When the dragon OBC lady was still staying at BU, we used to go to Centrepoint quite often. Yes, we often caved into her insistence, arguing with suanie is often an exercise in futility.

Which led to this blog covering disproportionately high number of entries on restaurants in this little shopping mall. Bernards, Champs, Cagayan, Jade Garden, Momo (changed name/owner), and Shanghai 1930 (closed).

the Straits Cafe at BU Centrepoint

I had no idea when the Straits Cafe first appeared at Centrepoint, it has the look of one of those restaurants that I usually wouldn’t stepped in to try until being suggested, in this case, by Jaclyn, who has been quite a regular customer.

Tucked at the inside of Centrepoint, most tables are al fresco. No air conditioning, but there are quite a few big fans blowing about. The menu is filled with a mixture of local and Thai delights – char kueh teow, phat thai, various types of fried rice, mee goreng, even steamed siakap and daging masak merah. Quite a variety.

Char Kueh Teow, Prawn Mee, Crab Meat fried rice, Mee Siam

I had the prawn mee (RM 8.90) on my first visit with #porkgang, and char kueh teow (RM 8.90) on my second visit with Val (who was passing the Corica Apple Strudel from Perth). While both dishes weren’t the best that I’ve had, they did not disappoint at all, and probably one of the better halal version of these dishes I’ve had from anywhere.

Others were happy with mee siam (RM 7.90) that looked a bit uninspiring, and the crab mee fried rice (RM 8.90) Val ordered was actually quite tasty too, despite not seeing much crab meat in it. But it’s less than RM 10 per plate anyway, and crab meat’s expensive.

Lorbak, Ais Kacang, and Roselle drink

I didn’t particularly like the chicken lorbak (RM 7.90) which was a bit too dry for my taste, I still believe this is one of those items without a good substitute for good old fashion pork meat in it. Their fried chicken wings (RM 6.90) though, was very tasty!

The Straits Cafe offers quite a few choices for desserts, ais kacang (RM 5.00) wasn’t disappointing, and there were also penang rojak, cendol, logan jelly, and even Thai steamed tapioca. My personal favorite drinks at the place would be the Roselle ice, I last had it years ago during a food review at Coca restaurant and never seen it on any menu since. It’s a pretty special drink, try it when you have the chance.

Kim, Gareth, KY, Jac, Eric, Horng, Suanie, and Val (separate visit)

While not exactly the best food you can find, the Straits Cafe does offer pretty decent food at a price that is acceptable for the type of place it is. This would be one of the places I should keep in mind especially when bringing Muslim friends for food.

Address:
The Straits Cafe
Centrepoint,
Jalan Leboh Bandar Utama,
47800 Petaling Jaya
Selangor
GPS: 3.137988, 101.610124

Xpax Advert:

One of the offers Xpax Blackberry users enjoy is the on going Xpax Big Freekin’ Sale promotion that runs until the end of this month is the Free Blackberry Access.

The mechanic is very simple, as long as you subscribe to BB 250 for weekdays, you get the weekends free! That works out to be RM 2.50 x 5, or RM 12.50 per week, which is only about RM 60 per month for the prepaid Blackberry Access. A pretty good deal for the best network coverage, I’d say.

Tags:  BU,  centrepoint,  ckt,  eric,  gareth,  horng,  jaclyn,  kimberly,  prawn-mee,  suanie,  val,  valentina

Posted by KY | 13 Comments »

Almost 4 years ago, I went to Tokyo as a stranger in strange land. The city was so packed with people it felt like rush hour at LRT station at all times. The language was incomprehensible, fashion was weird, everyone was so courteous and everything was uber orderly.

I arrived there at late March partly to coincide with the Hanami season (viewing of cherry blossom, or sakura). A friend had to reserved a spot at Ueno park from a night before just so that we get to picnic under the trees at the most famous hanami spot in Tokyo. We had loads of fun (despite my inability to communicate with most of them), it was an experience.

iketeru Japanese restaurant at KL Hilton

With that experience, I knew exactly what Hanami meant when Jean of KL Hilton contacted me for a food review at Iketeru for their Hanami Bento promotion. As to what would be in the bento, I had absolutely no idea.

I’ve heard good things about Iketeru, but this was the first time I went to this Japanese restaurant located on the 8th floor at Hilton. As you would expect from a 5-star hotel, the restaurant is beautifully decorated and has a very nice ambiance.

shrimp, octopus, and tempura, sea bream & tuna sashimi

Anyway, lets get on with the Bento.

There were nine dishes in all on the rather big bento box. As a rule of thumb, you should always start with dishes that are more subtle before moving to the stronger tasting ones. This applies to all sorts of cuisine and not just Japanese food.

The Tai (sea bream) and Toro (tuna belly) sashimi were of the finest quality and served with grated wasabi. That opened up my appetite pretty good.

The shrimp, green bean, egg custard, and octopus were very delicious too, but that little bowl of marinated something next to the shrimp (I couldn’t quite remember, a type of seafood it must be) was a bit too strong tasting for me, I’ll place that in the “too authentic” category. The small portion of tempura were just nice, and includes one of my favorite items, the Japanese pepper.

spring chirashi sushi, chilled sesame bean curd, teriyaki trout

The chilled sesame bean curd with bonito soya sauce tastes as exquisite as the way it was presented, and I love the little bowl of simmered bamboo shoot, eggplant, and especially the Japanese yam too.

The only grilled item on the bento was the teriyaki trout, and while trout isn’t exactly my favorite fish for grilling (I love salmon belly), this was rather good too.

Spring Chirashi Sushi serves as the main dish. I could taste plenty of tuna, ikura (salmon roe), amaebi (sweet shrimp), and even mushroom and a bit of vegetable in it. Very good combination.

nanohana blossom (vege), soup with bamboo shoot, mochi & fruits

The unsuspecting plate of vegetable is actually boiled nanohana blossom with mustard sauce. Nanohana has the unfortunate name in English as “Rape”, it tasted similar to “kai lan flower” but smoother and more refined.

Instead miso, we had clear soup with bamboo shoot and seaweed, subtle tasting, but a very good way to cleanse the palate before moving on to the final item, dessert, which consists of  mochi with red beans that tasted as good as it was presented, and some fruits.

KY & chef Ricky Kamishi, Li Zhi & Jean from Hilton

Chef Ricky Kamishi joined us for a while and told us about the idea behind this Hanami Bento. I shouldn’t bore you with the whole experiencing “four season” through food and philosophies like that, but the guy is cool, and with a sense of humor too.

The bento is available all throughout March this year as some of the ingredients are seasonal. Priced at RM 220++ per box, it might come across as a bit steep for the common salary earner, but that is pretty much average for something of this quality and setting.

KL Hilton is located right next to KL Sentral

These shots were taken with my aging and pretty bulky SLR, Olympus just launched their latest micro four third camera – the Olympus PEN E-PL1 which combined the portability of a compact and prowess of an SLR. I’m gonna be getting one for review, but in the mean time, check out their microsite at evolvewitholympus.com.my

Address:
Iketeru Japanese Restaurant
8th floor, 3 Jalan Stesen Sentral,
50470 Kuala Lumpur
GPS: 3.135631, 101.656476
Tel: 03-2264 2264

Tags:  bento,  hilton,  hotel,  Japanese-Food,  li zhi,  sashimi,  tempura

Posted by KY | 19 Comments »

A couple weeks ago I received an email from one of my readers by the name of Von who asked if I could do a review on Seeri Authentic Thai Restaurant.

Her exact wordings include:

“I found the green curry at that place just excellent, and hope that place won’t close shop as not many people know about it. It will be a waste to let such good food close shop.”

The email came across to me as pretty honest, so last week I suggested to some #porkgang jokers that we should give it a try, and we did just that.

Seeri Authentic Thai Restaurant, so authentic it’s in the name :S

Seeri Authentic Thai Restaurant is located on the same row as Kayu (which serves pretty good roti tissue) at the slightly less glamorous side of SS2, the Chow Yang area. Parking is usually not a terribly difficult exercise in this area.

When we arrived, there were only a couple other tables occupied. It was pretty quiet, but I wasn’t deterred. With it’s rather bland interior decoration and cheap plastic chairs, it’s not hard to imagine the lack of attraction to potential uninformed customers.

seafood tomyam, fried kai lan with mushroom, green curry with chicken

For the 8 of us, we ordered up quite a feast. Seafood tomyam and the recommended green curry were a no brainer, we also had vegetable, steamed fish, egg, squid, and pandan chicken.

Seafood tomyam (RM 30) came in an old school steamboat and actually turned out quite good, we didn’t order it very spicy (due to several low tolerance member) but it still had a zing, and ingredients were plenty full too. The recommended green curry chicken (RM 15) did not disappoint at all either, the curry was very rich with santan and yet super flavorful.

Fried kailan with mushroom (RM 12) was just to satisfy vitamin C quota. Nothing too exciting there.

steamed siakap fish, fried egg with crab meat, Thai style squid, pandan chicken

The steamed siakap (RM 30) we ordered was prepared the traditional Thai style. Last I had this was at De Chiengmai at Sungai Buloh, and while the soup based here was very delicious, I find that the fish wasn’t very fresh nor was it prepared properly. Perhaps I am spoiled by super fresh “live” fish at Chinese restaurants, but I do expect this situation to improve if business turns brisk.

Fried egg with crab meat (RM 14) was very delicious even though we could taste little crab meat. The squid (RM 12) too was very rich in flavor with plenty of basil, chili, and even whole pepper; I could be happier if they removed the eyes and beaks off the squid’s head though.

Kim, Cheesie, Jac, Eric, Suan, Kerol, and 4-eye KY

Last but not least, we also had the pandan chicken (RM 30, 10 pieces). They were rather fragrant and pretty tasty, but we had too much food, and the portion was a bit too big. If you were ordering this, better specify the exact amount you need.

With rice, plenty of cold fresh coconut (RM 4.5), and other drinks, dinner came to RM 197 or about RM 25 per pax, pretty decent for what we ordered. I’m sure Seeri Authentic Thai Restaurant is a place worth revisiting. *burp*

Seeri Authentic Thai Restaurant is located the same row as KAYU

Address:
Seeri Authentic Thai Restaurant
No.26 Jalan SS2/10,
Petaling Jaya, Selangor
GPS: 3.115587,101.616926
Tel: 03-7877 7659, 012-378 9618

kailan – 12, egg 14, squid 12, pandan chicken 20, tomyam 30, fish 30, coconut 4.5, logan 3, chinese tea 1. total 197

Tags:  cheesie,  eric,  fish,  green curry,  jaclyn,  kerol,  kimberly,  spicy,  SS2 SS3 SS4,  suanie,  thai,  tomyam

Posted by KY | 30 Comments »

I didn’t know I was going on my 3rd diving trip this 2-6 February until about a month ago.

It was Irene who mentioned that she’s going to Mabul/Sipadan with her sisters and 2 other guys, since she sounds like a crazy person who is fun to hang out with, I decided to tag along despite not having met anyone face to face prior to this trip, Irene including.

rather refreshing to be flying a non-budget airline for once

So I logged into both AirAsia and MAS for flights to Tawau and decided to take the non-budget route since the price difference was not more than 10% in this case.

RM 434 paid for the return fare, including 20kg luggage allowance, pretty delicious meal (the nasi lemak is just as good as those served on Air Asia, and comes with Ferrero Roche too).

Tawau to Semporna, at Dragon Inn

When I reached Tawau at 11+ in the morning, Irene, Lynn, Jen, Chan, and Gun had already been waiting there for some three hours after flying from KK. We chartered a van (RM 250 both ways) to our destination for the day – Semporna.

The 90+ km journey from Tawau (nearest airport) to Semporna took just over an hour. Instead of lush pristine Borneo jungle that I had envisioned, it we were greeted with rows upon rows of palm trees with the occasional village houses instead. Not a whole lot of visual treatment going on.

Semporna, at the lion’s lower jaw

Semporna is often the stopover town for divers and travelers alike heading to Mabul/Sipadan islands. Located at the southeastern corner of Sabah (the lion’s lower jaw), Semporna has a population just over 100k, with a rather tiny town center that isn’t even as big as SS2 in PJ. You could walk the whole downtown area in 15 minutes or so.

the view from Dragon Inn Floating Resort

We checked into Dragon Inn Floating Resort to spend the night. Since there were 6 of us, we chose the dormitory style accommodation for the night to give everyone a chance to chill together. At RM 20 per person per night it was really cheap, but unfortunately the lack of air conditioning proved to be a major problem not for being too warm, but for having too many mosquitos making a feast of us.

Speaking of mosquitos, here’s quiz from Lynn (answer at the bottom of the page): What’s the difference between a mosquito and a fly?

Umai – a traditional Sarawakian delight

Irene brought a packet of Umai all the way from Kuching for me (thank you very much!).

Umai is a traditional Sawarakian food that is best described as a sort of raw fish salad. A packet of raw fish (white fish) that is pre-marinated with lime juice and onion that is served by mixing with red chili, fresh lime juice, and probably some salt and pepper.

Give it a few tosses ala yee sang style and you’re ready to roll. It was actually quite refreshing, kinda like the cross of Japanese salad and Chinese yee sang but with a heavy lime juice taste and a hint of spiciness. I liked it and would try a fresh version when I find myself at Sarawak next time.

dinner at the restaurant by the bridge

For dinner, we took a short walk from the resort and settled upon the little restaurant by the bridge that connects town center and the resort. The vegetable was okay, spicy squid rather tasty, and the venison somewhat tough and forgettable.

We sat under the sky with a gentle breeze brushing our hair, waiting for the next day’s diving excursion at Mabul and couldn’t care less if dinner wasn’t exactly impressive. It was less than RM10 per pax anyway.

Next up – Mabul island.

Answer to Lynn’s quiz: A mosquito can fly but a fly cannot mosquito!

Tags:  irene,  sabah,  semporna,  Travel,  umai

Posted by KY | 33 Comments »

Over the weekends I went to Kuantan for a short trip with Sheryl. We didn’t have any concrete plan, and it was basically just an opportunity to spend some time and catch up after she’d come back from her post graduate studies in Europe. After all, it was some 7 years since we were last living together in the States.

Pak Su seafood restaurant, with the best al fresco dining experience

After spending better part of the afternoon chilling at Cherating beach sipping coconut juice, we decided to check out Pak Su seafood restaurant by the beach. It was partly due to convenience as Pak Su is located rather close to where we were staying.

While this is a Chinese restaurant, it is also halal, and there were quite a number of Muslim patrons and workers alike at the premise.

We took a table at the al fresco dining area by the beach. The scenery was incredible, full moon, strong waves, and the rather powerful sea breeze makes up for one of the best seafood dinner ambiance I’ve experienced.

fresh Canadian oysters, vegetable, butter prawn

For the two of us, we ordered a pair of fresh Canadian oysters (RM 8 each) to start. They were huge, juicy and absolutely delicious, the other other place with comparable oyster would be Kensington at Seremban.

Butter prawn (RM 20) was another commendable dish, it was cooked in the “wet” style (there’s also the other butter prawn preparation you might have had from Chinese wedding dinners, this is not the same method). The prawns were huge, fresh, and rather delicious.

To fulfill the illusion of having a complete meal, we ordered a plate of vegetable (豆苗 RM7) too. It was however, a bit too old and not something I’d recommend.

stuffed crab and steamed siakap

The one famous seafood dish everyone must try when at East-Coast is the stuffed crab. Pretty much every seafood restaurants from Kuantan to Kemaman will have this particular dish on the menu.

We ordered two stuffed crab from Pak Su (RM 6 each). It was basically a crab shell stuffed with plenty of crab meat and god knows what else, but it was quite tasty! I would order more than one next time, it was like having the best of crabs without having to deal with the whole peeling off crab shell nonsense.

The steamed siakap (RM 18) we had was forgettable. The fish steak as per recommended by our server was way too tough it felt like we were chewing on cardboard. There are quite a lot of other live fish to choose from though, so perhaps other choices would be better than what we ordered.

KY, the awesome view, and Sheryl

The service at Pak Su follows the life style of east-coast Malaysia quite a bit too much, it was horrendously slow. While it didn’t take too long for us to get our food after ordering, getting the attention of servers to start the prepare our table/ordering/paying/getting change took way too long.

Our dinner was RM 84 in total, including 5% government tax, pretty reasonable price that is comparable to KL standard.

As for the food, there were dishes that was rather good (oyster, stuffed crab, butter prawn), and some were pretty lousy (vegetable, fish). However, I do feel that this place is worth visiting even if just for the ambiance. You really have to be there to appreciate it.

Address:
Pak Su Seafood Restaurant
No.4/1417, Batu 6, Lot 922, Kg.Bahagia Beserah,
26100 Kuantan , Pahang Darul Makmur.
GPS: 3.87582, 103.36636
Tel: 09-544 8025
URL: paksu-seafood.com.my

Tags:  crab,  kuantan,  oyster,  prawn,  seafood,  sheryl

Posted by KY | 26 Comments »