Seafood in Penang: Bali Hai

Penang is truly famous for its wonderfully tasty street food...but it has its share of excellent restaurants as well. And being a small island...by implication, the seafood must be wonderful...and indeed it is.

Lining the street of the famous Gurney Drive, are rows upon rows of seafood restaurants. But curiously most of them are rather empty...except for one. Bali Hai seems to be doing a roaring business when we dropped in on a Friday evening. Bustling. A display of live seafood lined one wall...



Diners can pick their dinner while the seafood is still alive...and indeed we did. First we started with this little fellow...



Flown all the way from Boston, this lobster was kept nicely chilled...and was rather confrontational when he was being weighed...look at the stance. I guess, if his claws were not banded, he would have attacked me and chopped off a bit of my lens hood. BTW, he was not so little, weighing in at some 1.3kg.

And same fellow...



Boiled, chopped, and with a beautiful soy based sauce, spring onions for garnishing. The lobster was firm, but the meat was sweet and tasty. Very nice.

We also opted for some scallops, baked in cheese



Also beautiful. The scallops were fresh...whaddaya expect...they were live just moments before. The meat tender, smooth, rich, creamy. The cheese added layers of flavour and more creaminess and richness. Delightful.

Bamboo clams



Variously called razor clams, bamboo clams, cigar/cigarette clams...these are curious fellows. Within the thin shell, lies a tough, but incredibly sweet, tasty meat. Coupled with tons of crisp fried garlic with blanched tang hoon and chinese parsley, and a light soy based sauce, this was a recipe for a little slice of heaven.

Certainly an excellent seafood meal. Rivalling any, including the magnificent one I had in Hong Kong at Lei Yue Mun



90, 90A, 90B, 90C & 90D, Persiaran Gurney
Georgetown
10250, Penang
Malaysia
10150
+604-2288272 / 2281272




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