A king-tumeric affair..

Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia

A king-tumeric (Raja Kunyit in Malay, Mou San Wong in Chinese) affair. Hang on, I was referring to the King of Fruits- Durian Raja Kunyit. I was told that this specific breed is very superior in taste and price too; one of the prized varieties undoubtedly the pride of Pahang State (Malaysia consists of 13 states).

A good friend of mine, Chua he kept telling me about this particular type of durian and told me it's nothing like D24 (another type of durian), he said trust me, you will never eat that once you move on to this new one. I just smiled sarcastically and was thinking to myself how can great can it be?? Almost sounded too good to be true! Well he turned up one night and brought some durian for me and it was my last week in Malaysia before moving to England last year. It was similar to a leaving/goodbye gift I thought! Very unique especially turning up with durian. And it turned out certainly to be one of the best gifts ever! I ran into a pretty good streak that week after another buddy, Mark found out I was searching for durian raja kunyit and told me he would bring me some. Well, he struggled and only managed one raja kunyit, few D24s and a bagful of mangosteen and rambutans. They were the best mangosteen and rambutan I've ever had seriously! Turned out those fruits were harvested from his girlfriend's family orchard. Sweet!!! He just spoke to me few days ago to confirm my date and will try to get some stock for me if there's any. Definitely something for me to look forward other than waiting for e-mail replies/ phone calls from headhunters and miserable London!

Check this out. The king of fruits and The king of durians! Best of the best! Durian Raja Kunyit.

When its opened, I only got a few in there but trust me, its worth the money and the time. Super delicious. Heavenly!

My verdict: The best of the best durian ever! Look at the photo below, I am not joking, am I? The thick flesh was golden yellowish in colour with an extremely creamy texture and bitter-sweet tasting. It also comes usually with tiny seed, proper durian should taste like this anyway. Well, durian is an acquired taste. I love it!!! It's number one on my list of things to makan (eat) when I head to Malaysia next week!! Yes, I have told my friends (suppliers) my arrival dates and will be checking on them for my durian supply. I can't wait..

Seafood at Seri Kembangan, Selangor

September 20, 2009

Family outing to Kajang & Serdang (sound weird for an outing place but our main purpose was to do some family visit)

Since it was the first day of Raya and Melaka town was overflowed with balik kampung & raya visits and also tourists coming from all over the places, we decided that this was a good day to head out from Melaka. We saw the crowd lining up for the chicken rice ball and we just had a good laugh among ourselves. What goes round comes around they say. Proved to be very true when we (about 3 cars filled with people) arrived at the famous Kajang sate shop (chinese one) and we saw people all over the shop standing and waiting for table. Not a bad scene compared to Melaka but yeah, it was hot weather and the smoke from the burning sate didn't help much and we just decided to skip the sate. I used to come to this shop for Kajang sate and I really love it, have a good friend who lives in Kajang. :) Pity him, I know how it feels when you get visitors and they want to eat at those really famously packed places; I know. Very frustrating to wait especially you know you can always go there on a weekday morning and probably have the whole shop to yourself. Anyway, Kajang town was packed too. Went to visit his family and it was good to see almost everyone and hope to see them soon again! We also went to visit my aunty because she lives in Kajang too and managed to catch up with my cousins and nieces after a long time!

We went to dinner with Zin and his family. Thanks to him for recommending us to this awesome seafood restaurant and for the great dinner! I am quite familiar with Serdang town, having sort of lived there for a couple of years, in my younger days but have never discovered this restaurant. We will definitely come back here again for more seafood, as Dad is already chasing me to make a booking soon for the geo-duck feast. Yay!!

OK time to show some photos of our dinner.

#1 Sang yue (Ikan Haruan, if I am not mistaken) Oh this is absolutely good! I love the way they cook it and present it, very good for sharing if you are here in a big group (say 8-10 people). The fish was sliced up nicely and deboned!

#2 Steamed ming ha (prawns). Very fresh and succulent. Very simply cooked to maintain its freshness. Just dip it with some chilli for the extra ommph! Quite easy to de-shell the prawn, I like it.

#3 Yam basket with some stir-fried chicken and cashew nut. Honestly, this was the disappointment of the night. Would not order this dish again.

#4 Tofu with some onion and sweet chilli. I love the texture of their tofu, very soft and smooth. Yummy!

#5 Stir fried eggplant with braised peanuts. Oh this was truly delicious and tasty. A must order dish.
#6 Steamed frog with essence of chicken. I love this one too! Fresh, tender, succulent frog meat. Would recommend this also.
#7 Kam heong mud crabs. Very fresh seafood served in this place and the crab claws were huge! But Dad preferred medium sized crabs, so I think you maybe would like to remind them while you place your order or just pick the crabs before you send them to the kitchen. :)
#8 Stir fried mantis prawn with salted egg yolk, curry leaves and bird's eye chillies. I like the texture of the mantis prawn because they were really succulent and also fresh. Bite into them and you can really taste the meat instead of those smaller mantis prawn which are often de-shelled and fried with batter, where I usually struggle to taste the actual meat. The bigger ones like this are usually cut into 5 pieces and stir-fried with the shells on.

Haha we finished everything, all of the 8 dishes and there were 8 people on our table. Price was quite reasonable and we will be back for more seafood soon! Good company and great food, what more can we ask for?? :)

Till then, take care everyone. I will be heading to Johor Bahru for a friend's wedding and we are going to Singapore for a couple of days, so will only update my blog when I am back.

Have a good one.

Wendy

Rojak, Laksa, ABC & Putu Piring

Sunday Ice Cafe, Melaka

September 15, 2009

Firstly, wishing all my Muslim friends "Selamat Hari Raya" today and happy holidays to my other friends!!

I remember during my younger days (not like I am quite old or anything- lah!), I used to come to this cafe quite often, especially it is opened by my granduncle and this cafe has been here for ages ever since I could remember. Anyway, it is located at Klebang, on the way to the Klebang Beach and towards Tanjong Keling area.

The rojak. I like this rojak, a different styled rojak and its pretty good. I always order mine with extra "taupok" (fried tofu). So good, especially cause the taupoks does a great job at absorbing all the sauces into them.

Mihun Laksa. Traditional home recipe from my grandaunt. They used to run this cafe on their own, but now my uncle is helping out too. The laksa is a milder version and the gravy is lighter than the usual fare. I have had this since young so I like the taste of it, perhaps it reminds me of my younger days? :)

ABC (Air batu campur) for dessert. We usually order their special dessert Number 1 ABC. But we wanted something lighter to share as this meal was just our pre dinner meal. Hahaha. This is good, we like it!

Next on the road, Mummy stopped and bought me another favourite snack of mine, Putu piring at Tengkera! This is the best putu piring in Melaka and we used to live just across this shop. The putu piring is 10/10, the gula melaka tastes just right and it was so fluffy and just awesome. Rm0.80 per piece.

A close up shot.

Before I get cursed from the low quality of the photos taken above, please bear in mind that all these were taken with my crappy old Nokia handphone with basic camera function. :) Have a good holiday to all! Cheers!!

My new found breakfast place, Section 17 PJ

Hello everyone, just to share a new discovery of a breakfast place nearby my place in Section 17, PJ. They serve the best Chang Jiang coffee in PJ I would say and we've been here many times and the food is great too!

This is one of the noodles variant that I had the other day, kuehtiow soup with fish paste and I ordered some extra pig's intestines to go with it. Oh it was a delicious combo! The fish paste was really good and those intestines were really good, was really fresh. The soup base was delicious too topped up with some fresh scallions and fried garlic.

Look at those intestines and fish paste combo. Awesome!
The tasty Chang Jian coffee! Oh it's a great alternative and much economical alternative to Starbucks.
They also serve the steamed kampung chicken. It was very smooth but for me, I prefer normal chicken to kampung chicken as the meat is more tender.

Dinner at Madam Kwan's and drinks at Vintry May 7,2009

It was a great night tonight, able to meet my two dearest friends from my Sunway College days and meeting up always turned out to be a rare opportunity as my gf, Mei Yee was always busy and always left me and CCY (the other guy in the picture that you will see later on) on our own. Haha, anyway it was always fun meeting them lot. For tonight's dinner we headed off to Mid Valley as CCY actually drove all the way for dinner from Bahau. We really appreciate his time , effort and of course plastic card! (thanks for paying the bills! :) )

I picked Madam Kwan's for something Malaysian as I was pretty sick with western food. Here we go, a photo of the ladies.

CCY and me.

3 of us together.

Claypot seafood beancurd to share.. It was quite nice.

I picked Nasi Bojari and they all ended up ordering the same! Delicious as usual! Yummy! Cost around RM24 if I am not mistaken. Huge portion just look at the whole chicken thigh.

We then headed off to Vintry, it's a wine bar nearby where I stayed and I kinda like it over there. CCY wanted to let me try their house cheesecakes as they did them in lychee and durians! He knows I would love to try anything with durian in it!

A bit of their deco and set up. Not too bad actually. Quite cosy.


Mei Yee, insisting to get me moving to the other side to take a photo, as it was her better (more hot) side. Haha, well you guys decide.
See how confident one is when they know its their best angle! :)

CCY and me again. What best angle? We looked great in any angles! Haha Mei Yee, don't get mad alright.
A glass of port for me and the lychee cheesecake and durian cheesecake for us to share. It was really good, we liked the lychee cheesecake as it was really unique and Mei Yee said it tasted like lychee. Haha she is really funny, we should probably label the cake next time and get her opinion again. Lychee cheesecake, of course taste like lychee LAH! :) The durian cheesecake was GOOD too. Thanks again CCY! Looking forward to the next outing!

Lychee on the left and durian on the right.

Lunch at Damansara Utama

My aunty took me to this restaurant nearby her office in Damansara Utama to try out the wan tan mee and this is just opposite Damansara Uptown and we had the yam cake for our starter and the homemade yam cake dipped with some chili sauce was really good!! Prices here are really reasonable too.

The Menglembu wan tan mee. I think it should be from a place or an area but whatever it is, it was good! Char siu was tasty and the noodles was abit springy or crunchy, accompanied by some nice wan tans. Overall, I will be back here again for sure!

Close up view. Yummy

Cendol & Hokkien mee, March 22, 2009

I took Belle for a swim at the municipal pool where I used to train during school days for a swim. It was good session and I hope to make it regular. After that, we headed for cendol with my aunty in Melaka Raya.
Below is a picture of the durian cendol. It was really good! First cendol in a long long time. A close up view. Mmmm.. delicious. Another good thirst quencher.

We went to KL after lunch and I went for dinner with Angela at a local favourite dinner place of mine when I used to work in KL.

Loh mee.

Hokkien mee at the Damansara Hokkien Mee. Oh I could eat this everyday! Brilliant!

Making curry puffs at home, March 20, 2009

After being pestered by my aunty and family at home, I decided to make some curry puffs to let them try and who knows, if the taste is good, maybe I could start selling some curry puffs to get some pocket money.

Below is how the curry puffs looked like. Its basically some pastry puff with curried potatoes with some bits of chicken in it.
I had a visitor earlier, Mummy took this cute siberian husky pup over to our place and he was so cute with blue eyes! The only downside was, Nugget (my dog) was quite angry when we saw us fussing with the new puppy. He ignored me for the rest of the afternoon until I carried him and took him for a walk. I think he could smell the different puppy smell on me and hence refused to come to me when I called for his name. Ha ha. Jealousy.

Measuring the flour.

Kneading the dough. Painful process for someone lazy like me.

My head chef checking on me. She was impressed at the end of the day. Good work for a beginner.

Rewarded myself with a plate of char kueh tiow after the hard work :) (shared it with Mum & Dad)

It tasted great. Just stir fried rice noodles with bean sprouts, chilli, egg and topped up with some sweet sauce. They should make this simple dish as a standard dish on the menu in all the restaurants around the world. That would be awesome!