Next in my recap series from my trip to Penang in October, after sharing my stay at the Blue Mansion and details of my #1 must do recommendation of visiting the street art of George Town, it is time to talk food! During my visit I had a super long eating wish list, and was successful in eating some of it – means an excuse to return right to finish crossing everything off? Here are my food highlights of Penang for you to consider for your list when you visit.
Satay – individually ordered sticks of prawn, beef, lamb, lamb black pepper, calamari, and chicken tandoori at a Satay Specialty shop
In Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur may be the national capital, but Penang is its food capital. Lonely Planet ranked Penang as the #1 Best Food Destination in 2014, CNN Travel named Penang as one of the 23 best food cities in the world last year, and The Culture Trip named Penang one of the best 15 cities in the world for food in 2016.
Street food is such a source of price that the tourism board offers Street Food maps with a list and description of an array of popular street food dishes, along with a handful of recommendations of where to get it, on a free street food map. There are also plenty of blogs by locals with their own lists of where are the top places to get a certain dish.
I divided the foods of my Penang food highlights into two main areas: one is street foods of Penang, which you can usually find at hawker centers or evening markets like Chulia Street, New Lane, Gurney Drive, Batu Lanchang, Air Itam, etc. In this case my intent is to help you recognize some of the food you may see. The other grouping is Peranakan food, which you will have to intentionally search to find where it is offered as it is not as common as the street food offerings.
You might also find some amusement in the WonderFood Museum. It’s mostly lots of plastic fake food, but I was impressed with the first floor in showing some special preparations of a various ethnic cuisines that contribute to Malaysia’s food culture in dioramas along with example visuals of dishes with a legend (like seen below). They also offered an overview of the vast many kind of dishes in Malaysia, even some suggestions on where to go to eat the local dish, and of course, so many silly photo ops. If you’re caught in a rainstorm like I was or just want a break from the sun I recommend an hour here. 
