Another Malatang eatery has opened up in Wellington. This eatery is where the old Cha was on Courtenay Place, right next to KC Cafe. The layout is nice, with the raw food at the front of the restaurant with the counter and the seats at the back. It is a relatively small premises. However, I feel it will be to their advantage as if it is too big, then it is harder to fill and has higher costs. In these Malatang eateries, including Tiger and Babaili, you pay per gram on how much raw food you put in your bowl, and it can be pretty expensive if you are not careful. There are the typical ingredients to choose from, except you get no marinated meats at Babaili Malatang on Dixon Street. Some of the food is still frozen here, which slightly annoys me as frozen food is heavier than non-frozen food, so you pay slightly more.

At Kungfu, I think there are only two ways to have your food, either with soup or without. I have been twice and tried both, each being at a medium heat level and not costing more than $28 per bowl. For the dry version, I got asked if I wanted to get it with rice, and I thought, why not. When it arrived, I was slightly annoyed as it had quite a bit of coriander (which I am not overly a fan of) and had peanuts scattered all over the top (which I wish I had known earlier as I am slightly allergic to peanuts). However, I managed to pick it all out, and luckily, the peanuts were not cooked with the food; they were just put on top before serving. The flavour in the food was ok; there was not a lot of seasoning, but you can add other sauces and condiments to it later. The spice took the flavour away from the food, which was a shame.

The Soup base version, however, was a different story, and I was impressed with their soup. It has lots of flavour and a good amount of kick. I always add vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, chilli oil, and a bit of salt as my dipping sauce, and it goes really well with the food in the soup. The food was cooked perfectly in both dishes, with nothing too chewy or soft. Also, I got a free Milk Tea as a Grand Open promotion. It was a good Milk Tea and went well with my malatang

A slightly funny story, though: when I went the second time, the staff came over and was holding a bowl of raw food, and I didn’t even notice that half of the food I put in my original bowl was not in my cooked bowl. They profusely apologised, cooked me a new bowl, and added more noodles to the second bowl. I was so full afterwards that I couldn’t even finish it.

Overall, I feel I will be able to rank the three Malatang eateries in Wellington: Tiger, Babaili, and Kungfu in terms of flavour but not price. If you want the dry version, I would go to Babaili based on taste and seasoning. However, I feel overall, they overcook your food as half their food is frozen, and when they cook it all together to ensure the frozen food is cooked, the vegetables, especially the noodles, are overcooked. If you want the soup variety, I would go to Tiger and then closely followed by Kungfu. Overall, I think Tiger comes out on top as there is more variety of raw ingredients, and they don’t overcook your food. It is followed by Kungfu, with Babaili third. However, the best service and cleanliness goes to Kungfu.

Address: 37 Courtenay Place, Te Aro, Wellington 6011