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Tan Lih Jin has been making chilli pan mee for as long as he can remember, using his family's secret recipe that has drawn crowds of locals and foreigners for 30 years.

Long queues often form outside Kin Kin for the soft noodles topped with minced pork and dried chillies despite its location in Chow Kit, one of Kuala Lumpur's grimiest neighborhoods.

Kin Kin is one of Kuala Lumpur's brand-name street food stalls that seemed happy to stay rustic but was recently wooed to open in the food court of the swish new Publika mall.

"We decided to set up here because many of our regulars live in the area," said Tan, 31.

Located in the upmarket neighborhood of Mont Kiara just outside the city centre, Publika is an arts theme mall that promotes local arts, brands and food.

Eleven well-known hawkers from Kuala Lumpur and Penang are setting up shop in its EAT Village, and another three will do so within the month. The hawkers from Kuala Lumpur and Penang were picked from among scores of recommendations from the public.

"When it comes to food, everyone has an opinion," said Publika complex manager Kow Shih-Li. A team was sent out to taste every recommendation and approach selected hawkers to move to the food court.

Not every hawker, she admitted, was comfortable with moving into upmarket premises but some took the leap. This concept was popularized by the swanky Lot 10 mall in the Bukit Bintang tourist zone two years ago when it opened Hutong, named after the old alleyways of Beijing.

Hutong's hawkers were picked for the popularity that they had built up over at least three generations. Business has boomed to the point where Hutong has caught the attention of international food guides.

Its owner, YTL Corporation, now plans to open a similar food court in Guangzhou, China, next year.

Publika hopes to do the same to preserve old-style street cooking, which now has to compete with fast-food outlets.

Its popularity, said Kow, is based on the nostalgia that people feel for the cooking of their hometown.

It is also the air-conditioned comfort that draws food blogger Yoong Wan Yen, who thinks that people now prefer clean surroundings.

"At outdoor stalls, the sight of rats and cockroaches running around is common,' he said. 'Maybe people wouldn't have minded 20 years ago but, nowadays, everyone is fussier."

It is, of course, a lot more expensive to run a restaurant and quality may suffer when resources get stretched. Some well-known stalls, such as Nasi Lemak Antarabangsa in the Malay enclave of Kampung Baru, opened upmarket versions only to close them soon after.

"QC, QC, QC," said Tan in explaining how the standard of his chilli pan mee is maintained. The noodles are made fresh every day and the chilli cooked at his parents' home as it has been for the last 30 years.

At RM7.50 (S$3), the noodles cost about RM2 more than at the Chow Kit shop to cover the higher rental cost.

Danny Yap, who runs the Hokkien mee stall, is also making an effort to stop standards from falling. "We have been getting our noodles from the same supplier since 1960 when my parents started their stall in Sentul," he said.

Yap, 44, who has been frying the sticky black noodles topped with pork lard since his teenage years, also insists on using a charcoal stove which, he said, makes all the difference.

He has kept the price at RM7.90, the same as at the stall in Sentul.

He is not the only one to insist on a traditional cooking style. At the stall selling northern-style yam rice and stewed pork, the hawker also had a special stove made for a huge enamel tub used to cook the soup.

"Business is good as my regulars like it here," Yap said.

Reprinted courtesy of Straits Times Indonesia. To subscribe to Straits Times Indonesia and/or the Jakarta Globe call 021 2553 5055.