Rasa Nusantara - Malay kitchen in Newcastle

After almost 3 years in Newcastle, two things that I miss most (apart from my family and the cats) are the almost all-year-round sunny spell and authentic Malay food. Being way up in the north east region of England, Newcastle lacks the relatively warm and temperate weather of the more southern areas, e.g London, and being relatively small in terms of size and touristic value, it's kinda hard to find that many authentic Asian, let alone Malaysian, restaurants in the area. The Chinatown is practically a mere 'Chinastreet'.

So imagine my excitement when I saw a couple of friends checking in on Facebook Places into this new place called 'Rasa Nusantara' roughly a few weeks ago. For someone who hates bland and tasteless English food, the mere name of the restaurant sort of invokes this hot and spicy feeling around my tongue. Yes, Asian restaurants do exist here in Newcastle but most of the food served in these restaurants (there are some few exceptions - Little Asia, St. Sushi) are way too westernised, on the account of trying tempt the western palate, I find that even their most spicy food (usually coded on the menu with the small drawing of three chilies next to the name of the food) could barely tickle my Malaysian tongue.

My friends and I planned that we would go on Saturday for lunch and I was beyond excited that the lunch was the one thing that I had in my mind all week. In fact, the lunch was the one thing that helped me go through the week; it was the last week of my Mental Health rotation and I could come off as one of the patient myself! (I'm SO glad the rotation is over!)

Since it was still relatively new, there was not much to see from the outside, In fact, the sign outside still showed the name of the previous restaurant that use the premise before. Walking inside, you could see all the mismatched tables and chairs from the previous restaurant but I somehow liked it.

The decor aside, the food really was amazing. Yes, good food and bad food are all a matter of relativity and you'd need something to compare them to so it's kinda hard to say if they're really the bsst because there was no other Malaysian restaurat serving day-to-day Malay cuisines. Suffice to say that most of the food served are authentic enough when it comes to the richness of the flavour I got this sudden urge to get the first flight back home!

karipap - seeing them after sooo many years was like seeing a long-lost childhood lover...

nom nom nom...

awesome mee goreng mamak!!!

nasi dagang

nasi lemak...the sambal was spicy but I have to admit it was no match to the nasi lemak in Little Asia.

they even have the classic beverage of all food stalls and restaurants in Malaysia - sirap! how cool is that?

my sirap bandung - couldn't get any more Malaysian than this!

the amazing rendang ayam, YUM-MY!

Another reason that I really enjoyed being there was the friendly, chill and relaxing atmostphere the restaurant had. Suffice to say that it really was typical of hawker-style eating-out experience we Asians so love. My friends and I spent almost three hours sitting and chatting and bantering as we went through our meals (We ordered several dishes for all of us to share) before ordering more and more once we're done eating them. It was just so Mamak-ish! The food was also very cheap for the sizeable portion they served, not to mention the cheaper prices they had for student.

after almost three hours...

I just soooo loved the place I went again the next day for dinner. And their day-special was Lontong! It could have been spicier but hey, I'm not complaining really because it was pretty good nevertheless. I hadn't eaten Lontong for a very long time and I doubt I could find it anywhere else here in Newcastle.



Lontong - averagely good, could be spicier...



spicy prawn chilies - I ain't complaining!

I'm not, by any means, trying to promote the restaurant (although I see no harm in helping my fellow Malaysians kicking up the business).  I'm merely expressing how happy I am that there's now a pretty authentic Malaysian restaurant serving Malay cuisines that are so spicy they would trigger my irritable bowel syndrome right away. As bad as it sounds, I don't really care!