I thought I will share with all of you some pictures I took of the hisbiscus, Malaysia's national flower in different colours.
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![Image hosted by Photobucket.com](http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y152/boo_licious/hibiscus2.jpg)
![Image hosted by Photobucket.com](http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y152/boo_licious/hibiscus3.jpg)
I love Japanese food and it's always my default choice for dinner, if possible. One of my favourite spots is Rakuzen at Subang Jaya which is tucked away in some obscure shophouse. Besides this outlet in Subang Jaya, the same management also runs another Rakuzen in Chulan Square and Zen in Sunway Pyramid. We get pretty decent Japanese restaurants here as we have a large community of Japanese expatriates who are seconded over to work in Japanese companies. In certain areas near their work area and homes, there are Japanese restaurants everywhere. Subang Jaya is one area that has quite a few Japanese outlets as this place is quite near the Japanese factories in Shah Alam.
It took us a while to search for a table that we were satisfied with that gave good lighting; the ones downstairs were too dim but the upstairs tatami rooms were just perfect with their halogen lights. We ordered a Spider Maki that has a deep fried soft shell crab for starters. I notice the sushi counter is always busy with requests (it takes quite a while to get this) as everyone seems to order from it. The last time we were here, we had their famous Dragon roll with prawns and avocado which I thought was so so. This Spider Maki was much nicer and tasted oh so good with the crunchy soft shell crab.
Splashie Boy wanted something light that night as he had a heavy lunch so he opted for Niku Soba noodles. The noodles came with thinly sliced tender beef, mountain vegetables (sansai) and nameko mushrooms in a flavoursome dashi broth. I had a bit of the broth and it was yummy.
I love sashimi and sushi rice where they have mixed rice vinegar into cooked short grain rice. One of all time favourite dishes is the Chirashi Sushi where they have assorted sliced raw fish on top of sushi rice. Rakuzen has this unusual Chirashi called Hokka Chira Don which has slices of raw salmon, salmon roe, cuttlefish on top of sushi rice which has been sprinkled with sliced pickled ginger (gari), sliced omelette and sliced cucumbers. Simply heavenly stuff and so far, this is the only place I know that serves this combination.
Although it was a weekday, the place was packed and the tatami rooms upstairs were full. A well worth trip all the way to that part of town for some yummy Japanese food. Now, I must try and persuade Splashie Boy to try their KL outlet which I reckon is nearer to my place!
Rakuzen Japanese Restaurant
No. 13, Jalan ss 15/5A
47500 Subang Jaya
Tel: 03 - 5880 4717
*Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here is entirely based on my personal tastebuds and may vary for others. The reviewer also declares that she has not received any monetary or non-monetary compensation from the restaurant for writing this review.
To round up the menu, I gave dessert a new perspective as I stir-fried my cut fruits to give it a nice browned edge. It was drizzled with some sweet caramel and served with a sharp ginger ice cream. I borrowed this idea from my Restaurant Favorites at Home Cookbook by the editors from Cooks Illustrated.
Making the ginger ice cream is so simple as it just meant stirring some ginger juice into plain vanilla ice cream. This was done a night before to allow the ice cream to firm up after it was mixed with the ginger juice. For my fruits, I used a mixture of Granny Smith apple, pineapple, honey dew and strawberry. The dessert was light and not too sweet with the addition of the sharply flavoured ice cream. Just a perfect ending to a light and satisfying meal.
Ginger Ice Cream
One 2 1/2 inch piece of fresh young ginger, scrubbed
1 pint premium vanilla ice cream, softened but not melting
Grate the ginger finely. Transfer the grated ginger to a fine mesh strainer over a bowl. Use the back of the spoon to press down the grated ginger to extract as much juice as possible. Place the softened ice cream in a bowl and using a stiff rubber spatula, fold in the ginger juice. Cover tightly with plastic wrap pressing the plastic flus against the ice cream. Return to freezer for about thirty minutes to firm up.
Jasmine Tea Caramel
1 jasmine tea bag or a handful of jasmine tea leaves
1/2 cup boiling water
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon lemon juice
pinch of salt
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup Grand Marnier or freshly squeezed orange juice
Steep the tea in boiling water for 5 minutes. Remove and discard tea leaves/bag . Stir in the honey, lemon juice and salt until dissolved and set aside. Measure 1/4 cup water into a small heavy bottomed saucepan, pour the sugar in the centre making sure it does not touch the sides of the pan. Cover and bring to the boil over high heat. Once boiling, remove cover and continue to boil until syrup is thick and registeres 300 degrees on an instant read thermometer, approximately 6-7 minutes. Reduce heat to medium and cook syrup till it turns light amber, about 1-2 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the tea mixture being careful about splutters. Return to the heat and cook until syrup thickens, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a small bowl and mix in the Grand Marnier/orange juice and set aside.
Stir-fried fruits
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 medium Granny Smith apple, peeled , cored and sliced
1/2 cup honeydew, diced medium
1/2 cup pineapple, diced medium
1 cup strawberries, hulled
Heat vegetable oil in a skiller over medium high heat until smoking. Add the apple, honeydew and pineapple. Cook, stirring frequently until the fruit is lightly browned around the edges. Remove from heat and stir in the strawberries and the jasmine tea caramel. Serve with a scoop of ginger ice cream on the side.
Thanks to Linda for hosting and one will wait with bated breath for the round-up of wonderful entries.
It's the weekend (ta da!) and cat blogging time. If you want to share pictures of your lovely kitties, just leave me a comment with your permalink! and add a "weekend cat blogging" tag to your post!
This weekend, I bring you the Bollywood edition of WCB! I am not a great fan of Indian movies but I always remember them for their courtship dances around the coconut tree. Nowadays, they don't do that anymore but perform these slick choreographed dances ala Britney Spears.
Let me introduce to your the stars of my show. Here's the male star of the drama, the ginger kitten who has invaded my home and wants to stay in it permanently. Like any male star, he is charmingly cute and always wheedling his way to your heart.
Then we have the shy but beautiful female star, Meow Meow who lives a sheltered and pampered life at home. Always a romantic, here she is pining for the one cat who will sweep her to the sunset. If he does not come, a big bowl of cat food will be perfect too.
Unfortunately Meow Meow hates the ginger kitten whom she sees as a threat to her family's happiness. They were doing a little chase around the tree (not captured as my camera will take blurry pixs if the object is in motion) but here they are, where Meow Meow is doing the classic "go away" look. The ginger kitten is thinking to himself that she must have the hots for me since I am so cute and throwing me so much attention.
Meow Meow giving the cold shoulder to the ginger kitten since snarls will not do! Ginger kitty thinking to himself, female cats are so mah kwai fan (chinese for complicated!). There are more fish in the pond that are cuter and less complicated than this cat, let me go look for some.
Not sure if they will fall in love with each other eventually. Guess time will tell but so far, Meow Meow is tolerant towards the ginger kitten although sometimes, she can be quite bitchy to it.
Lotsa kitties joining us this weekend:
I had blogged earlier about tong sui when I made Leng Chee Kang at home but I thought I'll share with you this wonderful place I found recently. For those who are unfamiliar with tong sui, it literally means "sweet water" in Cantonese. Some have beans like red beans, green beans or barley which is boiled for hours so it's thick. Others have ingredients like fruits, dried longans, snow fungus which is double boiled and served with a sweet broth that is cooked seperately.
I stumbled on this little tong sui shop one day, when I decided to detour to Section 17 on the way home one evening. It starts business from 4.30 p.m. onwards for the evening and night crowd that eat at the Section 17 roadside stalls. I am so into tong sui these days as it's an ideal way to cool down during these hot and hazy summer days.
I love the varieties this place has as they are not the usual things that you get at the tong sui place. A bowl of tong sui will cost you RM1.20 which is so reasonable since it's quite a big bowl. You can opt to have it with ice cubes or not but if you don't, it will be extremely sweet.
The stall owner serves his assortment of tong sui from these huge metal pots that have individual gas burners underneath them to keep the tong sui warm. You can serve yourself the tong sui or ask the man tending the stall to scoop out a bowl of your preferred choice.
Here is the thick variety tong sui. Not to sure what it is but it looks like Peanut Paste (Fa Sang Wou). It's a definite must for those who love anything to do with peanuts as they make this tong sui from peanut butter.
This whitish tong sui is barley, bean curd skin (foo chok) and gingko nuts. Usually they boil the foo chok until it's all broken up so it's creamier.
This stall has a variety of unusual tong suis which he has added fruits and vegetables like sliced pears, apples, watermelons and winter melons. They all look so pretty in their huge big metal pots as the fruits and white fungus have floated to the top. This one has sliced peaches, winter melons and white fungus in a clear broth.
In this variety, the red bits are wolfberries (kei chi) that is a Chinese herb good for your health with slices of winter melon and snow fungus.
This is my favourite picture, the red juicy watermelon chunks mixed with the flower like snow fungus.
Some of the tong suis don't look so great in their huge metal pots so I thought I'll share with you the individual bowls which I had drank through out a period of time. This is an unusual one, it has dried figs (mo far kor), fresh sea coconut, barley and snow fungus. One of my favourites as I love the unusual combination.
This is steamed sweet potato and taro in a coconut milk broth which we call bubur cha cha in Malaysia. In this stall, his coconut milk broth is quite watery unlike the Nyonya restaurants that serve it thick. I liked the orange sweet potato which was soft and fluffy. Some places even add bananas, sago pearls in their broth.
This is the sliced pear, longan and snow fungus tong sui. Very cooling but sweet unless you add some ice cubes to dilute it a bit.
These pictures were taken over time as I usually have a different bowl of tong sui each time I pass through this area. Initially when I started snapping pictures, the owner thought I was a reporter. When I told him, these pictures are for myself, he was a bit dissapointed since he thought I would bring him more business. Yesterday when he saw me take pictures of my individual bowl of tong sui, he asked me if I was setting up my own dessert place. I told him nope but I wanted to take pictures to show my friends his lovely tong sui. He was quite happy and told me in typical China man fashion that no need to take pictures, just bring your friends to eat my tong sui.
Tong Sui Stall
(he has this chinese paper article on his stall pasted in front, also serves laksa)
Jalan 17/27
Section 17, Petaling Jaya
Selangor
Starts from 4.30 p.m. onwards. If you come late at night say about 8 to 9 p.m., tong sui may be sold out as it's extremely popular.
I read about this place from Suanie's blog and mentioned it to Splashie Boy in passing that there's a new place in 1 Utama with steaks. Hence on Friday, when it came down to choosing a place to eat, I got tricked in trying this place out. Originally I wanted Japanese food (my default choice) but that was vetoed out as he had Japanese for lunch. I offered Korean but he said no way, he would walk into a Korean joint and smoke out his precious BMW Williams F1 white shirt.
So he offered a compromise and said, let's go to 1 Utama (this huge mall) and see what is there. I was all for eating at delicious cafe but somehow he successfully steered me to this Jack's Place claiming he wanted to see this new place. When we got there, he took a look at the menu and said, those steaks look good and next thing I knew, I was sitting in a table there.
I must admit that this place does not look like those normal steak houses as they have a modern feel to it. Reading it's history (started in the 1960s in Singapore) made me associate it with the Ship, a local steakhouse popular in Malaysia.
We ordered an appetiser to share since we knew the steaks will definitely be filling. The stuffed mushrooms with crab and lobster sounded appetising and looked interesting in it's little frying pan. However tastewise, I thought it was nothing great and a tad bit bland. By the way, can you see Splashie Boy's precious BMW Williams F1 shirt in the background? It's a bit blurry since the focus is on the mushrooms.
Whenever I go to a new place, I usually ask the wait staff for their recommendations. The waitress that night said their Jack's special steak was their most popular item on the menu so I ordered that. It comes with white asparagus on top and shitake mushroom sauce. Sides are blanched broccoli and carrots with a huge baked potato. The difference between Jack's Place and the other steak houses in town is they serve these thicker cut tenderloins. Very juicy and almost melt in the mouth. Definitely nicer than the usual sirloin, rib eye cuts that you get in other places.
Splashie Boy ordered the Garlic steak which came with lots of fried garlic. The nice thing about this place is they serve their steaks on the hot plate so if you feel your steak is a bit undercooked, you can sizzle it a bit on the plate. Vegetables are also not overcooked like most places and tastes fresh and crunchy.
They also serve a pretty reasonable set lunches throughout the week (including weekends) for about RM13 for the chicken and fish dishes while the sirloin steaks are about RM18 in the lunch sets.
Jack's Place
F346, First Floor Rainforest
1 Utama Shopping Centre (New Wing)
No.1 , Lebuh Bandar Utama Damansara
47800 Petaling Jaya
Tel No: 03 - 7725 1433
(next to La Senza)
*Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here is entirely based on my personal tastebuds and may vary for others. The reviewer also declares that she has not received any monetary or non-monetary compensation from the restaurant for writing this review.
I am super late today in blogging this as it's been a day of all sorts of mishaps. Luckily I am home now and ready to finish this post I started this morning.
The last time we were at Hartamas Shopping Center where we ate at Warung Aji-Don Alley, we spied this Flamin' J Firehouse. Hence when we decided to eat out last Friday, after the typical conversation of where ah?, what do you want to eat? questions, Splashie Boy decided we will give this place a try.
I was a bit hesistant as I have not heard much about this place and the last time we walked past it, the restaurant was empty. Since I did not want to argue on a Friday night, I dutifully followed Splashie Boy to the restaurant and this time around, it was packed with people. There was a noisy group of people having an office party, some families and two Japanese men tucking into their fries looking really out of place in their suits.
Although this place is Malaysian owned, food served here is American style with sandwiches, burgers, fish and chips, steaks and etc. What amused both of us was the menu had two different categories; US Size and Malaysian Size. A quick check with the waitress indicated that since some Malaysians were small eaters, they could opt for the lighter portion.
Splashie Boy spied his favourite, the All Philly Cheesesteak Hero which he immediately ordered. He asked for lamb pieces in his sandwich and it came packed with it. This was served with potato crisps. It was yummy and quite filling as he ordered the US size portion. Although it cannot beat those American franchises like Chilis and TGIF, it's a real good effort by a local in cooking American style food. The prices are also reasonable and much cheaper than the franchises.
I ordered a burger called the Big Bertha which was huge and came topped with a slice of cheese and pickles. The beef patty was yummy and juicy. My only complaint was the french fries could have been better as they did not taste home made and felt like the frozen ones you get from the supermarket.
A quick look at the place also indicates that they have this challenge called Beat the Phyton where if you finish this gi-normous sandwich within an hour, your name will be recorded in the wall of shame at their outlet. Amazing stuff! For more professional pictures of their menu items, do check Kevin Han's portfolio. He has some amazing shots of the flame grilled steak and the Phyton. Also check his snails on top of the sandwich!?
Incidentally, we also realised that this shopping center seems to be a US/Malaysia place as not only does it have a restaurant that serves the different sizes but when you pre-pay your car park ticket in the machine, you can also opt for US/Malaysian language.
Flamin'J Firehouse
LotP3L & P3M, (2nd Floor)
Hartamas Shopping Centre
60, Jalan Hartamas 1
50480 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 03 - 6201 7750
10, Jalan USJ 10/1E
47620 Subang Jaya
Selangor
Tel: 03 - 5634 4171
*Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here is entirely based on my personal tastebuds and may vary for others. The reviewer also declares that she has not received any monetary or non-monetary compensation from the restaurant for writing this review.
We made another trip to Hot Mama last weekend as we wanted to try the other things on the menu. This time round, we sat in the middle round table which offered less light so the pictures may be slightly dark. Not only did we have a wonderful meal, we both had tremendous fun.
Once we had sat down and ordered, suddenly a bevy of beauties sauntered in with their entourage. A glance at their sashes claimed that these were Miss Chinatown Malaysia National Finalists. Since we sat in the middle part of the restaurant, we had a bird eye's view of all of them as they sat in front of us. Needless to say, Splashie Boy had a fantastic time since he could see all the pretty gals in a row (see his sneaky picture below). We both did some beauty watching and noticed that: