Loving Hut Cafe, Kota Damansara

Sick of eating meat, meat and more meat? Well, that was me anyways.
And no, dont want to just have plain old salad?
What about chinese vegetarian instead?

What comes to mind immediately would be chinese vegetarian ala 'chap farn' (mixed rice) or pricey vegetarian restaurants, which with those price, you'd rather eat meat, right? :p

Fret not, Loving Hut seems to fit in nicely..with it's cafe concept and serving some healthy 'fast food' alternatives.

Loving Hut is a simple cafe, which we stumbled upon recently.

A quick glance at the menu may not give us a feel of a vegetarian restaurant- there's a selection of asian ala carte dishes (noodles, rice, snacks) and western food (burgers, chops, salads, finger food). But upon closer inspection of the menu (pictures), yes, we realised these are definitely vegetarian.

We placed our order..and while waiting for our lunch, we were reminded that many Hollywood honchos are vegetarians and vegans too. Ahh, conscious effort to get us to join the stars?

I was starving and went straight for the Basil Delight Rice set(RM10.90).

Served with brown rice, vegetables and corn soup (which was delish, by the way)..here's the 'basil delight'..

Looks suspiciously like stir fried beef slices with basil, I can guarantee you that this is definitely vegetarian. The 'meat' is soy based, wonderfully prepared to have a slight crisp skin and coated with sticky, sweetish basil infused sauce. Went perfectly with the rice.

WF on the other hand, opted for Chao Zhou Rice Noodle soup (RM7.80).

Prepared Teochew style with preserved vegetables, beancurd, taufoo, seaweed, mock fish slices, this was more mild in taste compared to the Basil Rice set.

I ended my meal with a hot cup of Green Tea Latte..

While I was satisfied with my meal, WF still felt "empty"- quite a common behaviour amongst my friends who avoids vegetarian. To them, vegetarian meal just cant fill as much as meat.

What do you think?

Loving Hut Cafe is located at 19 Jalan PJU 5/6, Dataran Sunway, Kota Damansara, PJ, Selangor.

Arisu, Kota Damansara

Lots of birthday eats recently...
Getting really remorseful with the additional food but still with the lack of exercise :p
And yes, this is one of those BD post, a belated one in fact.

I thought Arisu would be fitting, since she's a hallyu fanatic :D, she'll take korean overdose anytime. And we got korean food, korean setting, korean MTV and korean staff serving us. Happy happy joy joy for SL. hehe.

We had some marinated beef ribs BBQ (RM48)

Sizzling rolled up ribs...

Unroll it and we got juicy slabs of ribs with nice fat marbling..Well marinated beef ribs, each piece was scrumptious, especially eaten tightly wrapped with fresh lettuce, garlic slice, spicy beanpaste..delish!
The banchan (side dishes) were sufficient, but nothing too interesting that pique my interest..

The stir fry pork with kimchi (RM25)

This was an interesting dish. The pork was piping hot and salty with the kimchi, but paired with the cold, compact taufoo, the combo was excellent. The pork portion was too much, by the time we were done with the taufoo, there was still plenty of pork..which was too salty to eat it on it's own.

And here's the Nam Meon (cold noodles, RM20)

I always liked korean cold noodles and this was no exception. The noodles had a wonderful springy yet slightly chewy texture, which went well with the very spicy sauce. Served with a few slices of beef, sliced vege and boiled egg. Simple yet satisfying.

We had a good time of OD-ing on korean at Arisu, will be back again, soon.

Arisu is located at 32/3, Jalan 5/16, Dataran Sunway, Kota Damansara, 47810 PJ. The restaurant is located at the second floor, corner shoplot.

Ice Room @ The Strand

We were having dinner at Kota Damansara, when my sweet tooth kicked in.

The dessert selection was almost non existence in the restaurant we were dining in, hence we popped by Ice Room for a quick fix.

Ice Room, as it's names suggested, serves snow ice desserts. If that's not your cup of tea, there's still a range of desserts, mains and snacks to choose from.

Both of us wanted snow ice..

There's the Tropical Mix Snow Ice (RM9.90)

Topped with a mixture of local fruits (and some non local ones), the vanilla based snow ice was drizzled with pureed fruit and syrup. The combination of the tangy puree, sweet fruits and chill from the fine ice makes each mouthful enjoyable.

The Durian Snow Ice (RM8.90) was a surprise..

I expected durian flavoured snow ice, but the real durian fruit pureed smothering this dessert catapulted it's aroma many notches up. The basil seeds added a slight crunch to this tasty treat. Yums.

Ice Room is located at 27, Jalan PJU 5/20E, PJU5, The Strand, Kota Damansara, 47810 PJ, Selangor.

Erawan, Kota Damansara

When I heard of Erawan last year, I've tried to arrange for a makan session there. However, it was a busy period for me and my friends, plans were delayed, further delayed and perpetually delayed.

It took Mr Chardonnay to remind me of Erawan, he and MC wanted to buy me a belated birthday meal and the venue? You guessed it...

We had preordered our food- it was recommended to ensure that the dish was available and that the waiting time would be shorter..

First up, drinks to quench our thirst..

Interesting name like Black Rose and Trilingual, but the flavours were less surprising.

Started our meal with their Pomelo salad..

Large chunks of sweet pomelo topped with condiments (peanuts, dried shrimps, shallots, desiccated coconut etc) and drizzled with their homemade sauce. The burst of flavours were refreshing- the juicy, sweet pomelo coiled with tangy spicy sauce and ended with the crunch of the peanuts. Tremendously enjoyable, do order this if you're in Erawan.

Up next, the seafood tomyum..

Served in a dainty bowl, we chose a level 1 spiciness, as we were forewarned that Erawan's spiciness level was rather severe. Although our tolerance for spicy food was fine, we decided not to risk it and were so glad we stuck at level 1 (they have 5 levels). Even at 1, the soup was so very pedas that we started sweating heaps after a few sips. We all loved the tubular Chiangmai mushrooms in the soup, gave a nice bite while we're slurping down the soup.

We were ready to eat as the soup has opened our taste buds- and were served with the Fish and Salted Egg green curry.

A rather uncommon green curry dish, this was beautifully presented and tastes as good as it looks. The fishball was made from tenggiri fish, with a lovely bouncy texture when I bit into it. But what I love most was the creamy, velvety green curry sauce- the fragrance was enchanting and perfect with white rice.
The Steam seabass with lime sauce looks very fresh..

While Chardonnay finds this delicious, I enjoyed this, but not to the extend of gobsmacked for words. The fish went well with the spicy, sour sauce- which soaked right into the fish flesh. The more we ate, the spicier it gets, but hey, no complaints here :p

The kailan with salted fish gave our need for greens..

Simple dish, no faults to pick. Tasty.

To end our meal, we decided to try some of their desserts. Most unfortunately, the choice of dessert that we wanted was not available, so we settled for coconut ice cream and red ruby dessert.

The coconut ice cream was different from those I've sampled- there's no cream involved- just thick coconut juice frozen and mixed with julienned coconut flesh. Very enjoyable version. The red ruby on the other had, was forgettable.

Erawan serves fine Thai cuisine, the food was obviously prepared with care and patience. Overall, it was a great dining experience, I'll definitely come by again. Oh, do note, the pricing is towards the steep side, our meal for 3 pax costs RM200.

Erawan Classic Thai & Fusion is located at 22-1,Jalan PJU 5/16, Dataran Sunway, Kota Damansara, 47810 Petaling Jaya.Tel: 03-6141 2393.

Fun Taipei Tea Cafe, Kota Damansara

We were on our way to another destination, but it was lunch time, we were famished and Fun Taipei had just opened it's doors at Kota Damansara. Parking was relatively easy, we decided to give it a try..

The restaurant was decorated with large wall posters of famed taiwan tourist attractions and snack street pictures, clearly indicating their main food focus. There were quite a number of set meals to choose from (other than ala carte), with very decent prices.

Choosing our meals didnt take that long..

WF had oyster mee sua..

I was rather surprise with her order, since she had just returned from Taipei a couple of weeks ago and I assumed she ate this many,many times when she was there. It's was a mediocre dish though, the sauce tasted rather quirky, not like the norm oyster mee sua. The accompanying deep fried tofu was quite nice, if eaten together with the pickled cucumber.

I had the san bei (3 cups) chicken..

Was a decent version, not too bad. Sadly, the chicken was not well marinated and did not absorb much of the sauces flavours. The mince pork rice (lu rou farn) had too much star anise aroma in it, which I didnt like. Also, insufficient gelatine in the sauce to

Amy decided to have the braised set..

So her's looks the plainest of the lot :p. Braised egg and tofu served with braised mince pork rice. The base sauce was the same for all the dishes, so everything tasted rather similar. Average tasting set..

We all agreed that Elaine's set was the best..

Her chicken chop set..

Humongous deep fried chicken chop, lightly dusted with chilli powder. The batter was crunchy while the chicken fillet remained juicy and well marinated. Very yummy indeed.

Overall, we find the food average, but all of us really enjoyed their bubble tea (which I didnt take any picture of :p). I guess I will come back for the bubble tea and maybe to try some of the snacks..

Fun Taipei Tea Cafe is located at No. 16-1, Jalan PJU 5/15, Dataran Sunway, Kota Damansara, Selangor. There are a few other branches located around Klang Valley.

The Uma Balinese Restaurant, Kota Damansara

When we speak of Balinese cuisine, many of us (especially those in Klang Valley) would think of Ole Ole Bali, Bumbu Bali or Waterlily. But there's more than just that famous chain, right?

A few months ago, we decided to pop over to Uma, which serves non halal Balinese cuisine.

I thought we could finally have babi guling, alas, when I checked with the owners, it was not in their plan to serve babi guling. Nonetheless, there's still lots of porky selection to satisfy our porcine cravings..

The menu's quite extensive, but was told that it will be expanded further with more pork dishes (by now, with my delayed posting, am rather certain that the new menu is ready)..

We started with some pork satay..

Juicy pork satay which was very well marinated. Smoky in flavour, the meat had a slight chewiness to it, but was still nice.

The rest of the pictures will look the same as all of us ordered the rice set- with the same side dishes, but a different main (meat)..

The side dishes served in Uma were way better compared to Ole ole/Waterlily..

There were deep fried potato bits- spicy and very good, the vegetables were crunchy and fresh, the shredded chicken was well-spiced and goes wonderfully with the rice while the condiments- onion/ shallot sauce and the chilli sauce was excellent.

Here's my order..

Deep fried duck..

Yummy, reminds me of the bebek (duck) I had in Bali (only that this was larger in size). The duck was juicy, the skin was crisp and aromatic. My only small gripe was the slightly salty skin.

The curry lamb and curry pork dish looks the same..

The only difference was that one was served in yellow rice while the other was white. Was told that different flavours of rice enhances the overall taste of the dish. Both curries were delicious, but if I had to choose, I'd take the lamb.

Jem decided to have the Babi masak kicap (pork cook in soy)
Melt in mouth pork served in a rather chinese tasting sauce. Tasty nonetheless.

Andrew, who seemed to crave for pork satay had his rice served with pork satay. What can I say? I think he OD on porkiness..

Hmm, seems like everything sounds good and scrumptious? Not really actually. I didnt like the satay lilit here, find it too mushy. Some of my friends did mentioned that its rather pricy for its portion.

But these are small flaws that I'm willing to overlook- will definitely return when I feel like having Balinese food again :)

The Uma Balinese Restaurant is located at The Strand, Kota Damansara, 7-G & 7-1 Jalan PJU5/21, 47810 Petaling Jaya, Selangor - Tel 03-6142-2771.