Extra Super Tanker: Where tradition prevails

A restaurant that has become part of Damansara Kim’s landscape still serves a fine rendition of good Chinese food.

This year, Extra Super Tanker celebrates its 10th birthday. And true to its roots, its flavours and quality have remained the same, as has its customer base. Well, that is hardly surprising, considering its chef, Chin Jin Fah (affectionately called Ah Wan-kor), has been helming the kitchen since its inception.

The restaurant has a sizeable menu, covering everything from seafood (abalone, prawns, fish, etc.), poultry (duck and chicken), meat (venison, ostrich, pork, lamb and mutton), vegetables and bean curd to rice, noodles and desserts.

Extensive as this may seem, the menu only serves as a guide to the restaurant’s capabilities. There is a whole list of unlisted dishes, which regulars order with ease. However, this makes ordering fairly difficult for newcomers, as you’ll have to "grill" the captains, who, albeit polite, are mostly Chinese-speaking and seem fairly uncomfortable conversing in English.

As soon as we sat down, we were greeted by a trio of starters – small plates of fried peanuts, spicy pickled mango and acar. This, we learnt later, would cost us RM10 (pretty pricey nibbles). Food came fairly quickly, yet the restaurant still handed out a bowl of complimentary peanut soup beforehand, full of chicken feet and beans. And you know you’re in for a treat when this preliminary offering is earnestly lapped up.

To eat the fried crab, pile it into lettuce leaves.

There is only one crab dish on the menu – Fried Crab (RM45) – and the restaurant lists it as a speciality. Here, shreds of crab meat are mixed with roasted pine nuts, fried egg, bean sprouts and dried prawns, and served with crunchy lettuce wraps.

The restaurant is also known for its roast meats – char siew (barbecued pork), siew yoke (crispy roast pork), chicken and duck – although these are not on the menu. We ordered a char siew-siew yoke mix for RM50, and struck gold. The salty siew yoke had an extremely light, crispy skin and a soft, meaty bite. But it was the glistening slices of char siew that stole my heart. Extremely tender, each slice had a beautiful caramel coat that was stickily good. This was served on a bed of crushed peanuts for contrasting texture. Sweet!

The char siew-siew yoke combo (left) and lap mei fun. The salty waxed meats were delightful when eaten with the lightly crusted claypot rice.

A customary Chinese New Year delicacy is the lap mei fun (waxed meat claypot rice, RM68; not on the menu). A huge claypot arrived at our table, along with a platter of waxed meats – preserved duck, pork belly strips, lap cheong (preserved pork sausage) and yun cheong (pork and duck liver sausage). My favourite was the waxed pork belly. It was slightly chewier than the rest, and each bite released intense, porky flavours.

Usually, the waxed meats are mixed with the rice, infusing fragrance and flavour into each grain. At Super Tanker, however, the rice and meats were served separately, so while the dish was good when eaten together, the rice was a less flavourful version on its own.

The Fried Cabbage with Yam (RM20) is an unusual dish. The chef lobbed off the leafy ends of the nai pak, serving just the crunchy bulbous stalks in a creamy yam-infused sauce teeming with garlic, dried prawns and Chinese wine, resulting in fragrant mouthfuls.

The Fried Crystal Prawns with Salted Egg Yolk (RM15 for 100g) and Homemade Mapo Bean Curd (RM20) were also balanced dishes, both well prepared. The soft, supple prawns were perfectly cooked, and coated in a layer of creamy, fragrant salted egg yolk – the stuff dreams are made of. The silken bean curd melted beautifully in the mouth, and was enhanced by its spicy and salty chilli-and-bean paste (tau cheo) sauce.  

Super Tanker is one of those rare jewels that has managed to retain its quality and consistency throughout the years. This is one place I’d visit again and again... and again.

Extra Super Tanker
48 SS20/10, Damansara Kim
Petaling Jaya
Selangor
Tel: [phone]
Opens daily from noon to 3pm, and 6 to 11pm

This review appeared in the February issue of Flavours, Malaysia’s premier food lifestyle magazine. The March issue is out now.