While Cheddie paid a visit to KL about 2 months ago, Cheesie and I went for a seafood dinner to commemorate nothing at all. I’ve decided that Lala Chong be the destination since I’ve heard about the place for the longest time but have yet to give it a try.

it was very packed

Lala Chong looks to be a halal place with many female Muslim working as servers. However, mud crab is served though, so I guess it would be up to individual’s interpretation on the appropriateness to eat here if you embrace Islam.

Anyway, for the two of us we ordered three dishes. A shiong thong 上汤 lala, baked crab, and a spicy paku pakis (fern) to go with some rice. The place was really packed on that Friday night, but luckily food didn’t take too long to arrive.

lala, paku pakis (fern), baked crab, cheesie & cheddie

The shiong thong 上汤 lala was cooked in this herbal soup with some chili padi, it was pretty good but unfortunately the shellfish lacks in size. For a place with the name Lala in it, I think that’s a bit wrong.

However, the baked crab was fantastic. I think only salt, plenty of ginger, and some chili padi were used; but the crab was very fresh, very sweet, and very very juicy. I really liked it. No thick sauce to mask the original taste of crab, and no messy wet fingers to deal with either.

Cheesie’s favorite dish was the paku pakis with canned tuna. I find it very interesting too, the texture of paku pakis is unlike other vegetables, and the taste of tuna, chili, and garlic made it a pretty unique experience. Can’t really have it without rice though.

Lala Chong is just opposite Terminal 3, Subang Airport

If I remember correctly, the dinner costs some RM 70 for the two of us. Pretty reasonable for what we had.

A little boy was really amused with Cheddie that night, as evident from that picture. I think he was asking if he could have her baked.

Address:
Lot PT 6824, Terminal 3,
Abdul Aziz Shah Airport,
47200 Subang, Selangor
GPS: 3.135145, 101.553626
Tel: 03-7859 1906

Tags:  cheddie,  crab,  lala,  paku pakis,  ringo,  seafood,  subang,  tuna

Posted by KY | 43 Comments »

A little while ago I received an invitation from Andrea from Restaurant Coca for a food review session. It was quite a while since the last time I had Coca (for steamboat) and remember the experience to be a rather good one. Anyhow, Suan, FA, Ringo, Tim, and I went to the session on a particular Tuesday night last month and gorged ourselves silly.

the five free loaders at Coca and our juices

Most of you might have been associating Restaurant Coca with their higher end steamboat dinners, while this is still true, our review session was to try on their newer Thai inspired dishes instead.

Most of us ordered juices to start the meal, and I just had to get the pretty curious Roselle drink the moment I saw it on the menu. For the uninitiated, it is a type of Hibiscus (ala our national flower) with the drink that is sweet in a different way. The Roselle tasted fresh and very juicy to the bite too, I love it. Unfortunately Andrea said they imported this particular ingredient from overseas and they aren’t available at the stores.. bummer.

pandan chicken, stuffed prawns, deep fried calamari

Next came three appetizer dishes: pandan chicken, stuffed prawns, and deep fried calamari.

Out of the three items, the stuffed prawns were a bit disappointing, but perhaps maybe it was the presentation. They look so awesome but at the end the taste was just average, a case of visual over hype I suppose. Deep fried calamari was one of Tim’s favorite appetizer, the fresh squid and the taste of batter was a good combination. As for me, I have to go with the pandan chicken, it was probably the best I’ve had, better than the “paper wrapped chicken” at balakong and even the same dish at De Chiengmai. The chicken very succulent and the marinate was just perfect.

seafood tomyam, steamed fish with thai sauce, tofu with scallops, kailan

After the pretty heavy appetizers, we had seven main dishes to go with rice. Steamed siakap with Thai sauce was very good, the sour and salty soup mixes well with the fish and garnish. Fried kailan provided a fresher taste, while the clay pot tofu carried a very strong sweetness from scallops, very nice.

However, I find the seafood tomyam a little too “lemak” (though milk is used in substitute of coconut milk/santan) and didn’t enjoy it much. To me, tomyam should be sour and spicy instead, so I find the experience a little strange. The green chicken curry, though lemak as well, tasted pretty good as that was how it should be.

deep fried mantao and chili crabs, butter prawns

The big ticket items were the butter prawns and chili crab. The buttery batter used is slightly different from usual, with more Thai inspired spices and thus carries a stronger taste that I find very nice. I had extra since Tim, being a noob, doesn’t eat prawns.

The deep fried mantao went really well with the sauce from chili crab dish. As for the crab itself, while not very impressive in size, was fresh and tasted pretty good.

the desserts: mango with glutinous rice, red ruby, sago in coconut milk

As our stomach started to expand like a hot air balloon and already having quite a bit of leftovers due to the impossible amount of food served. Andrea decided that the meal wouldn’t be complete without trying their desserts.

We had red ruby, sago in coconut milk, mango with glutinous rice, and ice kacang. I only tried a few spoonful from each of them. They were quite good, but to be honest, I was already over stuffed to the point of losing my sense of taste.

It was a pretty good dinner, and I do think that most of their Thai dishes were pretty good (especially the pandan chicken). While the price is a little on the high side, Coca offers a very nice ambiance with pretty good quality ingredients.

Address:
Subang Parade,
Subang Jaya, Selangor
GPS: 3.082109,101.585416
Tel: 03-5632 8766

Tags:  chicken,  coca,  crab,  FA,  fish,  ky,  prawn,  ringo,  squid,  suanie,  thai-food,  tim

Posted by KY | 30 Comments »

I went to Yellow Cab Pizza on one of the Friday lunch sessions with the bunch of noobs from Nuffnang a few weeks ago. The second time we went there as a group was also Su Ann’s second last day in Malaysia before heading to the States, so for whatever it’s worth, I dedicate this post to Lim Su Ann (or lil miss Late who just got her first bank account last month, congrats!)

Su Ann and Suet Li posing with the yellow bikes

Yellow Cab Pizza is a relatively new restaurant that actually concentrates more on delivery business than dine in. Seating area in the restaurant is rather small, and to accommodate all of us (Su Ann, Tim, Firdauz, Robb, Suet Li, Barry, Nicholas, Tock) they had to open a whole new section upstairs. We get to be all noisy and rowdy without having to get stared from anyone, best.

wholesome pizzas, slurps slurps

For the bunch of us, I think we ordered 3 x 14″ pizzas. A NY classic, Manhattan Meat Lover, and a Cheese. The place is a bit lacking in choices of drinks, only serving soft drink in cans or mineral water with disposable plastic cup. Then again, they never pretend to have a proper restaurant set up.

The pizzas were really great though, thin crust with very little to spare as far as topping goes. Very wholesome, cheesy, and just plain delicious. We devoured all 3 boxes rather quickly and made the mistake of ordering 3 x 18″ pizzas the second time we were there and ended up having to tapao some back to the office.

we always get to sit at the empty hall upstairs

At Yellow Cab they have 2 categories of pizzas, “classic” goes for around RM 20 for 10″, RM 30-40 for 14″, and RM 47-67 for the huge 18″s (oh wait they have a website and you can even order online: click here). “specialty” goes for a bit more than those. If it sounds a bit more than pizza huts and dominos, it is because they are better, with more toppings and probably uses better ingredients. The lunch costs each of us around RM 14-16 with drinks. Still very worth it I’d say.

yellow cab pizza is actually very close to Nuffnang KL office

Address:
Intersection of Jalan Raja Abdullah
and Jalan Yap Ah Shak,
Kuala Lumpur (next to the Dang Wangi LRT pedestrian bridge)
Kuala Lumpur
GPS: 3.157625, 101.701217
Tel: 03-2694 2003

Tags:  delivery,  nicholas,  nuffnang,  pizza,  robb,  su ann,  suet li,  tim,  yellow cab

Posted by KY | 28 Comments »

On a lazy weekend morning a few weeks ago, I was looking for a lunch buddy and happened to see Lorna coming online over MSN.

“Lunch?”
“Why not?”
“Let me bring you to this Malay chicken rice place”

I said okay with a mixture of apprehension and curiosity, then proceed to get ready and wait for the lady to pick me up. (sexual equality, right? :P)

Lorna sipping her syrup ais

As it turned out, the nasi ayam bakar special (special roasted chicken rice) place is located pretty close to where I stay, at SS5 just next to the big Kelana Jaya Giant. The Malay food court area was not as busy in the afternoon as it is at night, there were only a few tables occupied.

drum stick, rice, soup, satisfying

We ordered two sets of nasi ayam bakar with drum sticks, and another extra drum stick for good measure. To properly Malaysianised the meal, we had iced syrup to drink.

The bbq chicken was rather unique, I could only describe it as a cross between roasted chicken and the chicken tandoori with the sauce that is somewhat similar to paprik style, slightly sweet and a little spicy. The rice was cooked together with other chicken parts (such as neck) and I presume, fats; thus carry a very fragrant smell that goes very well with the meat. It was very unique and certainly delicious. We finished devoured everything to the bones.

If I remember correctly, the chicken rice was less than RM 5 per portion and only available during lunch. The same place also have a big sign board that says “steamboat”, I wonder how Malay steamboat tastes like, maybe another time.

Address:
Jalan SS6/2,
Kelana Jaya, PJ, Selangor
GPS: 3.101791, 101.598172

Tags:  chicken-rice,  lorna,  lunch,  malay-food

Posted by KY | 18 Comments »

Having to make a decision for dinner last weekend before a movie, I was trying to be smart and told Lorna (my petrol heroine) that I am bringing her to a pretty interesting place without first giving her the restaurant’s name. We then walked past Sushi Zanmai, and she told me “my sister and I went to another Zanmai place last week, the one downstairs”

“Pasta Zanmai?” I asked. She said yah. That was exactly the place I thought I’d surprise her with, so you can imagine what an ass it made me feel. Well the important thing is that we still ended up there and I was able to finally give Pasta Zanmai a try.

pretty nice interior with an integrated shop

Pasta Zanmai is actually from the same group that runs RakuZen at Subang Jaya, Chulan Square, as well as the Sushi Zanmai branches. I have always had positive impressions at their establishments, so my expectation was rather high stepping into this place.

It was a rather busy Saturday dinner time, we decided to sit at the bar right in front of the glass shielded kitchen rather than wait for a table. The interior decoration was pretty nice, with ample lighting, comfortable chairs, and a busy pace.

crab meat avocado spaghetti, Japanese curry rice

The menu came accompanied with pictures of most dishes, which makes ordering that much easier. I couldn’t resist the combination of kani (crab) and avocado with pasta, and Lorna ordered the Japanese curry chicken rice. We also asked for ikura (salmon roe) and teriyaki hotate (scallop) as appetizers. A big pitcher of ice fruit tea was shared.

Despite the crowd, food didn’t take long to arrive, and they were good! Ikura was a bit smallish in serving size, but I guess there isn’t much to complain as the quality was good and the price reasonable. My spaghetti was really delicious, good portion of avocado and kani (real crab and not crab sticks) with the slightly salty pasta sauce that wasn’t over powering. The ebiko (flying fish roe) sprinkled on the pasta gave it an added sophistication as well. I really liked it.

ikura, hotate, and the giant ice fruit tea

The curry chicken rice was true to the taste as well, slightly sweet and not exactly spicy. I like the fact that they use real Japanese rice in this dish. As for the teriyaki hotate (scallop), they were so sweet and succulent I was so glad we ordered them.

Total bill came to Rm 100.05 including tax and service charge. Highest priced item was my RM 25 pasta while the other dishes and drinks ranges from RM 12 to RM 22. Give it a try!

Address:
Pasta Zanmai
G210B, Ground Floor Promenade
1 Utama Shopping Centre
Bandar Utama, Petaling Jaya
GPS: 3.150050, 101.615939
Tel: 03-7728 1210

Others:
Masak-masak
Brought up 2 share
blueepinkk

Tags:  1-utama,  dining,  Japanese-Food,  kani,  mall,  pasta,  spaghetti

Posted by KY | 28 Comments »