Lucky Mala Noodle, PJ SS17

 Lot No. L2-21, Level 2, 

Seventeen Shopping Mall, 

No. 998, Jalan 17/38, Seksyen 17, 

46400 Petaling Jaya

Tel#03-5031 3243

https://www.facebook.com/luckymalanoodle/

The long awaited mall in the former site of the PJ Seksyen 17 morning market has finally opened. It was good that instead of chasing the hawkers away, they were given a new permanent home, complete with a roof above. No more worrying about the rain (or sun). People can eat there comfortably. It does get rather cold too when the breeze blows strong.

Back to the mall, the anchor tenant is Aeon supermarket which looks sadly a bit dead. Or maybe I'm always there at the off-peak hours. There are few restaurants and cafes which don't look like they are doing well either.

Except for this one. Always packed, always with a queue that extends to outside the shop, Lucky Mala is a build-your-own-meal kind of place:

1. Take a bowl (or two). 
2. Fill it up with your choice of veggie, meat and noodles 
3. Queue up. Decide on your choice of soup (non-spicy, mild or spicy). 
4. Contemplate if it's going to  be worth it when the cashier rings up the bill

They calculate the price based on the weight. Meat would cost more than veggie/noodle so be wise.

I've only been here twice and each time, the wait to pay and for food to be served is long. Here are some tricks to make it more manageable:

• Use two bowl even if it's just for you. That'll make it easier for the cashier to weigh the items. Otherwise, you have to wait for him to separate the veg from the meat 
• The soup is FOC. So, if you don't mind to share, just get 1 bowl instead. That 1 bowl is frigging large. Think of it as a jumbo soup bowl 
• Remember what your mama told you: eat your greens. So load up on them veggie because meat can seriously weigh a fair bit and they don't even look like it. 

 On both occasions, I tried the mild soup and found it to be just the right level of spiciness. Again, it has that infamous tongue-numbing Chongqing chili. Not quite enough to bring a tear to your eyes, just that you won't need any more sauce to go with it.

The concept of being able to decide what goes into my bowl of noodles is awesome as sometimes I don't like the default configuration. And broccoli, how often do you see/get that? They cook everything together and serve it piping hot. As such, some veggie may not be as soft but heck, still a damn good bowl of noodles.