If you happen to visit Muar Town or Bandar Maharani, and you love to eat really delicious Muar pau (steamed buns or dumplings), then I strongly recommend you these two best places to get your Muar best pau in town.
I am not talking about those halal pau Muar selling along the roadside at Tanjung Agas or at Murtabak Singapura Restoran Murtabak JD.
I am referring those Chinese non-halal pau selling in the town center.
Two Best Spots For Muar Best Pau (Steamed Buns or Dumplings)
The first shop is at the Muar famous Glutton Street (thum-chiak-kwei in Hokkien dialect).
The name of the shop is Guan Kee Kedai Makanan which is three doors away from the once-popular yellow color facade corner shop Kim San Public Cooked-Food Market.
This eatery opens daily from as early as 4 a.m. till 12 noon. Actually this place is known for its dim sum or tim sum.
Personally I haven’t tried its dim sum, but the pau is soft and savory. Be it char siew (barbecued pork) or twa pau (big dumplings).
The twa pau filling is stuffed to the brim. The dough or what it is commonly known as the “pau skin” is soft and not thick like those commercially-made steamed buns.
They are kept warm in the old fashioned bamboo steamers.
The other equally lip-smacking succulent dumplings are available only at night time.
It operates on a three-wheeler motorbike parked at outside Piau Siang Foodstuffs along Jalan Meriam.
To be exact, near the intersection of Jalan Meriam and Jalan Sayang.
It used to be stationed near the intersection of Jalan Meriam and Jalan Sisi, diagonally opposite the Muar Soup House (as featured in the picture above).
As I have said this pau seller only sells at night. Operating hours start from 7 p.m. onward until it clears all its stuff.
If you are there, you are sure to see Muarians come in their cars to make their purchases.
This roadside stall is very popular with the local Chinese folks. By eight-thirty in the evening, many of its selection would have sold off.
The pau are hand made from home and keep warm in the bamboo steamers. As they are home-made, they are not all neatly-shaped.
But the flavor is authentic as what a pau should taste like. Not like those commercially-produced ones selling in the shops around the Klang Valley area.
They are bland and rather expensive too.
Again the so-called “pau skin” is soft and thin. When you bite into it, you get the whole chunk of the fillings. The meat is tender and you don’t get oil dripping out onto your hands.
There is one more Chinese pau roadside stall at night along the Glutton Street, at the road intersection of Jalan Ali and Jalan Haji Abu.
That was where the old Peng Ah Bookstore used to be located back in the 70s.
I have tried it and they are not as good as the the two which I have just mentioned above.
Kedai Ali Muar Pau
For those baby-boomers (born between the years 1946 and 1964) who are from Muar, I am sure you know of this famous pau shop called Kedai Ali.
Interestingly, this was a Chinese kopitiam (coffee shop) with a Malay name on its signage.
It was located at Jalan Salleh (facing the Muar Balai Bomba).
If memories serve me right, it was a second shop. The first or the corner shop-lot used to be a noodle-making factory, which had two big noisy white colored parrots.
Anyway, its pau were extremely popular back in the Sixties and Seventies. The dough was amazingly smooth and soft.
Back in the Seventies, my late dad used to buy so-called “Ali Pau” back for us kids for tea-break.
Besides known for its Sai Kee coffee, Mee Bandung, Hainanese chicken rice balls and satay, you should try out Muar pau as well.