KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 7 — Have you heard of mangga susu? Literally translated from Malay, it’s mango milk or a thick smoothie made from a blended concoction of sweet-tasting fresh mangoes, ice cubes and krimer manis or sweetened creamer. For the past few months, the drink has been in great demand especially during Ramadan.
Makeshift mangga susu stalls that opened for Ramadan bazaars saw long queues of people patiently waiting for the refreshing sweet smoothie.
One of the places that is riding the mangga susu wave is a roadside stall located at Pinggiran Batu Caves. After the stall’s existence was shared by popular Malay sites like Cempedak Cheese, Siakap Keli and Makan Murah Je, it has sparked off long queues at the stall.
Opened in June, the stall is a venture by a group of enterprising young men including Abdul Arif Ridzuan bin Abdul Hamid. The group of friends take turns to run the stall as they juggle their day jobs like driving a taxi or despatch runner. Abdul Arif Ridzuan had learnt the mangga susu recipe from his “sifu” known as Tok Abah who runs a fruit juice stall near the Petronas station in Kampung Baru.
He had been a frequent visitor to the stall for their delicious mangga susu, despite living in Batu Caves. As a tribute to Tok Abah, the stall uses the hashtag #lenganbajulipat, since Tok Abah’s signature look is his folded shirt sleeves.
They start from 12.30pm to peel and cut the mangoes for the day. One portion goes into the blender while the smaller diced mangoes are reserved for the topping. Each day, they go through around 150 kilogrammes of mangoes and the stall is open until their supply runs out for the day. Currently the stall uses the Thai mangga susu variant as it’s sweeter tasting. Since it’s seasonal, they will have to source for another variant once it’s no longer available.
From 2.30pm onwards, there’ll be a queue of people waiting patiently as the owners continuously prepare the mangga susu using two blenders. In the evening, the crowd swells up and sometimes it takes an hour before you can get your mangga susu fix.
The mangga susu is so delicious that one of their customers, Vijay, who stays in Batu Caves does not mind queuing up for the third time. As he says, “Sedap dan sekarang musim panas (It’s delicious and now it’s the hot season)”. He had seen the queue when he was eating at the nearby mamak Damai Bistro across from the stall and out of curiosity he joined the queue and got hooked.
Some like Kak Ieyza who lives nearby and read about it on Facebook joined the queue since it wasn’t too long in order to grab the mangga susu to share with her children. What Abdul Arif Ridzuan also noticed is there are some people who are faithful regulars. He can recognise them coming every day to queue up for mangga susu.
Previously two sizes were offered, a small one for RM3 and a large one for RM5. As most patrons order the large 1 litre portion, they have decided to just offer one size. Each cup is accompanied by a straw and plastic spoon, making it easier to slurp down the fruits.
Next to the mangga susu, you will find the Mor A Grifa chicken burger stall (https://www.facebook.com/moragrifakitchen/). As the fried chicken burger was pictured together with mangga susu on Facebook for RM10 when the posts went viral, many assume that these two stalls offer a special set together.
In fact, Abdul Arif Ridzuan explains that this is not the case as they are entirely separate stalls. As the one-year-old burger stall only opens from 6pm onwards, we didn’t get a chance to try their special burger that is fried chicken pieces served with cheese sauce, lettuce and herb mayonnaise on a bun. They also have another version for RM9 that includes a chicken sausage. With the craze for mangga susu, the stall has been doing brisk business and Abdul Arif Ridzuan says they can sell up to 50-60 kilos of chicken pieces per day.
With the success of this stall, Abdul Arif Ridzuan has also taught a number of enterprising friends how to make the mangga susu. These friends have also opened other roadside stalls around the area. To identify their link with the original stall, the stalls carry the same banner that has the hashtag #lenganbajulipat.
As we were interested in the backstory, our next stop was Kampung Baru to talk to Tok Abah who is credited as the one who started mangga susu. We discover a small stall along Jalan Datuk Abdul Malek known as Gerai Tok Abah in front of a row of wooden houses operated by two young girls. Just a few steps down, there’s Dusun Tok Abah that is open in the evening. There’s no signboard and it may look ramshackle but the locals know that this is the place that started mangga susu.
During the day, the stall is operated by Nor Hayana binti Mukari and Siti Nur Intan. Both 17-year-olds help out after school to prepare the mangga susu. You’ll notice the difference here as they use a high powered blender that makes the mangga susu incredibly smooth and finely blended. It’s priced at RM4 and they only make the small version as they only sell the larger 1 litre-sized drink at night when Dusun Tok Abah is open.
Started in 1989 by Fauzi bin Ismail or Tok Abah, as he’s popularly known, the stall specialises in fruit juices. Initially they also offered Western food items but they have since stopped serving those. Around 2000, they came up with the idea to make an ice blended drink with the fruits, hence the mangga slurpee was born.
It took inspiration from Slurpees sold at 7-Eleven convenience stores. However, they stopped selling the drink after some time. It was only at the beginning of 2016 that they brought it back. Later, it was given the nickname mangga susu. That name stuck and it’s now popularly called that.
Well known among the locals for his generosity and kind hospitality, the electrical engineer runs this stall as a hobby. He chose fruit juices since it’s healthy. The stall offers about 20 varieties of fruit juices. Choose from apples, dragon fruits, grapes, bananas, papaya, pineapple, honeydew, watermelon, orange, starfruit, starfruit, guava and so on. You can also mix and match the juices.
Popular choices include mangoes, honeydew, red apples and pineapple. They go through about 125 kilos of mangoes each day. The mango variants are based on what’s available and fresh in the market. Even though the stall is now run by Tok Abah’s son, Mohammad Afdhal or Along as he is known, everyone always asks for Tok Abah to make their mangga susu since he does not stinge when it comes to the amount of mangoes he adds into the drinks. As he explains to us, he’ll add a medium-sized mango or three small ones to blend for one portion! His customers would often pay back in kind by bringing him home-cooked food in return.
What’s also interesting is the stretch of restaurants around Jalan Datuk Abdul Malek are also selling their version of mangga susu. A quick look at the hashtag for #manggasusu and it zooms in on one of the popular stopovers — Classic Cafe. Catering to the night crowd, their mangga susu may be priced at RM5 but it’s a relatively smaller size compared to the other places. From what we understand, they go through about 200 kilos of mangoes to make their specialty drink. It’s extremely thick and the chopped fresh mangoes that top the drink have a lovely floral aroma.
In our search for mangga susu, we realised everyone adds their different touch when it comes to the drink. The proportions are not fixed and its taste is highly dependent on the person making the smoothie. Sometimes it’s also dependent on which mangoes are available, as we tried different ones made from Indian mangoes. Maybe it’s best to stick to the one that started this, as Tok Abah says to his customer when he hands them the mangga susu, “This is ori (original)”.
Mangga Susu Stall
Opposite Pangsapuri Saujana Gombak
Lebuh Utama Sri Gombak
Taman Pinggiran Batu Caves, Gombak, KL
Open: 2.30pm till 8pm or until their mango supplies finish. From 7.15pm to 8.15pm, they take a one-hour break for Solat Magrib. Closed on Friday.
They have also opened branches at Kampung Laksama in Batu Caves, Batang Kali, Kampung Datuk Keramat, Taman Greenwood, Danau Kota. Plans to open in Ampang and Duke Gombak are also underway. To identify their stalls, look for the banner that displays the hashtag #lenganbajulipat
Dusun Tok Abah
At the corner of Jalan Raja Uda and Jalan Datuk Abdul Malek
Kampung Baru, KL
Open from 6pm till 12am. At night, they only sell the larger-sized mangga susu for RM5. Gerai Tok Abah is open from 10am to 5pm and only sells the smaller-sized mangga susu.
Classic Cafe
152A, Jalan Datuk Abdul Malek,
Kampung Baru, KL
Open: 7pm to 2am.
