Immediately visions of thick fluffy french toast and poached eggs came to mind. I’m a huge huge fan of western breakfast. Give me toast, eggs, sausages and muesli anytime. Other than the occasional nasi lemak & dim sum, my immediate preference for breakfast is Continental or American.

It was while I was pondering where to head to for a good American fry-up did flashbacks of my indulgent Ipoh trip came into mind.
Oh, I love Indulgence Restaurant and Living. I love my Qatrynka suite and I love my wonderful breakfast the day after.
Let me share with you the breakfast that awaits me when I woke up from my slumber on the four-poster bed.

Every Breakfast set comes with a choice of coffee/tea or fresh juice. Served from 9am onwards until 12pm, breakfast is not available on Mondays/Tuesdays as Indulgence Restaurant is closed on those days. However, but the restaurant remains opened for hotel guests.

There’s a plethora of items to choose from the menu, but mine was as predictably as carbo-licious as possible.

Here’s Andrew’s morning pick-me up – Julie’s signature Hibiscus Latte, with my pancakes in the background. Julie has been incorporating hibiscus into her menu and cooking recently, as she has partnered up with another friend who has a hibiscus farm in Malaysia.

This Hibiscus Latte was a tad sweet, but what it does is it perfumed the latte with its floral scent and gave the coffee an overall pleasant floral sweetness. It might have been more suitable for me, since I like my coffee sweet. Andrew could barely finish it.
My healthy choice of beverage for breakfast is a Strawberry Milkshake. And Indulgence Restaurant serves a very mean, luscious and thick one too.

Oops, not so healthy after all? Nahh.. it still is I’m sure.
There’s protein from the milk and vitamins from the strawberries right? 

My pancakes takes 20 minutes to serve, but not to worry, it was already informed beforehand on the menu.

These pancakes were definitely worth the wait. It was incredibly fluffy and light, thanks to use of purely only egg whites in the recipe. I’m not sure it should rightfully be named pancakes either, as it’s more of an egg souffle. I love bananas with pancakes and this was even better as they came drizzled in caramel.

Andrew’s choice of breakfast actually topped mine! We both loved this dish. I wished I can remember the ingredients in it, but vaguely I could recall eggs & spinach. The sardines (not the Ayam brand ones, mind you!) were hardly fishy, something which I didn’t like about sardines. These gourmet ones were flaky, meaty and plain delicious.

If I could make such wonderful breakfast each weekend, I would!

Good news is, I’m moving to a new place next month! It has a big kitchen and I’m thrilled knowing that I could bake, whip up American brekkie and slowly doubleboil nourishing soups each week from Feb onwards! 

Time to put my Ikea Malaysia Ambassadorship Card into good use too! I have been at lost as to what I should buy the last few months as I have almost everything I need at my current place.

Well, the new kitchen would need new kitchen utensils so it’s Ikea shopping time!

By the way, I’m thinking of attempting caneles with my new oven. Anyone one of you here like Caneles?

Website: Indulgence Restaurant and Living, Ipoh

GPS:  N04° 35′ 37.50″, E101° 4’37.48″

14, Jalan Raja Dihilir
30350 Ipoh Perak.

All pictures taken with:

That’s cos I’m a pork burger addict and I was having a major craving for pork burgers for ages, which has to be appeased pronto before I start PMS-ing on those around me. 

It was also thankfully one of the restaurants around that didn’t feel there was a need to play annoying festival Chinese New Year songs during this festive season, sparing me the agony of endless looping of CNY songs in my head.

The restaurant is bathed in incandescent light, perfectly suited for its intended ambiance of casual dining and drinking environment. Divided into 3 main sections; there’s an al fresco dining section outside, a bar and an indoor dining area.

There was a quite a selections of beers, perfect to go with a rack of ribs; but I’m not a beer person so it was strictly food for me that day.

We started with 2 pork burgers, of which we eventally realized to be a BIG mistake, as both essentially tasted the same though the menu’s description was deceivingly different!

Blackened Cheese & Onions Burger
Grilled with blackened seasoning and topped with cheddar cheese and sautéed onions. Leon ordered this as he wanted to try the “blackened seasoning” or “black cheese” as we were lead to believe by the fancy name.

What we got was fundamentally a cheeseburger. No black cheese or blackened cheese. As you can see from the above, my cheese was as snowy pale as it could possibly be.

If it could be of any consolation, there was a subtantial amount of black pepper in the patty. However, the seasoning barely made any difference in terms of taste, as the pepper flavour was mild. While I liked the sweet sauteed onions, Leon didn’t think it was worth a mention at all.

Here is our next burger; the Smokehouse Bacon Cheeseburger. Obviously we ordered this for the bacon and for the BBQ sauce.

The description says “Glazed with Hickory BBQ sauce, cheddar cheese, sautéed onions and crispy pork bacon.”

But in the end, both patties were similar, and the only differentiating factor was the condiments that came with it.

The cheeses were the usual parmesan and cheddar, flat in taste and flavour. The BBQ burger is a BBQ burger just because it has added generic tasting BBQ sauce. Some slices of tomatoes and a few leaves of lettuce with the same sauteed onions topped off both burgers.

To conclude our experience, we didn’t enjoy our pork burgers. Obviously Leon would never step into Morganfields again, but I might still hop in for the ribs, if a pork ribs craving ever strikes. After all, a foodie has to sample other offerings on the menu at the same establishment before passing concrete judgement.
So who’s up for the pork ribs?

Morganfields

Level 4, Pavilion KL
+603 2141 3192.
Opens daily from 11am – 1am.

All pictures taken with:

I have been to RAW coffee twice prior to this visit and I loved the place.
Oh, I haven’t blogged about it; simply because like all my other blogposts, it’s been sitting in drafts for like ….forever.. yes, cos I’ve been busy, REALLY BUSY.

But when an email came from Michael, (and it was a very adroit and articulately worded one too), I made exception to my “stay-home easy Sunday” policy to drive into the heart of KL; curious to meet the man behind the cafe/email, as well as to deepen my knowledge about coffee.

Upon arrival at RAW Coffee, we were asked if there was anything that we’d like to have, which we did order some sandwiches and soya milk (having coffee right before a coffee workshop is asking for caffeine OD, literally) since I haven’t had breakfast. Also, I had the sandwiches here before and I liked how they prepare it, healthy & fresh ingredients in wholemeal-based bread.

My order: Pumpkin Hummus and Veg Sandwich.

I love it! Especially so for the smooth pumpkin mash, which was naturally sweet and freshly made.

Frankly speaking, I can’t take much coffee, which is a pity as I’m a huge coffee fan. My gastritis is not getting any better, and I’m on medication most of the time. Hence, my partner in crime, coffee lover and connoiseur Kevin was here to save the day.

Kevin’s breakfast: 3 cheeses sandwich. This was lip-smacking good as well. Wholesome (albeit a bit fatty) and flavourful due to the mix of 3 different REAL cheese (not the processed slice ones!), toasted til the cheeses were all melted.

As we’re about to eat, Michael started his presentation but luckily we’re allowed to go on tucking into our sandwiches. The workshop will be conducted in a backwards fashion, starting with taste then going into preparation, roasting and finally the green beans to help us understand more on what goes into a good cup of coffee.

Our classroom. Yes this was in Wisma Equity on Jalan Ampang, just opposite KLCC.

In order to make a good cup of coffee, one needs to be very methodical as the whole process is akin to dominoes, where a fault in one of the stages will affect the rest. Any improvement initiative should only take place at one factor at a time.
Good beans grown in ideal conditions which are harvested and processed properly, will taste great if roasted and prepared properly.

Starting with taste, the main terms used in the cupping (tasting) are as follows:
Gustation – taste perceived on the tongue. Bitter, sour, sweet, salty, umami
Olfaction – nasal (breathe in) and retro-nasal (breathe out) – the smell processed by the brain differs when we breathe in and out.
Mouthfeel- – physical sensation in the mouth, helps to detect the oils and dissolved solids. Generally perceived in the whole mouth and around the tongue.

As explained by Michael, there are generally a few taste that are perceived when drinking coffee, which are bitter, sweet and sour. A good cup of coffee should have a combination of these three tastes.

However, the taste perceived on the tongue of each person may differ as to which part of the tongue is more sensitive to tastes. To explore which part of the tongue detects the taste more, a small experiment was conducted involving sweet, sour, bitter and salty solutions, which are prepared in 2 concentrations accordingly.

Me: Taste test…

After the taste test, we moved on to the preparation part. Here at RAW Coffee, the espresso is prepared using a Kees van der Westen machine, the “Rolls Royce” of coffee machines available in the market.

As with all method of coffee preparation, the coffee beans should be grounded right before extraction as the aroma of the coffee will escape soon after.

For espresso, the ground coffee needs to be tamped to have an even bed so that it can withstand the water pressure from the machine during extraction. According to Michael, best method is straight down and straight back up in a single motion.

Once done, it is now ready for extraction. At RAW Coffee, they pre-infuse the coffee before the actual extraction. For the first round, Michael divided the extraction into 6 stages, which the shots are halted at certain time intervals to show the flavours extracted from the coffee.

Stage 1: Thick and very sour tasting
Stage 2: Less thick but still sour tasting
Stage 3: Slightly sour with a natural sweetness
Stage 4: Sweet with a hint of bitterness, faint sourness still tasted
Stage 5: Bittersweet
Stage 6: Mostly bitterness, happens when the coffee is overextracted. (Taste like a coffee prepared by press which was left to infuse way too long)

When it comes to espresso drinks, by general preference it is served with some steamed milk, of which there are a few stages to it.

Firstly, heat up and froth the milk to create micro bubbles followed by swirling to refine the texture.

Once done, pour the milk into the espresso and increasing the pour rate after the cup is ⅔ full is so that the thick foam on top will flow down which helps to create the latte art.

Slurpilicious cappucino!

Now for the roasting process. The coffee beans at RAW Coffee are roasted using this machine.

When it comes to roasting the beans, there are 3 forms of heat that need to be taken into consideration, which are:
Contact: Heating by direct contact with the drum
Convection: Heating from the hot air circulating inside the machine
Radiation: Indirect heating from the hot machine parts

Below: Raw coffee beans inside the machine. Yes, they are green in colour!

When asked on the roasting darkness of the beans, Michael’s reply was rather than focusing on the colour of the roast, it is better to ensure even roasting of the beans, so that the roast is even inside out.

Watch the expert…

She keeps her fingers on the controls …

At RAW Coffee, the roasting is adjusted accordingly to the bean and preparation method, i.e. the beans for espresso and filter coffee are roasted differently.

However, it is preferable that the beans are not roasted to the point where the oils rise to the surface as it will become rancid on exposure to air, not to mention loss of flavour from the beans due to the excessive caramelization.

Below: She also picks up any inferior beans, the cracked, dried out ones etc..

After the lesson on roasting, Michael showed us the storeroom where the coffee beans are kept at 18 deg C.

As RAW Coffee purchase their beans direct from the estates, the beans arrive in their original shipment packaging. For the beans that are packed in hessian bags (or gunny sacks), the beans are stored in airtight containers until roasting. Some estates do vacuum pack their beans as to preserve their freshness. Based on his experience, the best coffee Michael had was roasted right after drying.

And at RAW Coffee, the roasted beans are vacuumed packed right after roasting to extend their freshness and to allow resting as coffee beans emit carbon dioxide gas after roasting. Also, this resting period allows the flavour to develop as well.

In accordance to the workshop programme, Michael takes us back further to the cultivation, harvest and processing of the coffee beans. Then as another step in appreciating high quality coffee, there was a short session on grading the beans.

2 350g samples of coffee beans were allocated, with one being a high quality one and the other one being a sample which Michael himself declined to roast after taking a look.

Good coffee beans.

Bad coffee beans.

Grading of the coffee was done according to the Speciality Coffee Association of America’s Arabica Green Coffee Defect Handbook, which indicates the types of defects of the beans ranging from minor to major defects.

While this pretty much sums up the workshop, Michael took another step in indulging Kevin with some African bean prepared using the Aeropress.

Here, about 16gm of Yirgacheffe beans (from Ethiopia) are ground up and placed into a preheated Aeropress, which looks like an oversized syringe plunger.

Then about 170gm of hot water is poured into the press, the water is about 90deg C, and the coffee is allowed to steep for about 30 seconds then pressed into a glass.

Tasting notes: Notable acidity with balance of sweetness and bitterness, somehow expected of African beans. According to Michael, another few seconds would have allowed more flavour to be extracted.

Another highlight at the end of the workshop was the affogato made with rooibos espresso and mango sherbet.

The rooibos tea by itself has the complex balance of sweet bitter earthiness, which combined with the sweet-sour of the mango sherbet creates a whole new sensation for a dessert. One has to try this to believe it.

But if you insist on your affogato with ice cream, RAW Coffee offers New Zealand Natural ice creams.

If you do drop in at RAW Coffee, there’s wholesome and healthy cereals, sandwiches (as you have seen above), cakes and pastries to pair with your cuppa.

Rest assured that your coffee are expertly prepared by trained baristas.

WIFI is speedy and reliable. Chairs and environment are comfy and spacious.

Your cuppa won’t cost you a bomb.

There’s really any reason why you are not dropping in for a cuppa at RAW Coffee.

So, if you’re seeking a good cup of coffee, don’t say I didn’t tell you where you can get a good one! 

RAW Coffee
Wisma Equity opposite KLCC.

Note: Michael has opened another one named Artisan Coffee, right besides Maybank at TTDI (on the same row as Sid’s, Tom, Dick & Harry) so PJ folks rejoice! There’s where you can get your coffee fix!

Naza World is having a Chinese New Year celebration this Saturday and everyone’s invited! 

Yup, it’s THIS COMING SATURDAY at 1pm! Refreshments will be served so who’s joining me? 

Venue: Naza Auto Mall, PJ
Date: 4^th February 2012
Time: 1pm

There’ll be Lion Dance performance, by 2010 & 2011 Champion in World Lion Dance Competition, Kun Seng Keng Dragon & Lion Dance Association.

Trust me, the Kun Seng Keng troupe is brilliant. Other than food and performances, there are featured Naza models on promotion too:
Toyota Estima
Toyota Wish

Yes, I am definitely going to watch the lion dance performance! Who wants to join me? 

Hence with my little family, I suggested Acme Bar and Coffee at Troika since I have read and heard raving reviews about the food.

I can tell you upfront that my meal was less than impressive. Or perhaps that’s the problem when you walked in with high expectations.
 We paid RM39+ for this Crab & Watermelon Salad, which was basically some lettuce tossed in vinaigrette , chunks of poached crabmeat (yes, thankfully there was crab meat), sprinkle of almonds, cheese shavings and mirin soy mayo dressing over grilled watermelon cubes.

There was absolutely nothing memorable about the salad and I didn’t even think the flavours from the salad jived at all.
A bit dumbfounded, since everyone who has dined here has recommended this particular salad, I left the rest of the ordering to my close friends. One chose the Snails wrapped in Bacon (RM19++) and another the Salmon Mousse (RM19+).

They said nothing can’t be fixed with bacon; and I’m inclined to agree. Without the bacon, this dish might have been another disaster.

Thankfully the snails was not too salty from the bacon. The problem with this dish; as Leon succinctly put it; was that it lacked any aroma or depth of flavour. In other words, it bordered on tastelessness. The lacklustre garlic parsley sauce didn’t help at all.

Homemade salmon mousse with bread. Creamy salty salmon mousse. We dugged out some chunks of salmon which was even saltier. 

I think at this point we might have walked out if it wasn’t for the fact that it was CNY eve. Besides plain laziness, the flow of conversation & our close comradeship kept us to our seats. I for one, silently prayed that the main courses were going to be better than our appetizers, since I’m the smart alec who so confidently steered them to this place.

Sambal hebi aglio olio spaghetti, with prawn sambal & olive oil.

The pasta wasn’t al dente, but we were forgiving; given that this was the best dish of the night. The savoury, aromatic dried spicy prawns was fantastic with the pasta. Or wait, could it be that we were plain relieved that our meal are starting to show some promise? LOL.

Leon and I are heavy meat eaters. A steak or some form of meat are the norm when we dined together. We zoomed in on the Grass-fed Tenderloin (RM79+), specifically requested for medium rare, and crossed our fingers that we do not have to send it back to the kitchen if it was served overcooked.

It came perfectly medium rare, and we sarcastically raised our glasses to the Chef. What a feat it must have been; to get the steak right, considering the uninspiring dishes we just had.

Perhaps we raised our glasses a bit too soon, for the steak was overly seasoned and the fries had a bit too many shakes of salt. We left the fries untouched and had to eat the steak by first “removing” the outer layer of the meat where the seasoning was. Thankfully, the lovely pink interior-flesh was juicy and we enjoyed the natural flavour of the meat so at least it wasn’t a complete waste of RM79++.

The cakes on display was perhaps the favourite section of Acme. Throughout the night, patrons; especially ladies, would walk over and admire the cakes and pastries.

It was understandable; as the cakes were pretty interesting and looked delish.

Cempedak Pistachio Cake. RM15.

Pina Colada Cake. RM15. We checked for this one for alcohol, but unfortunately there isn’t any.

Banana cake with caramel layer frosting. RM13.

Apple & Olive Oil Cake with maple syrup cream cheese frosting. RM15.

Raspberry & Chocolate Cake with Chantilly Cream. RM13

Rhubarb Pie.

Bounty Cake – shaved coconut and chocolate layers. RM15.

Chocolate Cake – chocolate chip, ganache, and feuillantine layer. RM15.

Macadamia Cake.

We were wary at first, since our meal has been quite a hit and miss affair. Should we risk it & order desserts? Even Jo’s iced mocha was insipid and Leon’s coffee was flat.

Eventually we did settle for the Cempedak Cake, though more out of curiosity and fulfilling a need to wrap up dinner with something sweet. The cempedak fruit flavour was very pronounced but that was only in the cream layers. The alternating layers were plain pandan sponge which did a good job of taking away the overwhelming richness of the cake. Still, we couldn’t finish it as it was too creamy.

Will I be back?

I’m not sure. 
Perhaps the original chef was off for CNY thus the lackluster food that night? There were raving reviews from many satisfied diners that I’m just flabbergasted that my experience were so contradictory.

Anyone here care to share?

Acme Bar & Coffee
Ground Floor at The Troika,
50450 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Mon – Thu: 11:00 am – 12:00 am
Fri – Sat: 11:00 am – 1:00 am
Sun: 11:00 am – 12:00 am

Website: http://www.acmebarcoffee.com
reserve@acmebarcoffee.com
+603 2162 2288 

In the first place, I went to Chicago Rib House after reading many many raving reviews online. Secondly, after much thought, I’m pretty sure ours was an isolated case.

Hence, I’ll be fair here and while I’ll still be honest & share with you guys what happened, I’ll focus more on the taste of the PORK BURGER (yes, this is another of my pork burger series) than dwell on the unfortunate “food poisoning” incident.

To start off my porky lunch, I attempt to allay the guilt by ordering a salad. This Oriental Salad (RM15.90) caught my attention as the menu described that the salad cames with mandarins oranges and a peanut based sauce.

When it was served, I was immediately disappointed with the ingredients.
Going a bit off topic here…this is my peeve about F & B outlets that offers salads on their menu. It’s challenging to find good salads these days. Most restaurants, if not all, charge a bomb (or to me it is expensive) for a few miserable leaves, quarters of tomatoes and proceed to drown everything in some generic sauce and they call that a SALAD! Is it so difficult to offer good, decent salads??

My salad above was just plain lettuce with tomatoes and a few cloves of mandarin oranges. All that for RM15.90++! That’s almost RM20!

If there’s any consolation, the peanut sauce was decent. Pour it over the lettuce, eat it with a clove of orange and enjoy the match of tangy juicy orange with savoury nutty sauce. While the salad is not bad, it still doesn’t justify the price.

BOC Pork Burger, topped with bacon, onion rings & cheese.

This was what I was there for. The presentation was certainly promising, though the sliced cheese put me off. What the heck, for RM27.90, I’m sure CRH could do better!

Anyhow, the snob in me doesn’t eat sliced cheese so I shove it aside and immediately halved the burger to inspect the patty.

The texture of the patty tells you a lot about how well it was made. A pork patty should ideally not be too finely minced or dense, which essentially means that too much fillers were mixed in. The meat should be loosely packed and able to hold its shape when handled with the hands. Generally, pork is pretty fatty meat but the ratio of fat to lean meat involved will have marked differences in the end result.

Having said all that, CRH’s pork patty was decent and well seasoned. The overall ensemble was rather plain, with the usual lettuce, tomatoes and sauteed onions thrown in. Seriously, a good cut of quality cheese would have elevated the taste of the burger. I’m not big on the rubbery Kraft singles.

And then comes the our half rack Pork Ribs with Honey Mustard, RM32.90.

The marinade, whatever it was, wasn’t memorable at all.

The meat?
I thought it had a very funny smell and the marinate was more of a coating than actual marinate as it surely didn’t permeat the meat as it should. Thus, me being the rather sensitive type, was able to detect very strong gamey taste as I chewed on the meat.

We left most of the ribs untouched. Even the remains as you see below were actually after several “forced” attempts to finish it as it would be a waste if we don’t. But eventually we gave up as it did tasted pretty foul.

Now this is where I have to relate the after-meal story. My dining partner, Justin vomitted shortly after we left the restaurant and was unwell the whole day. Myself had a short bout of diarrhea the day after.

We took a photo with the girl at the front because Justin insisted. Since we spoke, I took the opportunity to inform her about our weird tasting/smelling ribs. I relate the same to the waiter serving us as well as another guy that was ushering the customers to their seats that day. All of them simply nodded and didn’t even volunteer to check if there was anything amiss with our ribs.

I gave up after seeing their non-responsiveness and waved it off as “bad ribs place” and swore not to return. I had thought the ribs just tasted bad, but it was only after Justin told me he vomitted that I suspected that it may not be that the ribs tasted bad, but it could be that the ribs we had were contaminated.

After all, CRH did many raving reviews and nobody compained that the ribs tasted bad/weird.

Chicago Rib House
Lot F346, First Floor Rainforest,
1 Utama Shopping Centre.

Tel : 03-7727 3210

But I could never comprehend the popularity of Kanna’s & Raju’s. I personally thought they were both crap overrated & overpriced. The last I’ve been to Kanna was nearly 2 years ago, and it had left me with such a lasting impression that I never went back. Blame it on some tweets recently; all of them of which had positive remarks about Kanna, that gotten me curious enough to give it another shot.

During my last visit, I remembered crappy service, awfully salty fried chicken & pretty miserable vegetables for the basic set. You see, for most people, the basic set is not significant, as they would focus more on the add-ons – the curries, the fried goods, the meats. For me, the vegetables that comes with the basic set is VERY IMPORTANT, as I love my vegetables & I also view it as the fundamentals of how an outlet set the standards for their banana leaf rice.

2 years ago.

The basic set. RM4.00. 

Vegetables that comes with the set: Potatoes in curry, cabbage & cucumbers in yogurt.

At least back then there was this cucumber + pineapple + onions yogurt coated mix. The one I was served last week was just plain cucumbers cubes.

Douse your rice in fish curry.

The famous fried chicken. It’s a must order for most, though I can’t understand why. I find it way too salty.

The norm: Add-ons of mutton, chicken, fish curries, etc.
I find that the staff would normally bug you to add these extras and would even show you the sour face if you decline! Anyone felt that before?

Your options of fresh seafood for the deep fryer.

To give credit where’s it’s due, the deep fried squids were additively good. I think that’s probably the only thing good going for Kanna.

I added an order of this “fish ball cake” & frankly, it was pretty terrible.

Some overpriced, so-called 3 layer tea.

De-shelled prawn sambal curry. Not too bad.

I can’t say much has changed, for my chicken was still salty but fortunately bearable. At least it was still tender & moist. The basic BLR set still came with 3 vegetables, all of which was disappointing.
The first was simply coarsely cubed plain cucumber (not even mixed in yogurt!), followed by cubes of radish in dry-ish curry & lastly the “kurma” curry vegetables which consisted of cauliflower & some carrot cubes. The last one was literally more kurma gravy than anything else. I certainly didn’t hit my vegetables quota with this!

The Basic Set. RM5.00.

Fried Tenggiri. Not very fresh or flaky enough. RM5.00 for this small piece.
Fried chicken. How can you not order the famous fried chicken right? RM5.50. Still salty.

1 mutton curry.
This was good & tender; not much chewing required. Thumbs up! For RM6.80, the portion sucks though. LOL.

The sotong goreng (deep fried squids). Addictively yummy! RM6.80.

1 watery teh-ais – RM1.60.

1 mango lassi – RM5.00 . This was a HUGE disappointment. It didn’t even taste like lassi; more like a milk + mango syrup.
I will NEVER order this again. That is if I ever even step into Kanna again.

Conclusion:

Like: Deep fried sotong (squids). Flavoursome curries. Mutton curry.

Dislike:
The fact that the basics (the banana leaf set) is pretty sucky compared to other BLR places. If you are here for that, then you’re pretty much eating nothing satisfying since the accompanying vegetables seems to be more of an afterthought rather than as main dishes of your banana leaf.
If you are willing to fork out extra $$ for the mutton, fried chicken, curries and other add ons, then Kanna’s would still be a viable option for your BLR fix. Otherwise, head elsewhere where you’ll get more bang for your buck.

So there, I have re-visited a place that I swore off after 2 years. Now, should I do the same for Raju’s? ;-)

Kanna Curry House

GPS:  N03° 07.10′ E101° 37.47′
Jalan 17/45
Petaling Jaya.

 

Besides providing appealing content for a blogpost; it’s an interesting eye-opener to myself as well as my blog readers to know how in other countries, food chains tailors their menus to suit a specific country and it’s food culture.

A while back I was in Sg for a quick trip. Someone told me Ikea Singapore serves pork on it’s menu. Even better, that person told me specifically there are pork meatballs!
So yes, I hopped into Ikea just to have the meatballs. Don’t ask me if the furniture stock in Ikea Singapore is any different from the ones in Malaysia. I wouldn’t know! But I do know that the meatballs is different! 

Below: Pork and beef Swedish meatballs.

My friend failed to mention a little trivia though. He didn’t tell me that the meatballs here at Ikea Singapore is a mix of PORK and BEEF, not solely pork.

So the difference was pretty subtle, and certainly not discernible from looks alone (hence trying to show you the differences via pictures were pretty futile).

Below: Beef Swedish meatballs in KL, Malaysia.

Other than the slight difference in colour, everything else lies in the taste. Needless to say, the Pork + Beef meatballs tasted much better. It could be my imagination; simply because I know there was pork in it and hence it influenced my tastebuds.
Argue whatever you like, it’s just much better with pork! 
But if I really had to describe it, I’ll say that the meatballs were more flavourful & moist, thanks to the fat from the pork meat.

I had a dessert too – The Almond Cake. This beats the saccharine, diabetes-inducing Daim anytime. I love the nuttiness and the moist texture of this cake.

Prices:
Meatballs
$9.50/20pcs
$8/15pcs
$5.40/10pcs

So have anyone else here sampled the Ikea meatballs in Singapore? What do you think about it? Any difference?

IKEA in Singapore:

IKEA Alexandra
317 Alexandra Road (S)159965

IKEA (Tampines)
60 Tampines North Drive 2, Singapore 528764

Oh yeahhh.. it’s the Eee Pad Transformer Prime!

It was launched just a week back and I was the only blogger to get a review unit so far. I shared this awesome opportunity with Vernon (who did a video here) and my good techie friend Kelvin (@l0rDKadaj).
I found out soon enough why everyone (ok, almost everyone I know at least) looked forward to the launch of the Asus Transformer Prime. It is primarily the world’s first tablet with Quad-Core Processor.

Oh, don’t worry. I’m not about to spurt tech jargons here. Let’s just say it means that the processor is very very fast. And “Quad” representing “four of something”.
So basically, if you read on any other specifications of other tablets in the market, you will come across the terms “single core” or “dual core”. The Transformer Prime’s processing speed is 4X faster, which of course translates to smoother browsing, better multi-tasking capabilities (having multiple applications active at the same time) and generally superior performance in running applications.

All that is in theory of course. You must be wondering if it’s as miraculous as marketing and advertising has lead us to believe.

Well, I have been toying with it and it has not disappointed so far. Then again, I used it for light browsing, blogging and basic emailing. The preinstalled SuperNote application is able to take, draw or record notes; while Polaris® Office is great for productivity as it gives users the ability to read and edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint (MS Office 97-2007 version compatible) files. All that will be reviewed in due time.

I have been showing it off at all the open houses this week. LOL. Yes, the Transformer Prime is a real beauty. It’s sleek, it’s solid and it’s boasts of a gorgeous exterior with metallic spun finish design made of aluminum.

Another reason why it made headlines was also because it is a tablet cum netbook.

On its own as a tablet, it’s 8.3mm thin and weighs in at a mere 586g. It has a very solid vibe and I find the size just nice for light work.

I’m afraid the 8MP rear auto-focus camera dídn’t quite impress me with its quality. I’ll be posting the pictures taken on my next post.

When combined, the weight of both the docking station and the tablet is heavier than my Acer Aspire S3, an ultrabook. Eekks!
Hence generally I go around with the tablets only but for longer blogging periods I’ll work with it docked on its station as I’m not used to typing on touchscreens.
Sigh, íf only if it was as light as an ultrabook. It might be capable enough to replace my need for an ultrabook. Oh, which reminds me, I must post up a picture of the weight (both dock and tablet) on the digital scale I used.

Below: Slide it to detach the tablet from the mobile dock.

Below: View of the base of the mobile dock.

The Asus Transformer Prime is only available in one model  (32GB, WIFI, with both tablet and mobile dock) and it’s price in Malaysia is RM2,199.

And the accessory, i.e. TranSleeve will be available after the Chinese New Year break, priced at around RM159.

Specifications:

So here are my new toys for the last week. You jealous? 

But on a more serious note, do leave me a comment if you have any queries on the Transformer Prime! I would answer them the best I can!

And it seems that most Chinese people had the same idea!
Below: Picture taken at 1130am.

Below: Situation at 1230pm.

While designated members of the families are busy preparing for their reunion dinners, the others congregated at malls, mamaks and Indian shops for their sustenance.

Out of the lack of options, I joined the fray, as I do every year when the CNY festives looms near.

My lunch cost me RM11.50. I asked the fella who calculated it what justified RM11.50.
His reply: Chicken 2 small pieces RM3, drumstick RM4.50 and small rice with 2 small portions of vegetables RM4.

Ah well….
Truth to be told, food wasn’t too bad. I think Devi’s Corner at TTDI (just down the road at the corner from here btw) fares better though.

On another visit we had the banana leaf rice set. The basic (vegetarian set ) comes with rice, 3 types of vegetables and some papadoms.

Not bad for RM5.00/set.
Being typical gluttons we added on a fish (RM5.00) and a small plate of chicken (RM5.00).

The curries, the fish and the chicken were all fresh, moderate on the grease (anyhow Jaipur is south indian, where the culinary style can be a bit heavy on the oil) and the vegetables are not overcooked. Everything here bordered between good and decent.

Last but not least, we washed it all down with some fresh, sour & appetizing rasam.

There was nothing particularly memorable here at Jaipur. I came here as I was trying to avoid the more popular BLR outlets on the eve of a public holiday. But my overall dining experience was above average in terms of quality, service, and pricing. Errmm, ok, maybe not the pricing. 

Restaurant Jaipur Curry House
32, Jalan Tun Mohd Fuad 1,
Taman Tun Dr Ismail, 60000,
Kuala Lumpur, Wilayah Persekutuan.
Tel. No: 03-77282955

All pictures taken with: