Lai Po Heen at Mandarin Oriental Welcomes Chef Thomas Fong from Doha
April 24th, 2024
Somewhere in the suburbs, one of the Klang Valley’s most ambitiously inventive restaurants of 2014 launched this week – it’s a dirty, deliriously delicious secret, its sole entrance tucked away on an SS2 side alley that leads up to the top floor of a shop-lot, without a signboard to call its own.
Smoking Hog is smokin’-hot; this passion project by TY, Audrey, Alex, Ryan, David & their collaborators (some of them were also the founders of SS2’s Crab Factory) is swathed in sultry shadows. Inside, the blinds are completely pulled down over the windows, creating a space where the daylight hours blur seamlessly into night-time.
It’s an intimate place that’s meant to evoke Melbourne’s hidden gems, seating scarcely over 30 guests in a sure-to-be-bustling dining hall with an open kitchen. A lounge upstairs with an alfresco terrace is slated to open later this month, so a few dozen more people can hang out there. The restaurant is still a work in progress, with a chandelier & other fittings to be set up soon.
Smoking Hog’s menu is extremely extensive (head here hungry!), but its name & its repertoire are both best summarised in this one recipe – ‘bacones’ (RM27), an all-day-breakfast dish of house-smoked crispy pork bacon cones stuffed with scrambled eggs, mashed potatoes & own-baked beans, served with Smoking Hog’s excellent kitchen-made tomato sauce.
A can’t-fail magnet for crowds, this seems certain to clog up your arteries & your social media feeds in the months to come. One of the most reassuring aspects of Smoking Hog: It emerges as a fully-formed, completely confident restaurant that knows exactly what it wants to do – no half-baked ideas here.
Lifting the lid on the smoked cheeseburger (RM34), another only-at-Smoking-Hog staple, adding scorched new dimensions of nuance to the entire ensemble, from the sesame bun & beef patty down to the cheese, lettuce & tomatoes.
Carb overkill? Mac-&-cheese sandwich, mixed with pulled pork & bacon (RM25). Everything here is built for sharing, with tons of temptations for bread-lovers, such as toasts topped with either chopped-up chicken liver or fried quail eggs & buttered leeks.
Protein power: Stew of Aussie wagyu oxtail, crowned with layers of pig ears for a terrifically tender, gloriously gelatinous platter. RM58; the serving’s sufficient for two or three customers. Smoking Hog’s team says the menu is expected to evolve every few months (with a measure of molecular gastronomy likely to bubble up next year), but this stew is here to stay.
Dutch Babies are born at last in Malaysia – these puffed pancakes are pleasurably textured at Smoking Hog, served with savoury accompaniments like a plump pork sausage with avocado & tomato salsa (RM24) or sweet treats such as honey-coated cornflakes & ice cream.
Raising the bacon bar for French toasts, piling plenty atop this nut-coated bread, with caramelised bananas between the bulky-thick slices, tinged with a tantalisingly naughty hint of whisky. RM27.
Chivas whisky also figures in the making of these mashed sweet potatoes, whipped up to a smooth & sumptuous butteriness, aromatically adorned with garlic chips. And yes, it has bits of bacon in it too. RM18.
Don’t leave without trying the ‘Mancakes’ – an adult’s alcoholic version of pancakes – with Guinness Stout batter pancakes in a beer mug topped with ice cream, maple syrup & – no surprise – more candied bacon, the pride & joy of this restaurant. RM25.
We begin with smoked bacon, so it’s fair to finish with it – bacon-&-egg ice cream, freshly churned at Smoking Hog all day long. RM24. Also: Rum-&-raisin ice cream (RM16), ice cream with crunchy corn fritters (RM18), plus multi-flavour popsicles (RM8).
There’s much, much, much more on the menu – Aussie pie floaters; oysters with kitchen-made sriracha sauce; meatballs with grated potato waffle hash browns, BLT sandwiches with soft-shell crab; lamb shank with brown rice & barley soup; vegetable lasagne with three cheeses & 11 types of veggies; spicy panko-crumbed bacon coleslaw; spaghetti bolognese with a trilogy of pork, beef & lamb in its sauce (& duckenail – duck, chicken & quail roast for Christmas). Smoking Hog’s parent enterprise, Culinary Dreams, is a name to remember & to reckon with.
Smoking Hog
21 Jalan SS2/64, SS2, Petaling Jaya, Selangor. Behind/by the side of Crab Factory.
Mon-Thurs, 12pm-11pm; Fri, 12pm-1am; Sat, 9am-1am; Sun, 9am-11pm. Kitchen closes 10pm, Sun-Thurs, & 11pm, Fri-Sat.
Tel: 03 7865 9239