Grand Palace Restaurant, Pavilion

It was friday, time to unwind and a few of us decided to meet at Pavillion for dinner and drinks.

We cracked our heads for a right place for dinner- WM had some teething issues and her gums were swollen.

Though we were assured repeatedly by WM that she'll be able to find food no matter where we decide, we felt that Grand Palace should be a good bet with some 'soft' food?

The captain, a very considerate staff, immediately started recommending suitable dishes when she found out about our 'requirements'..hehe

So, we had some soup with scallops, melon and shark bone (RM18 per single serve bowl)

Velvety smooth soup, did great things to warm our bellies on a cold, rainy day. It was a satisfying soup, the essence of the ingredients encapsulated in the silky broth.

The perfect dish for WM to go with her rice...

Silken smooth taufoo with crab meat and prawns (RM28)..

Light, yet still tasty, WM was very happy with this since it's a big leap from her 1 week of soup and mushy bread.

For the rest of us, we would still require some solids..hehehe

And we ordered the steamed kampung chicken (RM30)

Large portion but I find the chicken over steamed- some of the meat were too dry.

Some veggies to balance out all the heavy duty protein..

But RM16, the portion was measly.

Another recommendation from the captain, Mongolian style pork trotters (RM28)..

A dish that WM can have bits of, the melting fats from the knuckles dont require chewing..hehe

I find the dish average, the sauce was sweet and sour which would not be my fave choice for braised pork trotters.

Yet, the accompanying pastry bread (RM8) for dipping was simply lip smacking- it was so aromatic with the fried sesame and once soaked with the sauce, it was so divine.

Overall, it was a mix of good and average dishes, but we wont mind returning as it's spacious and gave customers ample privacy from other customers.

Grand Palace Restaurant is located at Lot 6.39, Level 6, Pavilion, KL.

Chinese Food, Harbin

Recently, I've received an email from a reader, requesting for me to share some of the food I've tried in Harbin as he is planning to visit Harbin early next year. Since I did write about the Russian foodI've tried there, I guess it's only fair to share on some of the local food I've had too..

We managed to try a range of Chinese food in Harbin even though we were there in the middle of a very frosty winter.

Lao Chang Chun Bing (Laochang Spring Pancake)
This was our first meal in Harbin. We were freezing and was travelling out for the night Ice Sculpture Exhibition and our driver insisted that we must have a hearty meal, else we wont be able to withstand the night temperature outdoors (it was reaching -35 by night). We didn't know where to go and he dropped us at a large shopping arcade. Looked around and saw this place was packed- a good indication of decent food..

As the name suggest, the main meal here was the spring cake. Well, to me, it was somewhat like a cross between popiah skin and roti canai..

We'll just need to order the spring cake, get some dishes as our wrap's filling and wahlah, absolutely tasty meal. We were given a bowl of congee like stuff made of beans- which was absolutely bland. Locals seems to like it though. Just like popiah, we spreaded some bean sauce and onions before topping it with the dishes we like.

Clockwise frm top left- Smoked pork, scrambled eggs, stir fried pork strips with dried chili, stir fried potato strips.

We ordered a number of dishes as our spring cake 'filling'. The smoked pork was served warm and it was very tender. The pork had a light smokey flavour, luckily it was not salty at all. Nice. The scrambled eggs was normal to me, but Alfred said that we should be glad they served us real eggs. Apparently, some restaurants serves 'fake eggs'- don't ask me what it's made of. The stir fried potato strips were refreshing- it was slightly crunchy, unlike the potatoes I've taste. Great as a base compared to the ubiquitous sengkuang (jicama) in Msia. My fave was the pork strips with dried chili. The pork was extremely fragrant from the spices and the dried chili was deep fried to crunchy bits. So very good!

We snacked on stir fried small ribs with salt and pepper..

Good stuff to go with the local Harbin Beer. The beer? Quite light and crisp flavour. Excellent to warm up the body on a cold winter night I guess :p

Dong Fang Jiao Zhi Wang (Eastern Dumpling King)

The bad breakfast served in our hotel led us to venture out for our breakfast..

No, we're not having noodles/ congee/ rice- we decided to have plates and plates of dumplings. Boiled, steamed, pan fried ones- dumplings filled with mince pork, with mince pork&cabbage, preserve cabbage with shrimps, mutton etc. Don't think I've ever eaten so many dumplings at one go. Quite decent dumplings, the skin was smooth (though a tad thick) and the filling was freshly wrapped upon ordering . The dipping sauce of vinegar and hot sauce complemented the dumplings well.

I read something funny in the menu- Hand Pulled chicken.

Curious and wondered how it would be, we ordered a portion. Here's the dish...

And you know why it's called Hand Pulled Chicken? Literally, the chef used his bare had to break the chicken parts, instead of using a cleaver to chop the chicken to smaller pieces. Hahahaha. Taste wise, well, it's a cold dish- feels like eating smoked, salted chicken that was just removed from the fridge.

Xiang Chun Xiao Yuan

We decided to get the driver, a local of Harbin, to recommend us our last meal in Harbin before we left. He asked if we have any preference- we just wanted dishes, at a reasonable price.

He led us to a restaurant tucked at a more quiet end of the town, but when we entered, it was extremely noisy and crowded. We seemed to be the only foreigners, the locals very boisterous and yakking away in their dialect which I could not understand. We were led near the kitchen to order and we led upstairs for our meal. One stark contrast I noted here was that the waiters were wearing the communist uniform. Alfred explained that these were government owned restaurants- hence it'll be cheaper, but yes, you will see them in such uniforms.

When we got our first dish, we knew immediately we have over ordered. The portions here were humongous!

Our chicken stir fried with wood ear fungus. Although the ingredients were chopped into an unrefined portion, the flavour was still good. I really liked their fresh wood ear fungus, every bite had a little spring and gave great texture to the dish. The sauce was a tad salty though.

The Mah Lat Beef..

It looks like a portion for 10 pax. Crazy. And the amount of peppers in this dish? Irrational. Too spicy (even for a winter day), too numbing, we could only finish a quarter of this portion.

Their Savoury Homemade Taufoo was excellent though..

The steamed Taufoo was served in a cute bucket and you can mix your own condiments into the taufoo. Smooth and utterly belly warming dish.

Our Omelette seems to have more vegetables than eggs..

Yes, by now, I realise that eggs are quite scarce (and expensive) in China :p. Wonderful dish, the vegetables were fresh and sweet, again, I really like their wood ear fungus :).

One of the more common sweet dish here- Stir fried dates with yam, apple and sweet potato slices. Though it looks like a cooled dish, it actually retained very high temperature. I burnt my tongue eating this. The sugar coating had hardened and crystallised, hence we get a nice crunch while biting into the hot warm centre of the fruits. Delicious!

And while we're eating, the waiters were all gung ho and went up the stage to entertain us with their local songs and one even recited poem...

Lao Chang Chun Bing (Laochang Spring Pancake)
No.180, Zhong Yang Da Jie, Dao Li District, Harbin, China.

Dongfang Jiaozi Wang (Eastern Dumpling King)
No 39, Zhongyang Dajie, Harbin, China.

Xiang Chun Xiao Yuan

No 2, Da Shun Jie, Harbin, China.

Restaurant Kong Sai, Taman Paramount

Back from a rejuvenating trip at Mulu, shall update on that soon.

For now, I'll write about Kong Sai, a popular eatery in Paramount Garden, for it's home style cooking. Years back, Kong Sai operates from a shack just across it's current shoplot. Guess the business has been steady and they relocate to a cleaner, brighter environment a few years back. Funny that I never wrote about Kong Sai, and during this visit, I finally remembered to bring along my camera :p

Started off the meal with pig's stomach soup..

Fantastic way to start the meal, the soup's piping hot, buzzing with pepper spiciness and the thick stomach slices had a nice, chewy texture.

My first taste of Kong Sai was their famed yellow (steamed) chicken- springy, sweet flesh that goes amazingly well with their secret dipping sauce. Power dipping sauce I tell ya, it enhances the overall flavour of the chicken. Leaves such lasting impression that I had to order this everytime I'm here.

The homely looking stuffed beancurd..

Generously filled with mince meat, take a bite and the light, still warm broth explodes inside my mouth. Simple, yet satisfying.

We need our greens right?

Decent but miserly sized yau mak.

This recent meal, I noticed though, was heavily laced with MSG.

Restaurant Kong Sai is located at 39, Jalan 20/22, Taman Paramount, PJ.

Ka Soh Seafood Restaurant, KL

The initial plan was to have dinner at an interesting place- most unfortunately it was close (for renovation or for good? beats me). So we checked with the birthday boys and they suggested Ka Soh since we were already nearby.

Started with Ka Soh's fish head noodles (RM29)- the last I had was years ago

I feel the standard has dropped; the soup was not as tasty and aromatic. The fish slices, which were a mix of fresh and deep fried, were rather bland.

CC insisted to have the steamed frogs with ginger (RM31)

I've tried the stir fried marmite frogs with ginger, which was yummy, but this version was really just average. The ginger sauce was way too thick, I could not taste the sweetness of the frogs as it was smothered with the ginger's strong flavour.

The braised beancurd with seng kua (RM19.50)

This was comfort food for me. The sauce was light but belly warming, the tofu was smooth and petola had absorbed the flavours of the sauce. Nice.

The fried intestines (RM19)came as a pleasant surprise

It was crunchy, the texture and taste felt like suckling pig. Yums..

It was porky all the way- we also had the pork knuckle (RM43)..

The skin was crackling, the fats were melting and the meat was tender. No complains here.

More pork in the form of deep fried ribs in fermented beancurd (RM24) was a rather waste of stomach space..

Something was missing here...have they forgotten sugar in their marination? Just tasted... lacking. The ribs were over fried and a tad dry.

Ahh, and the stir fried baby kailan(RM23) provided a much needed fibre boost..

Quite nice, the veg was fresh and not oily at all.

Dessert came in the form of chinese pan cake (lotus paste and red bean), peanut paste and water chestnut soup. I only liked the peanut paste- velvety, the slightly saltiness made the paste a nice closing for my meal. The rest were too oily and too sweet..

Overall, I felt that Ka Soh's dishes have deteriorated- maybe after so many years of not eating from here, I was just expecting too much?

Ka Soh is located at 18 Jalan Delima, Off Jalan Imbi, KL.

Kiat Seng Restaurant, Puchong

We were supposed to have dinner in KL..but due to some delay, it was late and my dad dont like late dinners.

So a switch of plan and we were at a restaurant nearby.

Since bro and shirley has been here a few times, they did the ordering..

The homemade tau foo with seafood (RM16)

The thick slab of tau foo was at the base of the claypot. The top was filled with seafood and chopped vegetables. The homemade tau foo was quite solid but smooth, the seafood sauce was light- pretty satisfying in a simple way.

The herbal kampung chicken(RM25)

Very tender chicken with light herbal sauce. By now, I noticed that Kiat Seng serves food that's less salty, which I feel is good. The chicken was quite tasty, but the sauce was rather starchy.

The star at Kiat Seng, the house special steamed tilapia (RM26)

The steamed tilipia was topped with generus amount of preserved vegetables (choy poh) and fried shallots. The combo goes well with the steamed fish (slightly oversteamed though), an interesting yet delicious match.

But the winner to me, was the hong xiu pork (RM18)

When I saw the rather garish red, I thought this will not be a nice dish. The redness of the sauce aside, the braised pork was excellent- the fat melts immediately, the meat was fork tender and had absorbed all the marination. A terrific braised pork indeed.

And to balance the high protein diet, we had a plate of fu yu yau mak (RM12)

Fresh, sweet yau mak with fragrant fu yu and bits of chilli padi. Nice.

Kiat Seng Restaurant is located at 19, Jalan Puteri 4/1, Bandar Puteri, 47100, Puchong. Located next to a few seafood restaurants. Kiat Seng also serves quite a number of seafood (crabs) dishes, guess that would be another meal..

Fatty Frog porridge, Taman OUG

One of the perks of maintaining a food blog, I'd say, is friends introducing food haunts to me :). And I'm lucky to have many foodies friends, always bringing me to try some yummies frequently.

Few days ago, we planned to cook dinner at my place; supposedly buying some wagyu to grill. And within a few minutes of discussion, Gary & Candy suggested for us to have dinner at Taman OUG instead.

Since I'm ok with anything, I let them do the ordering :).

It's always exciting to anticipate what you'll get for dinner right? hehehe

The wait was short and soon, I was presented with this..

Century egg with pork porridge in claypot.

The porridge was velvety and gooey, the century egg was chunky, giving the porridge a range of texture. The sliced pork was Gary's favourite, he said it's tender and very smooth.

The next claypot came soon after- I cant believe I'm having so many pots of porridge that night...

Took a glimpse and hey...not porridge after all..

It's frogs cooked ala kung pou style. Piping hot and lots of gravy, we're suppose to have it with porridge.

The frog's flesh was springy and had absorbed the flavours from it's ingredients. There's plenty of kung pou sauce for you to mix into the porridge- giving the porridge a spicy kick; and with the very hot temperature from the claypot- we were sweating buckets by the time we finished our first bowl. Unlike the usual kung pou, which has it's sauce cooked till dry and clinging to the meat, the kung pou here is more gravy like- hence we could add as much sauce as we like to enhance the flavour of a plain porridge. Very satisfying I'd say, especially on a rainy day.

Gary- lover of fish, cant help but to order a side of steamed fish head..

He ordered the ginger garlic steamed fish. The fish was fresh, the flesh was firm and sweet. One extra recipe in this steamed fish was the addition of chilli padi in it's steamed sauce (not as garnishing, but steamed with). So, when you take a bite of the fish, you'll first enjoy the freshness of the fish meat...and then the heat from the chilli seeps into your taste buds. And you'll wonder why the fish get spicier with each bite, even though it looks so harmless! :p

The bill was RM51 for these 3 dishes- I'm not sure of the breakdown though.

This is the picture of the stall- I dont have the English name of this stall..

The kung pou frog porridge stall is located at 2, Jalan Hujan Rahmat 2, Taman OUG, KL. It's a corner shop, the same row as Steven's Corner.

Restoran Fu Kua, Taman Megah

I hated fu kua (bitter gourd) when I was a kid.

My mum would cook bitter gourd soup; the bitter gourd cut in squares (the size of my kiddie palm, mind you!), boiled until its soft and I was forced to drink a whole huge bowl :(

It's very good for you! Mum would say while making sure I finished my portion.

But as I grew much older, I finally learnt to appreciate the finer points of this special gourd...and actually enjoy eating it :)

When my parents were up in PJ recently for a short visit, I suggested Restoran Fu Kua for lunch. You should have seen my mum's face- she was beaming with pride..haha.. or maybe it was my imagination? :p

As the name of the shop suggested, the menu was filled with every thing fu kua- from fu kua soup, stir fry noodles with fu kua, fu kua cooked with all sorts of meat/ seafood/egg/ tau foo and even stir fry fu kua with fu kua (yeah, you read right).

We didnt want to go fu kua overboard, so we had some stir fried fu kua with salted egg..

Thin slices of fu kua was slightly crunchy in texture and the salted egg added some light fragrance to the gourd. Quite tasty.

My must order everytime I'm here.. the fried tau foo with mince meat..

The tau foo was fried to perfection- the skin was crisp and aromatic, the mince meat and sauce complemented the tau foo beautifully. Absolutely scrumptious.

Braised ma yau (threadfin) with bitter gourd..

Other than the slightly over fried ma yau, I enjoyed this dish tremendously. Their bean paste sauce was excellent and goes so well with the bitter gourd and fish. In fact, I've tried their stir fried bitter gourd-bean paste combo with chicken, pork ribs and frogs..all tasted yummy too.

The marmite spareribs was mediocre though..

Could smell the marmite when the dish was served, but could hardly taste it when I took a bite. Luckily the meat was tender.

Wash the meal down with some bitter gourd juice and we are all contented..hehe

Restoran Fu Kua is located at 19, Jalan SS23/15, Taman Megah, 47400, Petaling Jaya, Selangor.

Restoran Yat Mun, Puchong

I am guilty.

Guilty of not clearing my very old post on time and wasted Gary's effort on introducing Yat Mun to me. Sorry ya, dude!

But Yat Mun's business is brisk, and sure it's still bustling with business now :p

It was already rather packed by the time we reached there, lucky us, we managed to get a table fast. Ordering was a little harder though, the waiters were all busy running about, and to get one's attention takes quite a while!

Left the ordering to Gary instead, since he knows the what's famous here :)

First dish, kam heong fish head (RM20)

Looks like a main favourite, many tables had this. The fish head was deep fried until crunchy and stir fried with kam heong sauce until dry. I was afraid that the strong flavour may mask the sweetness of the fish head, but surprisingly it didnt. The fish meat was still juicy and quite smooth at some parts.

We also had steam fish with ginger sauce(RM15)..

The fish was fresh, but slightly over steam. Lots of ginger sauce, you can almost drink it.

An alternative to sharksfin soup? Have the beancurd soup instead (RM12)

Smooth beancurd slivers in thicken broth. Add a dash of vinegar and it warms up a hungry belly anytime.

My favourite? The stir fried eggplant with long beans.

Absolutely scrumptious, the vegetables were full of wok hei and so very fragrant. The eggplant had a slight crisp while the long beans was crunchy still (not those dead withered type). Delicious.

Order some meat from the BBQ section..

Char Siew (RM12)

Pretty ok. Solid, non fatty type. Not overly sweet too.

The roasted duck (RM15) was average too.

Would have tasted better if the skin was crisp and the meat warm. Taste wise, it's quite nice(for a cold duck :p).

Restoran Yat Mun is located at No47, 49-3 Jalan Puteri, Bandar Puteri, 47100 Puchong.