, my pasta was still tasty and I didn't want to make the others wait. Not too sure how the others felt about Amis since it was a little different from the Italian they are used to, but hopefully they liked it too because these dinners are so important in developing good business relationships!
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After dinner, a coworker and I decided to walk back to our hotel instead of taking the cab to help digest a little bit. On the way back, I remembered that two years ago, I went to the old fashion ice cream shop called the Franklin Fountain with the same coworker. He's a huge fan of the sweets so we decided to make a little pit stop on our 30 minute walk back!
Franklin Fountain
116 Market St
Old City
Philadelphia, PA 19106
Outside of Franklin Fountain.
Inside. Exactly how I remembered. They definitely go for the old fashion feel.
Ordering counter with a list of the homemade ice cream available.
Rather than ordering just ice cream like last time, I went all out and got the Franklin Mint sundae.
Holy it was a big sundae and so damn good. I like mint chip so I went full speed for the first half. The minty Creme de Menthe helped too, but I definitely slowed down quite a bit after that. The marshmallow glaze was way too thiiick and in the end, I just ate all the ice cream, with about half the glaze left.
Got back to the hotel with this crazy sugar rush for a good hour or so!
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