A very long menu at Long Bar

Over the past cou­ple of months I have been review­ing Malaysian restau­rants all around Welling­ton for Malaysia Kitchen (full dis­clo­sure – I got refund­ed some of the costs). It’s time to share the reviews!

We made a book­ing at Long Bar because it was a Fri­day night, but giv­en the restau­ran­t’s Bran­don Street loca­tion in Lambton Quar­ter which is desert­ed by 7pm, we might not have need­ed to. Still, giv­en Long Bar’s pop­u­lar­i­ty at lunchtime, it was bet­ter to be safe than sor­ry.

Lunchtime din­ers miss out on the very exten­sive full menu though, includ­ing a whole page of veg­e­tar­i­an mock meat options like sweet and sour “fish” and “mut­ton” cur­ry. In the spir­it of things, we order veg­e­tar­i­an “pork” steamed buns. The fill­ing tastes a lot like roast pork, but I’m not a big fan of the bun itself — too glug­gy.

A much bet­ter entree is the chick­en wrapped in pan­dan leaves then grilled so it’s sub­tly infused with the flavours. The fried pork dumplings aren’t any­thing spe­cial, so they’re soon for­got­ten when the mains come out.

With four of us, we tried to order a range of dif­fer­ent styles and ani­mals. The noo­dle bas­ket that the macad­e­mia chick­en is served in is nov­el, and the meat very ten­der even if the sauce is a lit­tle goopy.

The peanut sauce on the mee rojak is deli­cious, and the veg­etable mix is intrigu­ing, but I’m not a fan of cold noo­dles.

When we were ago­nis­ing over what cur­ry to order (there were many, many options), the wait­ress cau­tioned us against our ini­tial red cur­ry choice, say­ing it was very spicy. I’m not opposed to a lot of spice, but one of our friends had a cold and thought it would­n’t be a lot of fun. Instead we went for a mer­ah cur­ry, which was beef cooked in a spicy toma­to sauce, as I’d nev­er heard of it before. It was expen­sive (in con­text) at $22, and did­n’t wow us. The orange beef, how­ev­er, was divine, crispy and chewy with a hint of chili. We were glad to share the plate, how­ev­er, as it was so rich.

If you like Malaysian food, Long Bar is def­i­nite­ly worth a vis­it at night so you can expe­ri­ence their full range. Let me know what new dis­cov­er­ies you make in the depths of the menu!