Malacca Revisited: Nadeje’s Mille Crepe, Satay Celup and Kerang Bakar

Tiramisu, methinks..

After the thoroughly satisfying late lunch in Ta Chi House we were looking for a place to sweeten our palates. At that hour, we figured that it might have been a little too late for cendol at Jonker 88 so our next option was to head to Nadeje Cafe, which was a good alternative since I have yet to try their much talked about mille crepe. For the uninitiated, the mille crepe is essentially a French dessert whereby the cake consists of many layers of crepe (mille=thousand, crepe)

l-r: Royal Milk Tea, Tiramisu, Original, Choco Banana. Thanks Shelle!

The cakes come in many different flavours- original, coffee, tiramisu, chocolate banana, green tea are the few that I recall seeing. We came here on a Saturday afternoon, and the cakes were selling like, urm…hot cakes! The two-lot cafe was filled to the brim, and we had to wait for a table, as usual (waiting for a place to sit seems to be the order of things when in Malacca). Ordering the mille crepe is a heart racing affair as you anxiously wait at the counter for the staff to serve you the while seeing the cake flavour of your choice disappearing from the trays at an alarming rate. Fortunately we did get to try the flavours of our choice – chocolate banana, original, green tea and tiramisu ((if I remember correctly).

So what did I think of the mille crepe? The taste turned out a little different from what I had anticipated. I had imagined the mille crepe to have a light flaky texture to it, much like eating a danish or a cream puff.In reality, the mille crepe had more of a ‘batter’ consistency to it, owing to the fact that the cake was made through copious layers of crepe after all. This made the cake a little moist, spongy and also more dense than I had imagined.  Several of the other crepes a bit too cheesy for my liking, though. I am by no means a mille crepe connoiseur, but I would have personally preferred bolder flavours in the cakes to balance out the batter-y tastes from the crepes, surely you have eaten crepe before and have seen how much topping is added to just that one crepe.  Nevertheless, Nadeje’s mille crepes are not to be missed while in Malacca – I enjoyed the chocolate banana one the most.

Nadeje Cafe

Nadeje

G-23 & 25, Jln PM4,

Plaza Mahkota,75000 Melaka.

Part of our satay celup stash.

The only way to go from afternoon tea was…dinner! There was only one option for dinner, ie our main agenda for the whole trip, which was satay celup. And since we have all been to Capitol satay celup, more than once in fact, we thought it was time to try a different place. Furthermore, as delicious as the satay celup in Capitol was, their infamous 80-minute queues were not something we looked forward to, especially since we had to get back to KL that same night for another get-together. And so to Restoran Ban Lee Siang in Jalan Ong Kim Wee we went.

Plus points? No queues! But that was probably because we got there just after their opening time and had to sit at the backyard, not that anyone was complaining though. The satay celup selection meanwhile are kept in refrigerators, which gives the customers a better assurance of hygiene and freshness. All sticks are 50sen each, which means you’d bust your guts faster than your budget. Selection of satay celup here is pretty good just like Capitol’s.

The not-so-good? The satay sauce here is good, but it’s not as rich and thick as the one in Capitol. During my last trip to Capitol last year, we would see the staff busily refilling the hot pot with peanuts and what I assumed was roasted coconut shavings. It made the sauce simply yum, while in comparison Ban Lee Siang’s pre-mixed sauce tasted a bit more watered down. The other thing we missed about Capitol was the exceptionally sinful century quail eggs. It’s a shame that Ban Lee Siang didn’t have them, although they do serve the regular century eggs.

The bubbling cauldron of...fishballs.

Nonetheless, Ban Lee Siang is another formidable institution for satay celup and is definitely worth a trip.

Restoran Ban Lee Siang,

45E Jalan Ong Kim Wee, Melaka.

With our stomachs still full, it was time to bring our trip to a close with our customary kerang in Bunga Raya.

Click here for directions to this place tucked in the backlanes of Jalan Bunga Raya, famous for its kerang and other shellfish, as well as sotong kangkung and tauhu sumbat.

“The terribly authentic kerang place”

behind Jalan Bunga Raya

Melaka