PETALING JAYA, Jan 31 — It’s always fun to discover a hidden gem. This unassuming place located within the Australian & New Zealand Graduates Association (ANZGAM) clubhouse serves a satisfying banana leaf rice meal with home flavours that definitely won over our tummies.

You probably won’t turn into this quiet street a few metres away from Armada Hotel unless you are making a beeline for the Tun Hussein Onn Eye Hospital or the German school so it’s a surprise to discover there’s banana leaf rice here for lunch. Parking is relatively easy as further down the road there are parking bays for the nearby Astaka.  

M. Kumaren runs the food at ANZGAM for breakfast, banana leaf rice lunch and dinner.

The catering at this clubhouse is run by the same people who once operated the banana leaf rice lunch over at the University of Malaya Academic Club. Nowadays, it’s helmed by A. Kumaren while the chef is a Filipino woman. She picked up her skills from the academic club where she worked for about nine years and she’s adept at cooking all kinds of Indian food. 

You have a choice of vegetable curry or dhal with your rice (left). You can add dhal to your rice (right).

They had taken over the clubhouse since last August. After a major renovation exercise to spruce up the place which had not been operated for more than 20 years, they opened their doors last October. It’s a simple set-up, all painted in white and fans to keep the heat away. Three tables with glass tops are available, whereby two are longer communal ones for sharing. Various plastic tables and chairs are also placed around the clubhouse for smaller groups of diners. For al-fresco dining in the evening, there are also tables and chairs outside the clubhouse. 

Fried items like fish and chicken can be ordered and deep fried a la minute for you (left). Black pepper chicken can be added to your vegetarian meal (right).

Tender tasting mutton varuval and four angled beans.

Through word-of-mouth recommendations, people trickle in throughout the lunch hour session to relish their banana leaf rice meal. You will notice it’s mainly retirees or even students from the Brickfields Asia College located on the main road and the German school next door. The basic set for banana leaf rice is priced at RM5 per person — a choice of plain or the healthier parboiled rice, five types of vegetables, vegetable curry, dhal, pappadum, rasam and yoghurt. Water is also provided. Just help yourself to a choice of ice or warm water. For Tuesdays and Fridays, the set is RM6 as there are up to 6 to 7 vegetables. On Friday, they also serve payasam to their diners. 

Service starts from 11.30am onwards and continues up to 3pm. As the food is prepared daily, the vegetarian items are made available once the lunch session starts. The extra orders, like mutton peratal, black pepper mutton, chicken curry or fish curry are cooked throughout the lunch session.

If you prefer a wider selection for your meal, we suggest you visit the place around 1pm. If you want to add more protein to your vegetarian meal, opt for their fried chicken or fish. The items are only fried upon your order. This means there’s a waiting time but you will be rewarded with piping hot and crispy from the wok items to eat with your rice. 

On Sunday, expect to feast on crab curry made with flower crabs.

You get more seafood choices on Sunday like this tender squid cooked in a black pepper sauce.

If you are searching for a more indulgent meal, drop by on Sunday as they serve a seafood feast. You get a crab curry — sweet tasting and very fresh flower crabs cooked in a fragrant mildly spicy curry sauce. There’s not much sauce so we were relishing every spoonful with our banana leaf rice.

There will also be items like squid peratal, black pepper squid and prawn masala. What we thoroughly enjoyed was the freshly prepared seafood which was perfectly cooked. For instance, it’s not easy to cook squid as it tends to get rubbery but the black pepper squid we had was tender and cooked to the right texture.

For breakfast, they serve items like nasi lemak, fried meehoon and idli. During the dinner session, there’s Western food and items like fried rice and noodles from the kitchen.

ANZGAM Food Corner Lot 3, Lorong Utara B, PJ. Tel: 03-79313380 / 012-3658233. Opens daily: 7.30am to 11am (breakfast), 11.30am to 3pm (banana leaf rice lunch), 6.30pm to 10.30pm (dinner)