Oil Town Noodle · Chinese-Bruneian Classic

Seria Kolomee

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Kolo mee traces back to a single Hakka immigrant, Kiew Shao Nyap, who arrived in Kuching from Guangdong at age 16 in the 1920s and adapted a salted noodle recipe from his home village into what became the dish's dry, shallot-oil-tossed style.

Kolomee is dry egg noodles tossed in fragrant shallot oil and a light sauce, topped with anything from fried pork belly to spring onion and wontons. Seria's Chinese-run food stalls, built up around the town's oil industry, are singled out among Bruneians as having their own especially sought-after version.

Why it's made this way: Kolo mee arrived in Borneo with Hakka and Foochow Chinese immigrants who settled in Sarawak in the early 20th century, and it followed the Chinese community that later settled in Seria to work in Brunei's oil fields, becoming a stall staple there.