Main dish minus grounded tea soup.
Wife suddenly have a craving for Lui cha, an almost full vegetarian Hakka dish and she started scouring the internet, forums & facebook pages for a good place. We had before at Ho Por Puchong and Green Talk @ Mahkota Cheras which is still quite ok, but not really hit the 'yes' spot yet. Read more on
lui cha here. She found a place not too far from where we stayed and off we go for it.
Snuck in between one row of malay stalls, this shop is pretty hard to locate if not for one forumer who share the GPS location. Google up for Serata Catering at Cheras Alam Jaya, the stall is right next to it. (Will see if my Google submission is approved to mark it for public).
GPS location: 3.081519,101.7656368
Parking is just right beside the malay stall at a small alley that leads to the main gate of a construction material shop. It's free or can try your luck on the shoprow next to these stalls.
It's a humble stall with very humble pair of husband and wife, very friendly and down to earth beside the main point that they serve authentic hakka lui cha. With all the original ingredients with almost no hint of MSG taste comparatively with all our experience of lui cha in KL/Selangor so far.
This area is a malay reserved land, thus the reason why the stall is sandwiched between so many Malay stalls. The owner even let my MIL cut the the leaf plant they have in front of the stall. It's not available for sale, so they need to grow their own to use it in lui cha recipe. The lady owner is very surprised that we managed to find the place since it's only locals at this area that knows this place, or for some is a customer's friend recommendation. Operating for >10 years and still surviving is a good signs of consistency and ultimately tells me at least the standard of food is above average for a stall specializing on in lui cha.
Today's menu, and any other day - lui cha.
Closed on Wednesdays.
Price menu and their simple stall.
Sufficient balance of different types of vegetables, yes original lui cha recipe added with lightly fried peanuts and chopped choi poh (salty preserved radish) makes up the dish.
Unfortunately, whether this is really tasty depends on personal preference. I would say this stall serves less salty lui cha, but at a very balanced taste and a tinge bitterness from the pounded tea soup. Resulting in very satisfying meal that detox your body due to it's leafy ingredients.
The soup is thick and mixed with sesame, not too watery. To be honest, lui cha at this price is a steal nowadays. The effort spent to prepare all the ingredients, and time needed to cook, blend and grind the grounded tea soup makes it very worthy for those who knows how to appreciate the dish. Of course the soup don't look as appetizing as it tastes, try it out to find out =)
Mixing in progress. Overall it's really thumbs up, wifey loves it very much -must be a little piece of heaven at Batu9 Cheras. This is a hidden gem for lui cha lovers. Food is prepared in a very authentic way that doesn't deviates from its original recipe. On top of this, it's really cheap & taste is just ~so original, a very rare lui cha place in KL.
Verdict: Yup, it hit the 'yes' spot for wifey. She is lui cha lover since her Uni times @ Johor where lui cha is more common sight than up above regions.
