Kampong Ah Lee

Exotic and colourful Malaysian cuisine in Edinburgh. People who come to the restaurant always leave with a smile.

KAMPUNG ALI Malaysian Delight | Malaysian Restaurant

Having an established restaurant in Malaysia, he has dedicated his life to perfecting the art of Malaysian cuisine.

Kampong Ah Lee, which means “Lee’s village”, has brought an authentic good taste from his home town (Negeri Sembilan) to Edinburgh.

Having tasted Mr Lee’s specialities, people who come to the restaurant always leave with a smile.

So, Mr Lee established this bigger “village”, hoping to share this exotic and colourful cuisine, which is a combination of styles from the East and the West, with more people in this city.

Malaysian cuisine is exotic with an exciting range of flavours and culinary styles offering the uninitiated and endless gastronomic adventure.

http://www.kampungali.com

u m a m i: September 2009 entries

We didn't make any plans for sightseeing until we reached Edinburgh.

It was very dim inside and very hot too, no airconditioning in the restaurant itself and an open window didn't help at all.

That, coupled with the heat in the room made us want to flee as soon as we could, and we did, skipping desserts and coffee for some fresh air outside.

There is a timbre deck/lounge outside while inside it is darker, with more wood and a decidedly casual feel, not a white tablecloth in sight.

Husband had a duck dish, also just OK.

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Amongst other things, it did a fantastic coconut rice, one of the best I’ve ever tasted.

I kept promising myself that we would drop by and check it out but, for one reason or another, the time was never right.

It’s already pretty busy when I arrive and the place is buzzing, but they soon find me a spot and I’m left to peruse the menu and admire the extensive collection of Post It notes left by the appreciative (and often rather talented) diners who have preceded me.

There’s a mound of sticky rice and (nice touch this) a chunk of al dente broccoli.

Oh yes, every meal comes with a little bowl of savoury miso soup, which is another nice touch.

Kampong Ah Lee Malaysian Delight (28 Clerk Street, Edinburgh ...

No-frills spot which offers a taste of home to Edinburgh’s Malaysian community and locals in-the-know.

Takeaway review Takeaway is available from both branches of the Kampung mini-empire on Clerk Street and Fountainbridge, so if Malaysian floats your boat (and it should) it’s a great option for a cheap and tasty pick-up.

Sambal chicken is particularly good as is roti cenai, a flaky flat bread with a spicy sauce which has practically attained cult status.

Celebrating a decade of serving up traditional Malaysian fare to local students and Southsiders, as well as customers craving a taste of home, Kampong Ah Lee is as popular now as it ever was.

The huge menu offers many soup noodle, seafood and rice dishes, but it’s the relatively simple roti canai – flaky buttery flatbread served with curry dipping sauce – that is the must-have for regulars, and rightly so.

Kampung Ali, Edinburgh, Old Town. Book now!

Open Monday to Friday (except Tuesdays) for lunch and dinner, and all the way through from noon until 11pm over the weekend, there’s plenty of opportunity to sample some of the best Malaysian cuisine in Edinburgh.

Start small and sample the Central and Southeast Asian styles that comprise the old-school fusion cuisine of Malaysia, with the Capital spare ribs offering Chinese barbecue, for instance.

Rice dishes like the spicy chicken fried with coconut rice move closer to South and Southeast Asian cookery, while the Singaporean rice noodles affixes its culinary pin firmly to the island city-state.

There’s an abundance of seafood-based dishes, too, with with sambal prawn tofu and Malaysian curried fish being particular highlights.

go famously Malay with laksa, but remember to make a repeat booking to continue your exploration of the cosmopolitan food on offer at this Fountainbridge Asian restaurant, a hugely popular spot west of Edinburgh’s city centre.

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Kampung Ali | Restaurants in West End, Edinburgh

Big bowls of spicy, noodle-packed Malaysian soups, and a taste of Kuala Lumpur’s thriving cuisine The curry laksa soup here is filed under a section of the menu called ‘Big Bowl’ - and they’re not messing around when they say it’s big.

For £6.30, steaming troughs of slippery noodles, prawns, chicken pieces, tofu, bean sprouts and Surimi sticks come in bottomless quantities (they’re brilliant value, but possibly a struggle to finish for the average stomach).

The moist, buttery roti canai flatbreads, served with a thin curry dipping sauce (£3.50) generally steal the show, and are hard not to order at every single visit.

Dry curries like their beef rendang are a speciality, as is the national dish of Malaysia, nasi lemak - sticky coconut rice, chicken curry, spicy peanut sambal sauce and egg, which is traditionally eaten at breakfast time (lunchtime will have to do for Edinburgh as they don’t open up here ‘til noon).

Plastic, lit-up souvenirs of Kuala Lumpur’s Twin Towers decorate the shelves behind the bar, with clusters of green pot plants and bright photos of tropical fruit bowls brightening the small, busy room.