I woke up at 5:30am on this Sunday morning for....you guessed it, another group drive for food.
This time is a rustic little eatery called Lemang To'ki 2, a Malay restaurant famous among Malaysian driving and riding enthusiasts because of it's location in Bentong, Pahang, which can be reached from the Sempah backroads or the Karak Highway, both popular routes for petrolheads.
Lemang is a traditional food made of glutinous rice, coconut milk and salt, cooked in a hollowed bamboo stick lined with banana leaves in order to prevent the rice from sticking to the bamboo. It is commonly found in maritime Southeast Asian countries, especially Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and . The bamboo tube containing glutinous rice, salt and coconut milk is placed slightly slanted on a small fire with the opening facing upwards and should be turned regularly in order to make it evenly cooked. It takes about 4–5 hours to cook lemang.
Source : Wikipedia
Lemang To'ki 2 is famous not just for their Lemang, but also their roast chicken that are typically served as a set with the Lemang.
We took the more scenic backroads from Jalan Gombak, meeting up at the bridge just after Hospital Orang Asli Gombak.
Departing the meeting point at 7am, we made a quick pit stop at the Sempah rest stop, before continuing on the long and twisty journey towards Bentong.
The Sempah-Bentong route is different from the Kuala Klawang route which I am more used to, in that the corners are much sharper and the roads are narrower, compounded with poor road surfaces in many stretches of the route with a lot of mid corner bumps.
It is definitely the more challenging one between the two, but if you can master this route you will be able to push your skills (and your balls) even further as a street driver.
The occasional fauna that appears out of nowhere, here being a stray wild boar.
We reached Lemang To'ki 2 after less than an hour from the Sempah rest stop.
All attendees are steemians (or at least have a steemit account). From left to right : 
and me
's white Proton Inspira parked next to my car. This is the first time he join our group drive.
To our horror, we arrived too early that the main Lemang To'ki kitchen was not opened yet!
Not willing to wait 2 hours for the kitchen to open, we settled for the more pedestrian mixed noodles, rice and other dishes.
I took the fried Noodles, Sambal cuttlefish, egg and nasi himpit (rice cake, the white cube-like dish)
After washing down the food with a glass of Nescafe on the rocks (lol), we left the restaurant and took the Karak highway home. From the meetup point to Bentong and return via the Karak Highway ending at the Gombak tollboth, the entire route was about 100km.
After driving the Sempah-Bentong route twice (third time this morning), I am still unfamiliar with this route which caused me to be more cautious this morning due to the somewhat treacherous reputation of this route. Hopefully I can find more opportunities to drive this route more often.
