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CHAPATIS made on the spot, and served with a variety of side dishes: fish curry with ladies fingers, curried boiled eggs, chicken curry with potatoes and spicy lamb curry. The vegetable accompaniments are dhall and two vegetable dishes of the day which could be anything from stir fried tau-geh (bean sprouts) with tau-kwa (bean curd), french beans, bayam (spinach), bitter gourd, long beans with carrots and bhindi with dried chillies. As if this mouth-watering feast were not enough, Ismail usually throws in a small portion of a cucumber/mint sort of salad gratis. Not only is the food delicious and nutritious but it is also incredible value for money.

We call the coffee shop Ismail's, after the chapati maker.. It is to be found at the cross-roads of Penang Street and China Street. Our favourite is local minced mutton with green peas. The other day, the four of us had chicken, fish, minced meat, dhall, french beans with carrot, cucumber salad and five chapattis all for an unbelievable RM9/- only!

The only drawbacks of eating at Ismail's is first, he sometimes is a little too liberal with the oil; and second, because of his insistence on serving the chapatis straight from his charcoal fired griddle to the plate, you sometimes have a long wait before being served. Rice is available for those who are not partial to chapattis

The coffee shop also has on offer a pretty good sar-hor-fun, a passable char-koay-teow and value-for-money Chinese "economy rice" i.e. boiled white rice served with a variety of meat and vegetables cooked on the spot.

Quite often during lunch hour, you can also get a mamak mee goreng or mee rebus from a pushcart that pulls up outside the shop.

Because of the amazing variety of food on offer, it is small wonder that this coffee shop is jam-packed during the lunch hour with all sorts of Chinese, Indians, Malays Bangladeshis and the occasional back-packers. To make sure of seat, it is advisable to get there well before one o'clock.

Incidentally, the proprietors of this establishment are an interesting Mutt & Jeff couple, Yeo and Yong. Yeo, the wife, runs the shop almost single-handed running around taking orders, washing the dishes, serving the drinks, clearing tables etc. She also fries the char koay teow!

While she's buzzing around developing her varicose veins, you cannot help noticing her MCP husband Yong, relaxing in his easy chair reading the newspaper, checking his large collection of fishing rods (he's an avid angler), playing mahjong or watching his favourite t.v. drama. Occasionally, one can catch a snatch of real life drama when our overworked Madame explodes in exasperation at her layabout Lord & Master .... .but that's another story.

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[Ed. Warning: Views expressed on Page 11 are entirely the contributor's own. Publication must not be taken to mean that the Editor shares the writer's taste in foods. All contributions to PAGE11 are welcome that do not transgress the boundaries of National Sovereignty, National Identity or National Pride or Morality or Incorruptibility. The line is firmly drawn]

THE WELL-INFORMED Kwong Hwa Daily reports the surprising appearance of 4 monkeys at the Dato Kong (Dato Ali) Shrine at Ang Teng Kak, the Red Lantern Corner (Noordin Street Ghaut); astonishing considering that the area lies close to the sea and is a fortress of unrelenting  stone and brick After taking bananas offered to them the new arrivals would retreat to the great trees towering over the shrine. The tameness of the animals impressed the Ang Teng Kak folk. Lee Kim Hing the coffee stall man and also caretaker of the temple reports that he had once treated one, who looked the oldest, for a wound. The monkey seemed to understand what he was doing. Sadly the old monkey fell to his death during a thunderstorm. Another monkey,  wandering about by the sea was set upon by dogs and killed. Two monkeys remain. Lee and his kids see to it they never want for food. Did Sun Wu Kung, the Monkey god alias Kau Tay T'ian alias Hannuman, send these monkeys to guard the shrine? Wonders Lee. Maybe, for the two monkeys never enter the shrine, nor do they trespass on the neighbouring houses