Albies is the epitome of cheap and cheerful Asian food. The sparse décor and haphazard nature of staff  and service would not be for everyone, but the quality of the food compensates for this! It was doing a busy trade the Friday evening we visited, and I always take a high proportion of Asian clientele as a good sign. It’s a very small venue so be prepared to share tables with strangers although I understand there is also a ‘back room’ that is reached by venturing through the kitchen?

Albee’s exterior – hard to miss

The menu is extensive, almost overwhelming, however photos help aid your decision. Albee’s also has a number of dishes that are ‘specials’, which you can only order on certain days of the week, so it’s worth researching the menu on the website before you visit.

Albee’s interior – with photos to guide your ordering decisions…

We started with the ‘karipap’ aka chicken curry puffs, and loved these. Filled with mild curried chicken, sweet potato, mixed vegetables and boiled egg. This was a great start to the meal and got us rather excited about things to come. Order as an entrée or could also be a very cheap snack.

Karipap – Chicken Curry Puffs ($2.50 each)

Curry Puffs – what’s inside

Next to arrive was the Hainanese chicken rice set dish. One of my favourite Asian meals, this provided a large serve of chicken stock and ginger infused rice, a decent amount of chicken and also the side of ‘special’ chilli sauce was very tasty, with the right amount of spice. The chicken was not completely boneless, but not everyone likes it boneless like me. I thought this dish was great value for the price.

Hainanese Chicken Rice Set Dish ($9.50)

We also ordered the set rendang dish with rice. This was a ‘wetter’ rendang than used to, but it worked well. The meat was very tender. I’m personally not a fan of ‘achar’, which is a type of pickled vegetables, however EatFreak 2 likes the complementary taste to the distinctive rendang flavour.

Rendang Beef with Rice and Achar ($10.80)

The lor bak was served alongside the chicken rice and rendang. Essentially a type of sausage made from minced pork and seafood wrapped in soya bean curd sheets and deep fried.  To be honest, this just tasted to us like cheap sausage meat, almost artificial in flavour. We were not big fans but ate it nonetheless (!).

Lor Bak ($8)

Lor Bak – what’s inside

You think we would have been full by now… but we had also ordered the hokkien fried noodles. The thick noodles are stir fried in a dark soy sauce with pork lard (which has been fried until crispy). There is a LOT of noodles in this dish. Wasn’t a bad dish, great if you’re carb loading, but there was not enough meat to balance out the noodles.  Essentially a bowl of carbohydrates and as you can see from the picture, we had a lot left over as a result (could also be the fact that we ordered a hell of a lot of food for 2 people).

Hokkien Noodles ($10.50)

Lastly, the ‘pulut panggang rempah udang’ or grilled glutinous rice with spices, coconut, dried shrimp and wrapped in bbq banana leaf. This tasted kind of like gluggy nothingness. Although it was listed in the entrees menu and ordered at the same time as everything else, it was served last, so our enthusiasm for this dish (and food in general) may have waned given the copious amounts of food consumed.

Pulut Panggang Rempah Udang – Grilled Glutinous Rice ($3 each)

Glutinous Rice – what’s inside

Return factor? It’s definitely on the return list. Unfortunately Albee’s ‘remote’ location means we can only visit when we have a rental car. With a bill of under $60, we found the food cheap, tasty and plentiful. Service was patchy, but we found our particular waitress very helpful with our queries on menu items. It’s worth the excursion for Malaysian food lovers.

Eatfreaks dined at Albee’s Kitchen in October 2012