GEORGE TOWN, June 4 — More than 70 years ago, the Lim sisters — Kooi Heang and Kooi Lye — came to Penang together with their mother Tan Ah Heng and settled here.
Tan and her two daughters were originally from Haadyai, Thailand. Not long after they arrived, Tan started selling curry mee at the Air Itam market sometime in 1946.
The two sisters, who were still very young then, had to help out; stoking the fire of the charcoal stove, preparing the ingredients for the soup, stirring the simmering soup and serving customers.
The sisters have continued with the business left to them by their mother and both show no signs of slowing down despite their age.
Kooi Heang is now 85 and though hunched and frail-looking, she sits on a low rattan chair as she methodically prepares each bowl of curry mee: putting handfuls of noodles into the bowls before passing them to her grand-daughter, Ong May May, who then ladles the boiling soup and other ingredients into them.
Kooi Lye, now 83, sits on a low plastic stool at the front, occasionally stirring the pot of spiced broth while taking orders and acting as the cashier, keeping the cash in her pouch and handing out change efficiently.
Sister Curry Mee, as the makeshift stall is known, is an icon in Air Itam and in recent years, a tourism draw as visitors seek them out to try their curry mee.
Their stall is unlike any other hawker stall there because the large pots of noodles and ingredients are all set on the ground in between the two sisters with the main broth simmering over a charcoal stove placed right at the front.
It’s not a stall or a pushcart, just pots and bowls with the sisters serving up hot bowls of curry noodles. For many years, there were no tables and chairs for customers either except for a few low stools.
Customers had to squat next to the sisters or sit on the stools and enjoy their noodles that way.
Now they have a couple tables nearby and three stools out front in case you want to try sitting on the stools to enjoy the noodles. Otherwise, most customers are encouraged to sit at a coffee stall across the narrow lane.
Nowadays there is a space behind the sisters where Ong and her husband, Ooi Boon Min, prepare more soup and other ingredients to refill the pots in front.
Even as a pot of broth simmers on a charcoal stove out front, there are several other charcoal stoves behind with more pots of broth simmering there.
Despite Sister Curry Mee’s fame — they even have their own Facebook page now — their curry mee has remained authentic and close to the original flavour.
Unlike the commercialised curry mee versions elsewhere, the curry mee here has remained simple and delicate without all the “noise” of extra ingredients or additional flavourings.
They serve up a very simple and straightforward broth that is light and smooth with just the right balance of coconut milk. The bowl of noodles is then topped with a scoop of tau pok (fried beancurd puff) and spicy cuttlefish. A dollop of homemade sambal brings the whole thing together, giving it extra spicy oomph without overpowering the delicate broth.
Sister Curry Mee is open every morning except for Tuesdays but be warned, parking is scarce and the road leading there is often jammed due to the morning market. But it is a treat worth making all that effort for.
Sister Curry Mee
Jalan Air Itam, Pekan Ayer Itam, 11500 Air Itam, Penang
Time: 7.30am-1pm (Closed on Tuesdays)
