Malaysian cuisine is real fusion food, with the complexity of Malay cuisine (the mother of Indonesian food) and overlays of Southern Chinese and South Indian flavors, plus a bit of British empire for humor. Add in some Trader Vic décor, and we’ve had such popular spots as the two Penangs, Tiger Lily, and the lamented Pandan Leaf. There’s also a more serious, intense way to do this menu in a restaurant, as we’ve seen at a couple of Chinatown places, and now at Aneka Rasa, which moved into an Allston spot that had hosted several good Chinese and Vietnamese restaurants in the past.

Aneka Rasa has all your favorite taro pots, satay, and spring rolls, and a fair amount of familiar Chinese food with some Thai dishes. But it really shines with Malaysian cuisine, and offers several dishes new to the Boston area. For a familiar appetizer, the Malaysian satay ($6.95) is outstanding. We had the chicken (beef is optional) and got six skewers of juicy meat with a fresh galangal flavor, and meaty, spicy peanut sauce good enough to save for later. The popular roti canai ($3.75) can also be ordered with this peanut sauce, but who can resist the hot curry with a bit of potato and chicken that ordinarily comes with it? Aneka Rasa’s roti (flatbread) is nicely browned and delicious. I also liked the roti teleur ($5.75), which offered the same chicken-curry dip, with sliced strips of a flatbread stuffed with egg and onion. Taro udang ($6.95) is like tempura, with five fried shrimp, but the wrap is a layer of taro, which fries up fuzzy and a little sweet. Its dipping sauce is what Thai restaurants call squid sauce — a sweet sauce with hot pepper flakes.

For cold nights, seafood with seaweed soup ($6.95) serves four to six. The broth gains the most from the seaweed (possibly two or three kinds), although it also picks up some flavor from the chopped squid, scallops, and a few shrimp. There are also straw mushrooms, gelatinous black mushroom, sliced fresh tomato, and a little carrot.

House-special duck spring roll ($17.95) sounds like an appetizer, but it’s actually a Malaysian-ized version of Peking duck. The main losses are that the crispy duck skin isn’t involved, and the pancakes are rice wrappers rather than wheat crêpes. Offsetting that was the fact that our server rolled us six delectable rolls right at the table, well-filled with pulled duck meat, cucumber, and shredded scallions, and flavored with a layer of hoisin sauce.

"Aneka Rasa red-grain rice special" ($9.95) is a spin on fried rice with a lot of scallops as well as the usual egg, onion, peas, and carrots. The red rice is a short-grain unpolished variety that doesn’t show much color when cooked, but it has a nutty aroma and texture. If you order rice as a side dish, the one to have is coconut rice ($1.25/small; $3.95/large), rich in texture with a lively, true-coconut aroma.

For something really unusual, try the buah patai ($8.95), described as "Malaysian jungle green beans (strong flavor) sautéed with shrimp." The choice of sauces are shrimp paste or "sambal sauce." We took the latter, even though "sambal" basically means "sauce," so it was hard to predict. Sambal sauce turns out to be mostly caramelized onions. The jungle beans I’ve never seen before, and couldn’t find even in Malaysian cookbooks. They look like bright, pure-green flattened almonds. The flavor by itself is resinous and somewhat citric, not entirely pleasant, and certainly "strong." But in combination with fried onions, some shrimp, and some rice, it’s very good.

Even more strongly flavored, but less controversial, is lamb rendang casserole ($13.75), an intense Indonesian-style curry with lemongrass and other unusual spices (one tablemate guessed cloves). Whatever it is, it’s good, and perhaps even better with lamb than with the more familiar beef ($12.50).

Blander palates are directed to the yam pots (actually taro) of which we had yam pot chicken ($13.25). The taro shell is like fried mashed potatoes, only with more flavor. The filling includes some white-meat chicken slices, cashews, red and green bell pepper, straw mushrooms, black mushrooms, "regular" sliced mushrooms, carrots, onion, and bits of fried noodle and shredded vegetables — all in a light stir-fry sauce.

Aneka Rasa offers 15 desserts, rather a lot by Asian-restaurant standards. It has familiar things that are quite refreshing after this kind of meal, but I would urge you to try the exotic ones. My favorite was pulut hitam ($3.25), a hot, sweet soup of coconut milk and black sticky rice, which averages to a purple fluid with black flecks. The fried banana roll ($5.50) tastes more like the fried wrapper than the banana filling, but the five pieces are lightly dressed with honey and sesame seeds. Coconut pudding ($6.95) is one of my favorites at Penang, where a whole coconut is stuffed with coconut custard. Here, the same husked coconut meat is stuffed with a rubbery coconut jelly, perhaps made from agar-agar. It’s more refreshing, but less rich and soulful. The exotic-fruit plate ($5.50) is all canned, but provides a large helping of lychees, rambutans (similar but smaller), longans, and pineapple. There are also dessert drinks and bubble tea, as well as Malaysian iced tea and iced coffee (with sweetened condensed milk).

The space is much improved from what used to be a double storefront. Most of the middle wall is now gone, so you have a larger-room feel, and some very large tables with lazy Susans for big groups. The live tanks from previous restaurants are still here, but not overly populated on my visits; whole fish, crabs, and lobsters are the likely future (if temporary) residents. Fewer walls mean less wall art, but these modern prints of Malaysian scenes are very cool and project a kind of universal humanity that goes well with a cuisine that has absorbed diverse influences so successfully. Interestingly, from the wall lamps to the ceiling, the décor is that industrial style that used to be called "high-tech." You know — conduit, galvanized iron braces, bare brick on one wall, exposed ductwork, and even a concrete floor painted to look like large quarry tiles. But the tables are warm pine patterns, and the walls are Tuscan ochre.

Service at Aneka Rasa was excellent on both visits. My lunch server was quick and willing; the dinner waitress went beyond the usual to divide soup, provide bowls for tasting the soupy dessert, and make the duck spring rolls for us. If you are getting a little fatigued with the more commercial Malaysian places, try this one for a renewed interest in this ancient and complex cuisine.

Robert Nadeau can be reached at RobtNadeau@aol.com.