UMAC House, Petaling Jaya

Ever in a rush for lunch but you cannot just eat another dish at your workplace’s overpriced food court? Fret no more, UMAC House is just around the corner. We know it seems as if we do not have to work judging by our long lunch entries, but we do need to rush our lunch most of the time due to work or family commitments.

So here we are, eating banana leaf rice to satisfy our hunger at a reasonable price and with a fairly quick service.

The ambience? Though seated outside, S quite liked it as they managed to put an awning to shade patrons from the searing KL heat. The last time she went there it was quite hot and humid. R wished it was air- conditioned. In fact, we begin to suspect that R wishes there was such a thing as an outdoor air conditioning everywhere. There is one, R. It is called Antartica. So our ambience rating fared between 6 and 7 out of 10.

Service was pretty efficient,with the banana leaves rolled out the moment we sat by our table, rated as 7 to 8. The basic banana leaf rice cost RM 6 per person with an assortment of refillable vegetable dishes, poppadom. As for the rice selection, we had to choose between the normal white rice or Indian rice. We do not know whether the guy made the Indian rice thing up but basically the grain is longer like Basmati rice but thicker than that. Ponni rice? Maybe, who knows. We don’t. Anyway, the meal was accompanied by a complimentary rasam which does wonders for your sinuses and the plain water was bottomless. 

The food itself was pretty basic but tasty. The vegetable dishes were laden with spices and authentic. Authentic Malaysian Indian mind you… we do not know how authentic Indian Indian food tastes like because we have never been there. The vegetable dishes are refillable but none of us did ask for seconds because we were quite full. R did add extra rice (for free, of course) as he needed to neutralise the heat. He has lower heat endurance so colour us (not) surprised, shall we?

S ordered the chicken varuval (RM 5) and fried pavaka (RM 3) while J had a slice of the fried mackerel (RM 7). The chicken packed a punch of heat and required several downings of water in order to finish the whole serving. J liked the crispy mackerel fried with a light batter of aromatic spices. The fried bitter gourd was a bit of a let down as they were not crispy at all and were decidedly soggy. All in all we rated the food 6 to 8 out of 10, depending on how spicy you like your food to be. A nice quick affordable lunch with refillable vegetables, poppadom, rice and water is a winning formula in our books on any day, we say.

Partially hidden in a row of abandoned houses, the place is located opposite MAHSA University College in Jalan Universiti. Here is the address for your reference: No 1, Jalan 12/5, 46200 Petaling Jaya.