Visit Rogues@Gasing inside PJ’s La Salle Hall for a banana leaf rice lunch full of home cooked flavours

PETALING JAYA, Feb 16 — Here’s a tip: if you’re looking for a lunch place without having to wrangle a parking spot around PJ’s Gasing area, try the La Salle Hall for banana leaf rice.

Originally the residence of the De La Salle Brothers, an order of Catholic lay teachers who set up various Lassalian schools all over Malaysia, it was transformed into La Salle Hall back in 2019, a community space for the La Salle school alumni.

Inside there’s always been a cafe offering dining options and currently it’s occupied by Rogues@Gasing that runs a popular banana leaf rice spread for RM12 with refillable portions.

Available from 12pm to 3pm, help yourself at the counter to a banana leaf lined tray and add your choice of rice, whether it’s plain or the healthier parboiled version.

Trays of cooked vegetables are placed on the table, which rotate depending on their market find of the day.

Dining at Rogues@Gasing is a pleasant, relaxed experience and you can pair a mug of cold beer with your banana leaf rice lunch. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi

You may get snake gourd, beancurd cooked in a spicy sambal, cucumber and pineapple acar or stir fried cauliflower cooked with dried chillies.

While the choice of vegetables change, the care taken with how they handle the vegetables does not.

Take the snake gourd: it is lightly stir fried without excess oil, retaining its freshness and crunchy texture.

Help yourself to mor milagai or sun dried chillies which lend a saltiness to the meal, while there’s a tangy mango pickle from the jar.

For a crunchy element, select your own pappadam from the air tight container, to offset the soft rice.

Go crazy with the four types of curries kept warm at the counter.

There’s the usual chicken and fish curry but what boosts the flavour tremendously is the salted fish curry and their thick sambar.

The curries may appear thin in consistency but the flavours are definitely there, once I drenched my rice with my choice of curry.

What I appreciated was that it came with chunky cut potatoes, carrots and rarely seen, nutritious drumsticks or moringa oleifera.

Extra items can be ordered like a spicy Prawn Sambal (left). The Pork Belly Peretal may not be super tender but the dry curry is fragrant with spices (right) — Pictures by Lee Khang Yi

For a more substantial meal, load up the proteins at an extra cost. These include a string of meat dishes cooked varuval or peretal style, from wild boar, chicken, mutton and pork belly.

There’s also a spicier egg sambal and prawn sambal.

For more goodies, order from the menu items like fish cutlet, mutton bone marrow and fried fish (choices of ikan bulus, black pomfret and tenggiri), fried chicken and even surra puttu.

The Prawn Sambal (RM7) is tinged with spiciness and the fresh prawns add a nice touch to the meal.

While I would have preferred a more tender Pork Belly Peretal (RM6), the meat was liberally coated with the dry curry redolent with spices.

On a daily basis, select from Chicken Varuval (left) to Mutton Varuval (right) for your lunch. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi

After lunch, there’s a different menu like fried noodles and rice, nasi lemak, pizza and burger.

There’s also a BBQ spread every first Saturday of the month, where they will serve steaks, burgers, sausages and prawns hot from the grill.

The restaurant remains open throughout the Chinese New Year holidays but they will be closed on February 16 as Monday is their usual day off.

Find La Salle Hall just round the corner from the La Salle school, off Jalan Chantek 5/13. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi

Rogues@Gasing

La Salle Hall, Lorong 5/15B,

Off Jalan Chantek 5/13, Petaling Jaya

Tel: 016-3352477

Open: 12pm to 10pm. Closed on Monday

* This is an independent review where the writer paid for the meal.

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