Malaysia's many cultures make it heaven for the gluttonous and curious, two virtues with which I am blessed – or is it cursed? Either way, it means that by the end of the trip my jeans won’t fit. My challenge? Discover the mysteries of Malaysian food in five culinary destinations. My motto? Never knowingly underfed.

Malaysia’s three main ethnic groups – Malay, Chinese and Indian – have distinct cuisines that influence and complement each other. The food may be complex in heritage, but it is remarkably easy to eat. And eating is the Malaysian national pastime. When meeting friends, the first question asked is: “Have you eaten yet?” Every moment is a potential snacking opportunity. It is the best of Asia in one country. Ginger, chilli, tamarind, turmeric, garlic, curry leaf, palm sugar, lemongrass, coconut and fermented shrimp paste are strong flavours fit for a brave and hungry traveller.

The sexy and succulent satay sticks at Awana, London’s luxurious Malaysian restaurant, got me hooked. Going native, Kuala Lumpur was an obvious starting point, but in a high-rise city of more than 1.5 million people, where to begin? Enter Adly and Honey, the duo responsible for the foodie website www.friedchillies. com. Their promise to introduce me to Malaysia’s culinary cultures in a day set a belly-busting challenge.

We started at Sri Nirwana Maju café with traditional Indian breakfast – roti canai. Fresh pancakes are served on banana leaf with spicy curry sauces and coconut chutney. Add teh tarik – strong sweet tea mixed with condensed milk and passed from jug to glass – and you have a breakfast for champions. Cornflakes are definitely for wimps.

Lunch was a Malay home-cooking lesson in making ayam percik – chicken in fragrant and spicy coconut milk. I waddled back to my hotel for a postprandial nap, and awoke just in time for dinner at Fresh Unique, a colossal Chinese temple to seafood with triple-decker tanks along a ten-metre long wall. Choose your live creatures, preferred cooking method and wait. Our meat crab with salted duck-egg yolk was undoubtedly fresh and certainly unique; a rare example of a restaurant that delivers exactly what it claims.

Eating in Malaysia – even in restaurants – is rarely a formal affair. Hawker stalls dish up local flavour and atmosphere. It is not uncommon to see a designer-clad couple next to penny-pinching students enjoying the same speciality. KL’s Jalan Alor, a long street lined with stalls, is a great place to start. Be brave, follow the crowds, and you can’t go wrong.

Kuala Lumpur may be a 24-hour all-you-can eat buffet, but multicultural Malaysia is its most vibrant in the historic city of Melaka. Long, tall colonnaded buildings line the main street and square, crowned with an austere church. Dutch rule leftovers fit snugly alongside British-built fortresses and forgotten Portuguese cannons. We checked into Hotel Puri, stuffed with antiques and nicknacks proudly proclaiming its Peranakan heritage. Descendants of Chinese traders and Malay women, Peranakans devised a unique cuisine: Nyonya.

Until recently Nyonya food had been confined to the home. Seek out the geometric stained-glass panelled doors of Ole Sayang, where traditional favourites such as shrimp in a fresh green pineapple, tamarind and candlenut sauce are on the menu. Simpler Nyonya food can be found in Jalan Hang Jebat, formerly Jonkers Street, and once famous for its antiques trade. Evening hawkers dish out savouries and sweets, such as cendol – bowls of ice shavings, coconut milk and palm sugar topped with durian – the stinky “king of fruits”.

The most surprising cultural aspect of Melaka is the Portuguese settlement where names such as De Silva and Texiera dominate the façades of waterside open-air eateries. Big Ben, the plus-size proprietor of an eponymous seafood joint, doles out potted history lessons along with devil’s chicken and piri-piri chargrilled fish. Here, a community of 3,000 Roman Catholics of Malay and Portuguese descent cling to the language and lifestyle their ancestors brought from Europe.

I could have eaten in Melaka every day for a month and still not fully explored its vibrant foodie heritage, but the colonial call of Penang was teasing me away. The plush Shangri-La Rasa Sayang made separation sweeter. The resort’s Chi spa smoothed away accumulated cellulite and got my circulation going – just in time for lunch. As Malaysia’s foodie capital, Penang is the place to slurp pungent assam laksa, and munch loh – chubby spring rolls with sticky soy sauce. There is a distinct Chinese accent to Penang’s culture and food. I followed the local crowds for the best char kway teow – shrimp, bean-sprouts, sausage, egg, fish cake, spring onion and chilli flash fried with soy sauce and thick white noodles and a sprinkling of cockles. Several taste tests across town revealed a clear winner: Two Sisters, where the siblings – one fat, one thin – rock their woks day and night. A passer-by insisted that we eat only the portly sister’s dish. “Never trust a skinny chef,” she proclaimed. Who am I to argue?

I took this advice to my next destination, Kota Bharu. Here, gals rule the home, marketplace and hawker stalls. I guess the men just eat. The town is ruled by a strict Muslim local government. Our hotel mini-bar was all mini and no bar, and we walked miles to a Chinese café to get a cold beer. The market, a four-storey Art Deco building with an open central courtyard, is Kota Bharu’s coup. Sunlight streams down on the rainbow hues of the veiled women selling fresh produce and iced cakes below. Add in nasi kerabu – local rice flavoured and tinted with blue morning glory flowers, and Kota Bharu bursts with colour.

All that sugar was furring my arteries by the hour. I craved a lightness of touch and taste. A lime’s throw from Thailand, the laidback island of Langkawi has buffalo and rice paddies. Here, flavours are distinctly Malay. It is also home to the Bon Ton Resort and its Australian hostess Narelle Mc-Murtrie. Eight eco-friendly stilted longhouses stand next to the open-air cocktail bar and restaurant.

Hands-on “Cuisine and Culture” lessons can be arranged with Shukri, a local chef. In his custom-built long-house Shukri demonstrates classic dishes such as belacan (spicy shrimp paste) and beef rendang. We picked fresh herbs, milked coconuts, crushed lemongrass and listened to Shukri’s tales of growing up in rural Langkawi. With the island as his kitchen garden, it is no wonder Shukri’s traditional food is tasty and tender. I left full of the insight a wise old uncle imparts to his curious and hungry family flock.

In two weeks and almost 100 meals in Malaysia I scratched only the surface of its lip-smacking opportunities. But one thing is certain – Malaysia and its multicultural buffet is proof that there is no better way to achieve understanding than through the stomach.

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