Unique Food Lift @ Hainanese Restaurant

Sin Kheng Aun is a place where all Penangites and many outstation visitors would have heard of. This restaurant has been operating for decades, serving tasty Hainanese cuisine. All the food in this restaurants is cooked over a charcoal stove. My hubby used to patronized this restaurant since he was a kid.


These non-air conditioned restaurant has two dining areas, one on the ground floor and another upstairs. The kitchen is located on the ground floor. Dishes from ground floor kitchen are send to the dining hall upstairs by a food lift. The food is placed in the lift and the worker upstairs will pull it up manually. So far this is one restaurant that I have came across that still uses a manual food lift….


Dishes that we had – the curry gulai tumis pomfret (tau tei) . They only uses this type of fish for this curry dish. The ingredients are coarsely chopped and the gravy has a hint of belacan.

Kerabu chicken with the mixture of cucumber, onions, chicken pieces and chopped peanuts which was rather spicy.


Fried liver and pork in black soya sauce served with sourish pickles.


Fried assam prawns – the prawns were very fresh with the sweet and sour assam taste concealed in it.

The last dish we had was fried broccoli with cauliflower, which I find it a bit soggy.

This restaurant located in Lorong Chulia serves really great and tasty Hainanese food at very affordable prices except for the fish which can be a bit pricey.

Sin Kheng Aun
2 Lorong Chulia
10200 Penang

Tel : 04 261 4786

Business Hours : 11am – 2.30pm and 5pm – 8.30pm

Closed on every alternate Mondays.