Christmas 2010 :)

I love festive season for a few reasons. Public holiday = no need to work; chance to get together with family and friends; food, food, food, food, food and food. I realised last week that we can’t really separate celebration from food. Whenever that we need to celebrate, food will be the main agenda. I guess everyone will be happy after filling their tummy with delicious food. Each celebration have their one unique food. Like for CNY, yee sang is a must. For Christmas, turkey is a must. In my case, western food is a must. Haha.

Me and Calvin has this tradition of dressing up nicely, as in me in dress and him in button shirt, for special occasion dinner. It will also be the time where Calvin will bring along a camera so that it would be easier to snap photographs of ourself and also the food.

For Christmas, Calvin made a table reservation for us at Jake’s Charbroil. I used to pass by that place all the time when I was still working in PJ but never have a chance to try their food. On my last girl gathering, Wai Leng told us her experience at this place and praised their food. I went back and told Calvin about it and we agreed that we will be there for Christmas dinner. We do not want to be stuck in the jam on Christmas Eve, hence we choose to dine on Christmas day itself, which was a wise decision. No traffic jam

 

Us getting ready. Red will be the main colour as it was Christmas. Luckily I have a red dress. I love Calvin’s red shirt, casually formal. Since he is fair, he looks good in practically any colour. Hehe.

 

Our table was at the first floor of the restaurant. Even though the restaurant is quite small, but it has a friendly and cozy ambience in it. Very family oriented.

 

For starters, we shared a chicken mushroom soup and half dozen of escargots. The soup was just normal canned mushroom soup with chunks of chicken meat. I was a little bit dissapointed with the soup, seriously. I thought that it will be home made type with coarse mushroom chunks in it. Escargot is just olive oil and some spices. Calvin preferred the one from Windmill but I actually love escargot prepared this way. Maybe I don’t really fancy cheese baked food, so olive oil and spices are actually the best combination for me. Our fruit juices were the best; orange for me and honeydew for him. Really fresh with no sugar added. Yummy…

 

We read that their steaks are very good and expensive as well. Calvin ordered the Australian Wagyu Ribeye which is above RM150 for 230g. But it was really worth the price. There meat was cooked until medium well and it was really soft and juicy. I absolutely love it. I ordered the weekend special (whish is only available on weekend), rack of lamb with mint bernaise. This has to be the best rack of lamb that I had, by far. Juicy and soft as well, the meat did not stick to the bone, which means it was good stuff. Both of us were very pleased and satisfied with our meal that day. I love the portion of the food with the side dishes, not too big. You won’t feel bloated or full up to the neck after the meal. Still a little space for ice cream… hehe.

 

We ordered the simple vanilla ice cream with chocolate syrup to be shared. What a simple way to end our dinner.

 

If you want to reward yourself or your loved one for a wonderful year, you should really visit this place and order their steaks. Expensive than the average but worth every penny (or ringgit). Definitely will be back for more… Thank you Calvin for the wonderful dinner. Have a nice talk over dinner and we did a short recap of the wonderful food of year 2010, which inspire me for the upcoming post. Hehe

~BuHBaI~

Pasta Zanmai

Pasta Zanmai and Sushi Zanmai are my favourite Japanese restaurants. Vincent and Sai Weng were the first few people that dine with me in Sushi Zanmai. The outlet at The Gardens has always been my favourite. Pasta Zanmai, on the other hand, was with my girls for CNY dinner. Besides girls, a few Serayan guys and Nicole’s sis tagged along as well. But it has been ages since I last visited Pasta Zanmai. Me and Calvin always visit Japanese restaurant that we have never been to, in search for the best Unagi in town. Haha. But I do crave for Pasta Zanmai once in a while because some of their spaghetti are quite nice.

We visited the outlet at Sunway Pyramid after watching Narnia. Both of us shared a large popcorn, which we did not finished, and a large Coke. So after the movie, we walked around and I wanted to have something light as late lunch.

Unlike Sushi Zanmai, there is no sushi conveyor belt at the center of the restaurant. Instead, they have small island of round tables that can sit up to 6 people. Restaurant was decorated for the upcoming Christmas, hence a lot of green thing-y draped all around the restaurant.

Me with my new black scarf that I bought from Forever 21. We went around the whole Sunday Pyramid to search for the perfect black scarf that I could bring along for formal/wedding dinner instead of a jacket. Calvin and I dug deep into the big pile of scarfs and finally settled with this one. It saved my life on Christmas dinner, which I will blog later. Hehe. I have no idea that I could actually look like a nun or some spiritual person with the scarf wrapped around me like that. Or maybe like those Arabian woman. Hahaha.

 

This is what the both of us shared. Creamy sauce spaghetti with mushroom and some special half boiled egg. I kind of love half boiled egg now, thanks to Calvin. He will always order two for breakfast whenever it is available. I prefer mine mixed with salad (made my own way) and spaghetti. Mix, mix, mix and mix … tadaaaa… thicker gravy which taste better than without egg. Hehe. Anyway, I love the spaghetti as it was really creamy. Oh well, I guess I love everything with mushroom on them. Haha.

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year people.

~BuHBaI~

Jyu Raku – Japanese Restaurant of Year 2010

Calvin and I have voted Jyu Raku from Subang Jaya to be the best Japanese Restaurant of Year 2010. Their food was damn good and the restaurant is very beautiful. I really felt like dining in a Japanese restaurant. It started with Calvin’s dad wanted Japanese food for dinner since Calvin’s mum went out with her sisters. Calvin suggested the shop rows just opposite SDMC as there are a few other restaurants there that we have yet to try. The only restaurant that we have been to is Tomoe. So we went there and uncle suggested to dine at the first restaurant that is nearest to our car park. When we went in, the only available seats were at the sushi bar and uncle was not so keen about it. So we went next door, which is Jyu Raku. When we went inside, we were told that the restaurant was full but after a quick check, there was an empty table on the upper level. Lucky us!! The stairs to the upper level is at the back of the restaurant. Once we reach the upper level, we were greeted by….

a beautiful walkway with tables on both side and 2 private rooms at the back. It is beautiful. Both me and Calvin can’t stop “Wahhhh….”.

 

Our table is on the floor but we can actually put our leg down as the leg compartment is quite deep. We don’t have to fold our leg while eating, which is awesome. The seats are very comfortable where we can lean on it, just like sitting on a chair. I told Calvin that I want to steal the “chair” home. Calvin, in return, told me that he wanted to steal the soya sauce dispenser home… I know, out of topic right. Haha.

 

The menu itself was very interesting. They have more choices for ala carte food than rice/sushi/sashimi set. I found this fish dish very scary as the fish looks pretty raw. Calvin found it cute and took a photograph of it. Hahaha. And no, we did not order the scary or cute fish for dinner.

 

Calvin took a photograph of me browsing through the menu. With my glasses on, I look like a nerd reading from a dictionary. Haha.

 

We were served potato salad as our appetizer. It’s free!! The salad was really yummy. It has onion and cucumber in it. All the ingredients were really fresh and crunchy. Me like..

 

Our dinner for the night. Calvin and Uncle Jeffrey shared sashimi for 2 person and sushi with chicken teriyaki set. I ordered fried prawn roll and seafood with chicken teppanyaki set. There were tuna, salmon, octopus and one fish that I don’t know the name on the sashimi. Both of them enjoy the soya sauce and wasabi as they were really good. According to them, fish was fresh and went well with the sauce. My fried prawn roll was nice too. There is a special sauce for this roll that is a little bit sour but I like. Best part is, the fried prawn was still hot when they serve the dish. Not warm, but hot. Hehe. Chicken teriyaki is better than chicken teppanyaki. The seafood teppanyaki was quite good. There were about 4 to 5 scallops with a big prawn and a slice of salmon fish.

Did you notice something missing from the meal? Unagi!! Haha. This is the first time that Calvin did not order unagi from a Japanese restaurant. Haha. Maybe he was also tempted by the variety of ala carte menu that the restaurant has. Hehe. He said that we will be back again to try their Unagi, which will determine whether it will replace Tomoe’s yummy unagi position. We shall see, we shall see. Haha. The restaurant serve shabu shabu as well. Maybe our 2nd round there will be for their shabu-shabu as it is raining season and shabu-shabu is the best way to keep ourself warm. Hehe.

~BuHBaI~

Uncle Seng Home Made Noodle

Deciding what to eat has always been easy for me if I am staying for at Calvin’s place for the weekend because there are so much to choose from. If I can’t decide, I will just tell him to find a parking space and we shall dine at the nearest restaurant.

But on last weekend, we decided to drive around first. We passed by this place that was packed with people, so we decided to try it out. Luckily we found a parking space just nearby. The name of the restaurant is Uncle Seng and their specialty is home made noodle.

 

The restaurant was full with people when we arrived and we have to wait a while before getting a seat. Their menu is simple. Noodle with fried pork, char siew, wan ton, mushroom chicken and etc. Since it was our first time there, we decided to order different “side dishes” with the noodle.

 

I ordered fried pork and wan tone while Calvin ordered shredded chicken with wan ton. The noodle are gravy-less. Something like hakka noodle. It was supposed to be mixed together with their special chilli sauce but we did not mix it in because it may be too spicy for our hungry stomach. We just take it as it is, which is not bad by the way. The noodle was springy. Char siew, well, not as good as the one from Jalan Alor. Hehe. But wan ton was surprisingly good. For others, the noodle may be tasteless but it was still okay for us. One thing for sure, the portion is really big. The amount of noodle they give per plate can actually be shared by 2 person. None of us could finish the whole plate!!! As usual, my plate has the most amount of noodle left. Nearly half, I think. Hehe.

 

The newspaper article at the front of the shop. If you have never tried hakka noodle, maybe you should try this place out. Different place has different hakka noodle, like the one in Ipoh is totally different from KL. The one in Ipoh is something similar to wanton noodle. One thing for sure though, both are gravy-less. So be prepared to be served with white noodle. Haha.

~BuHBaI~

Ecoba – Girls Gathering

Besides my family, Calvin and Baby, my girls are the 4th most important people in my life. They are the one that stand behind me when I was falling apart, help me up and make sure that I am alright. They are the one who made me realise what friends truly are. Sure, we have different opinions on everything but those differences are what make each and everyone of them so special to me. So it is important for me to have girls gathering with them from time to time. It’s getting harder nowadays to have a gathering as Wai Leng and Pui See are always on jobs. They will be on shoot for the whole night and day. And on the day that they are not shooting, they will be spending time with their partner or just resting at home. But I make sure that I keep in touch with them through MSN to know how are they doing and let them know how am I doing as well.

Since everyone are busy, even birthdays have to be celebrated together on the same day. We celebrated Mei Yee, mine and Tsuey Wenn’s birthday earlier this month. Wai Leng recommended Ecoba since she has been there previously for business purposes. Locating the place is a big challenge for me. I drove there myself and I have no idea how to enter the car park. Luck was on my side that night. I parked nearest to the lift which brought me directly to the bar. Hehe. Me, Wai Leng and Pui See arrived the earliest. So we ordered dinner for ourselves while waiting for others.

 

Wai Leng ordered Carbonara which was way better than my Chef’s Recommendation Kampung Fried Rice with Fried Chicken. Her pasta was creamy and went well with the mushroom and bacon. My fried rice was a big disappointment as it was practically tasteless. Only the fried chicken was edible. Haihhh….. Shin, as usual, fashionably late (as expected) ordered Aglio Olio which was nice as well. Note to self: order pasta next time. Hehe.

 

We waited for the others to arrive before ordering beer. The Hoegaarden was huge! I can’t even finish my beer at the end of the night. Maybe I’m not a big fan of beer and also my stomach was full of the yucky fried rice. Hehe.

 

We bought a birthday present for TW. It’s a rainbow colour sexy underwear where Wai Leng wrote our initial on the back of the underwear because we know that TW will not be wearing the underwear. It will be the most memorable present for TW who is not so girly. Haha.

We also ordered finger food to go with our beer. Nachos, fried calamari and fries. The nachos were really good, except that none of us touch the green chillies. Haha.

After that, we presented TW with her present.

There…. I have put all the photographs in sequence. It started with TW opening the packet and unwrapping the suspicious looking pink packet to reveal a colourful underwear!! Shin even did the honour to reveal our initials at the back of the underwear!! It was hilarious to see Shin kept on “promoting” the underwear while TW backing off away the underwear. Hahaha. Nicely done, Shin…

After that, we indulge into the Haagen Dazs ice cream cake that Pui See bought from 1U.

The cake was absolutely yummy. Definitely worth the price.

I went home with a full stomach that day. 50% is from the food, beer and cake. the other 50% is from all those laughing, gossips and, most importantly, the feeling of being loved and cared by the important girls in my life. Can’t wait to meet them again during the New Year party!!! Woooooohoooooo~~~

~BuHBaI~