In an attempt to eat healthy for once, we decided to head to this Korean Porridge place, Bonjuk at Desa Sri Hartamas. I had thought that the parking situation would be pretty shitty on a weekend, it was. After a round of unfruitful hunt, I decided to just pay for it at the commercial car park just a block away for RM 3.00 that was totally worth it.

some seriously healthy food

Like most franchise, Bonjuk does not offer a very wide variety of dishes in their menu. There are, however, over a dozen types of porridge, and an equal amount of Bibimbobs (mixed meal), as well as some Korean pancakes to choose from. The pancakes aside, all the dishes were not fried nor BBQ, so far so healthy.

After scanning the offerings, I decided to go for the mid size seafood combination porridge. Since the porridge is cook to order, it did take a while before I get to start satisfying the stomach, luckily, the wait was worth it.

now you see it, now you don’t

The porridge was cooked with squid, shrimp, mussels, dried oyster, and octopus. It was actually very good, the taste of the seafood mixture blends into the porridge very well, if only some dried scallop were used as well, it would have been perfect. Then again, that ingredient would drive the price up by quite a bit.

Free flow kimchi and a plate of marinated beef came with the dish, a salty and slightly spicy chili paste accompanied the porridge too. The kimchi and beef were pretty good, I had like 4 plates of kimchi as it was just at the right level of rottenness for me. However, I gave a pass to the cold soup, that thing tasted like a mixture of vitagen and vegetable soup served cold, not exactly to my taste.

Bonjuk is just opposite Breakers and Soda

The porridge was an economical RM 14.95, and if I remember correctly, no government nor service charge added. I’ll definitely go there again, and I think you should give it a try too. The young and friendly Korean guy who run the place scored an A+ for customer PR skills as well.

Address:
No. 18, Ground Floor, Jalan 25/70A
Desa Sri Hartamas 50480 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 03-2300 2302

Tags:  banchan,  beef,  dining,  food,  hartamas,  kimchi,  KL,  Korean,  makan,  porridge,  seafood

Posted by KY | 11 Comments »

After the interesting grilled frog at my favorite foreign city, I headed to a Vietnamese seafood restaurant for dinner the following night. At the heart of the city, the Hong Hai (pronounced as 红海, or red sea, in Mandarin) restaurant is not particularly lavish nor it is very eye catching. However, judging by the crowd of locals congregating at this place, it must offer some pretty good and authentic seafood.

fresh fish, shrimps, and various types of clam

The restaurant was quite packed, but luckily we managed to secure a table at the balcony on the second level. My friend made the order as I would have no idea how to go about reading the 100% Vietnamese menu, with no translation nor any pictures. I doubt any of the servers speak English either.

three types of clam, including cockle (blood clam)

The first four dishes that came consists of the various types of clam. The boiled cockles (I think) were very delicious, and goes extremely well with the fried garlic (including skin) and vegetable garnish. The fresh and somewhat bloody cockles with the slightly salty but strong tasting garlic was just perfect. A salt + dried pepper + dried plum + lime dipping sauce accompany the dishes.

We also had a grilled clam and a plum sauce clam dishes. While the grilled clam is best enjoyed with the dipping, the plum sauce actually goes well with some bread. Pretty interesting contrasting taste among these three dishes, the bloody cockles, the dry grilled clam, and the sourish plum sauce clam.

oyster with cheese, and a great tasting hot pot with eel

Next in line were the two huge oyster with cheese. Though this dish isn’t something that is unique to this part of the world, the oyster served were the size of my palm. Needless to say, you can guess if I enjoyed it from the photo above.

Other than all the shell fish dishes, we ordered a hot pot with eel. As with most Vietnamese dishes, the pot came with a huge serving of vegetable consisting spring onion, bean sprout, okra, and interestingly, shredded banana flower, all arranged in a neat and pretty presentation. The soup tasted a little spicy and salty, but compliment the vermicelli noodle and the fresh vegetables. It was a very good dinner.

Pham Ngoc Thach road is located at the heart of Ho Chi Minh City

Hong Hai is located at the heart of the city, not more than US $2 taxi ride away from any major hotels in District 1. The dinner itself was somewhere around RM 50-60, value for money indeed.

Address:
54, Pham Ngoc Thach,
District 1, Ho Chi Minh City
Vietnam
Tel: 8.292977, 0908-103547

Tags:  clam,  cockle,  eel,  grilled,  hcmc,  ho-chi-minh-city,  hot-pot,  seafood,  shell-fish

Posted by KY | 7 Comments »

After driving around PJ not knowing what to have for dinner, we somehow ended up at Sri Hartamas. Since the density of Korean restaurants at this area is probably only second to Ampang, we decided to include Kimchi for dinner.

quiet little place just above 7-11

After scouring around for a parking spot, we finally deposited the vehicle next to the 7-11 convenient store. Since there is a little Korean restaurant situated right above this place, we decided to give it a try instead of going to some of the bigger and more lavished competitors.

Mu Gong He is just like many other Korean restaurants, offering numerous grilled meat dishes but not a whole lot of other stuff that does not use the burner. The interior decoration is simple and actually a little dated. Since it was a weekday evening, the restaurant was rather quiet too.

the soup and side dishes

We ordered 2 soups, a Kimchi jjigae (Kimchi soup), and a Hae Mul Soon Dubu (Seafood tofu soup). The two soups (more like stew) came with banchan (side dishes) that is typical of Korean food. Two metal bowls of steamed rice were served too.

The two stews were surprisingly good, the Kimchi stew very strong in taste and packed with quite a lot of kimchi, as well as meat, tofu, and other ingredients. The kimchi served here were more fermented and thus more flavorful. Just the way I like it. The seafood soup though, was even better, generous amount of shellfish, squid, and prawn gives the soup a good base. The tofu used was very smooth and tasted awesome soaking in the spicy soup. There was even a half boiled egg, just perfect.

situated in Sri Hartamas, pretty easy to find

It was a very satisfying meal, 10 different dishes with rice. The banchan comes free and the soups each cost RM 15. Including tax, the two of us only needed to shell out RM 16.50 for a very satisfying meal. This place is a little underrated, but I would happily go there again.

Address:
Jalan 23/70A
Sri Hartamas
(above 7-11)

Tags:  banchan,  cuisine,  Eats,  Hae-Mul-Soon,  hartamas,  kimchi,  korean-food,  ky,  Mu-Gong-He,  seafood

Posted by KY | 10 Comments »

Itchy for steamboat again, the gang and I decided to try the “original” pulau ketam steamboat at SS15, Subang Jaya. The name of the restaurant is Bee Ho (美好海鲜火锅之家). This is of course, the same style as offered at the Patrick Teoh’s Damansara Village steamboat.

the chili paste is awesome!

Unlike the grand set up at uncle Teoh’s outlet, Bee Ho is just a big old school kopitiam. Meaning the tables near the sidewalk are much preferred as those situated deeper in the restaurant can be a little hot and humid with all the steamboat boiling on every table.

the steamboat, the crab meehun, and the two noobs.

For the 8 of us, we ordered 5 portion of standard steamboat meal, a plate of fish fillet (actually wanted to have the fish cubes but they ran out), string mushroom, extra meat roll, dumplings, and a big plate of absolutely must-order crab meehun.

The joy of having steamboat with plenty of people is that you have more choices ordering the side orders and not have to only settle for the standard steamboat meal.

the sloppy diner!

We boiled the soup with plenty of ingredients at least 4-5 times over. The ingredients were fresh and pretty good, the soup with good herbal taste, and the chili paste was really awesome. I think I had at least 3 small plates of those spicy stuff. Above all, the crab meehun was really something special, the aroma of crab soaked into the meehun, making it tastes unique of the crustacean’s sweetness, this is something that everyone MUST TRY at Bee Ho.

Bee Ho steamboat is at SS15, near the college areas.

The dinner only came to RM 17.50 per person that night. We had Chinese tea as drinks.

Address:
Bee Ho Steamboat Restaurant
no. 52 Ground Floor,
Jalan SS15/4C
Subang Jaya 47500
Selangor
Tel: 012-250 7717

Tags:  crab,  hot-pot,  prawn,  pulau-ketam,  seafood,  ss15,  Steamboat,  subang-jaya

Posted by KY | 6 Comments »

It was at the beginning, a plan to head to the famous Pantai Seafood at Kayu Ara. However, when we got there the whole place was all booked up, Kelvin the food expert then suggested that we go to this fairly unknown Restaurant City Star instead. Trusting the guy and his taste, especially after we went for the Kampung Atap curry fish head lunch, we agreed right away.

the gwai lou loves his food

Comprising of two standard shop houses, the restaurant isn’t exactly very impressive on its size nor its interior decoration. Just a basic and clean setting with half the restaurant air-conditioned (non-smoking area). One thing I like about City Sun Star though, is the way they attach pictures on most of their menu item, giving the patrons an easier time ordering from the extensive selection of dishes. But since Kelvin was with us, we let the expert do the job.

crab, prawn, fish, vege - we got it all covered

For the seven of us, we ordered 5 dishes. Crab fried with salted egg (咸蛋蟹), Thai style “mar yau” fish (马友泰式), Marmite prawn, tofu, and “four in a kind” vege (四大天王).

The selection was spot on, the crab was really good, firm and meaty, obviously very fresh. I found myself unable to stop licking the salted egg yolk off the shells. The Marmite prawn came de-shelled except the tail, but since it was deep fried, we just chew and ate the whole thing. The tail became crispy and actually tasted very nice, providing a contrasting texture.

tofu was pretty good, we cleared all the plates eventually

The Thai style fish was deep fried with Thai sauce and lotsa garnish, reminding me of the Thai style chicken I had at PJ Old Town. I also especially like the combination in the vege dish, there were long bean, okra, petai, and kacang botol (winged bean), fried with sambal and some onion. Last but not least, the tofu did not dissapoint either.

this is how you get to City Star at Taman Bukit Mayang Emas

The bill came to RM 177.14, with the biggest item being the 3 big crab costing RM 70 and the other dishes and drinks making up the rest. It was defintately worth it, for only about RM 25 per person to have such quality and well prepared food.

Address:
No 8-10, Jalan BM1/2,
Taman Bukit Mayang Emas,
47301 PJ, Selangor
Tel: 03-7806-2168

Tags:  city-star,  crab,  petaing-jaya,  seafood,  shrimp

Posted by KY | 12 Comments »