Canberra’s first food court malatang just opened in the Canberra Centre. Photo: Tenele Conway.
Canberra’s first-ever malatang eatery to be located in a food court has just opened in the downstairs food court of the Canberra Centre, and it’s bringing spicy pick-and-mix dining to the masses.
With absolutely no confusion as to what style of dining is being dished up here, the venue simply goes by the name Malatang City, and its appearance in a mainstream food court setting, nestled right next to McDonald’s and an old-school Chinese joint serving classics from a bain-marie, holds promise that malatang is about to become everyday dining for Australians.
If you aren’t familiar with malatang cuisine, I like to think of it as a hot-pot spin-off. Originating in the Sichuan province of China in the late 2000s, malatang became a convenient way to serve hotpot-style ingredients without the laborious setup of individual burners at every table.
The cuisine came to Australia in the mid-2010s when the first malatang eatery opened in the Haymarket area of Sydney.
Over the next decade, the cuisine took hold across the country but was primarily confined to areas with a large Chinese community. In Canberra, the highest proportion of malatang restaurants are in the City West area, close to the ANU, where they are frequented by Chinese students, but thanks to the chain Zhangliang Malatang, they can also be found in Woden and Gungahlin.
Malatang City has more than 80 raw ingredients to choose from. Photo: Tenele Conway
This newest member of Canberra’s malatang family differs from its predecessors in that it isn’t a stand-alone restaurant behind its own doors. Malatang City has a unique arrangement in that it sits wide open to the food court, where diners can wander up and start picking their ingredients right there in the food hall.
If you’re still confused by malatang or haven’t had the chance to try it out yet, here’s the full rundown.
First, you grab a bowl and a set of tongs from the counter. Next, you head to the open fridges of ingredients and start selecting what you would like to see cooked into a soup or a dry noodle dish.
The choices at Malatang City are vast, with around 80 individual tubs of raw ingredients laid out for you to select from.
Don’t be deceived by the bowls at Malatang City – these things are huge, and if you fill them up, you’ll be making a meal for at least a dozen people, and based on the fact that the meal is charged by weight, you’ll certainly be paying for it too.
My tactic is to opt for a selection of my favourite things without getting carried away and falling into the ‘one-of-everything’ trap.
Malatang allows you to create your own soup or noodle dish. Photo: Tenele Conway.
I generally stick with one to two proteins to save from flavour confusion, and I mix those with a range of textures and tastes like choi sum for some crunch, woodear fungus for some chew, shitake mushrooms for their umami and their ability to soak up a broth, and some lotus root for its sturdy nature.
Noodles are a must, and here you can choose from Hokkein noodles, rice noodles, spinach noodles, instant ramen-style noodles and my favourite, egg noodles.
You then deliver this bowl to the counter, where you’ll find out if your wallet is as big as your appetite as they weigh the contents of the bowl. You then make your soup selection from a list of eight options, which include Spicy Chinese bone broths, laksa broth, Vietnamese pho-style broths or a range of stir-fry noodle options like satay and spicy.
Your bowl of raw ingredients then disappears into the kitchen and returns in under 10 minutes, transformed into a steamy soup or stir-fried noodle dish, which you take to the condiments counter to add extra flavour and spice based on your preference.
The bowl I created on my first visit to Malatang City came out to less than $14, which was excellent value, and I was pleased with my portion and final creation.
Pick and mix your own soup at Malatang City. Photo: Martin Conway.
The overall experience reminds me of those pick-and-mix lolly stores that appeared in malls all around the country in the 90s, but instead of overpriced and underwhelming sugar in various shapes and colours, you end up with a hearty, balanced and fairly healthy meal for a reasonable price.
Based on the ever-churning queues at the McDonald’s next door compared to the slow trickle at Malatang City, build-your-own malatang dining has a little way to go before it’s a staple of the Aussie food court, but having never seen the appeal of the golden arches in a setting with so much choice, I will definitely be back soon to build my next creation.
Head to the downstairs Canberra Centre food court to try out Malatang City.
