One Good Thing: Taste Good's Kaya Puffs

How green was my pastry . . .

Welcome to one good thing C&M’s column about one thing so good you’ll keep coming back for it. On to the thing(s) . . .

In my quest to try all of the noodle dishes at Taste Good Malaysian Cuisine–an Elmhurst joint that’s been around for as long as I’ve been writing about food and has gotten a wave of new customers thanks to The Infatuation, it sometimes takes a while to look past the laksa. Case in point, today’s one good thing, boxes of kaya puffs that sit on a table just inside the door.

They’re joined on the table by curry puffs–haven’t tried them–and round roast pork buns, filled with chewy five-spice scented pork that are probably great fresh out of the oven. The golden half moons filled with sweet Malaysian kaya coconut jam gone verdant thanks to pandan are heavenly, though. The flaky crust yields to the sweet filling, a reminder that the word kaya means rich.

I like to have one with coffee in the morning and try to limit myself to one box every other week, which isn’t so hard as they tend to sell out come dinner time. When a real craving hits though, I stop by before the restaurant opens to score a box. For the record my favorite noodle dishes so far are the char kway teow, pan fried flat noodles with shrimp, egg, and fish cake enriches with little nubbins of pork fat; wok sauteed silver thread noodles, which are like char kway teow but with chewy tapered bits of “rat tail noodles;” and mee siam, vermicelli stir fried with shrimp, tofu, and spicy sauce.

Taste Good Malaysian Cuisine, 82-18 45th Avenue, Elmhurst, 718-898-8001