My Brother's Garden - Penang

“Train up a fig-tree in the way it should go, and when you are old sit under the shade of it.”

Charles Dickens

"The ordinary acts we practice every day at home are of more importance to the soul than their simplicity might suggest."

(Thomas Moore)

"I hope that while so many people are out smelling the flowers, someone is taking the time to plant some."

(Herbert Rappaport)

"With coarse rice to eat, with water to drink, and my bended arm for a pillow - I have still joy in the midst of these things. Riches and honors acquired by unrighteousness are to me as a floating cloud."

(Kung Fu-Tze)

“True friends are like diamonds, precious and rare. False friends are like leaves, found everywhere.”

“Don't expect mangoes when you plant papayas.”

The Han Room, Gardens Mall - Kuala Lumpur

Kit from Singapore, but whose home town is Kuala Lumpur, has always sung the praises of the Han Room, an outlet of the Oriental Group. Ipoh-born Chef Justin Hor Chee Keong presides over the several restaurants in this group. I was more than curious when I found myself in the Gardens Mall, where the Han Room is located on the ground floor, when niece Su Hui and friends were coming to catch up with me. Cantonese in foundation, the cuisine offered has a twist, in presentation, taste and texture. The four of us had to wait on the sofa at the entrance as we did not book for lunch on a weekday. 

Kit had sent me the UOB Chef Menu, thoughtfully and delightfully contrived and chosen.  I got diverted, when I saw offerings like charcoal grilled Spanish pork roll;  crispy cod fish roll with pork floss; tea smoked farm chicken; and the braised Shatin chicken stuffed with liver suasage.  In the end, we settled for subtle tasting spare pork ribs grilled with pepper, accompanied by a selection of entrees.  They also had petite yum cha items like the steamed thousand layered cake; durian pudding; steamed cheong fun with unagi (eel); and the classic siew mai, but this time with pickled ginger and century old egg.  Above picture depicts a delicately balanced chicken perched on a dragon fruit slice base.  Critics observe the small portions of the dishes.

I reckon the Han Room offers Cantonese fare with a surprise, some fusion and innovation.

They offered foie gras with a delight, harmonising the goose aroma with sweet fruity sensations.

Traditional roast pork and red lined char siew were done well. We did not get dessert as we wanted to try a Taiwan outlet at the top floor of the nearby Mid Valley complex,  which had a sensational amber jelly concoction (we were not disappointed there as well).

The Han Room has been opeenedd since January 2011.  My impressions from my visit in June 2012 are:

Atmosphere:  Upmarket buzz.

Location:  Shopping centre.

Taste:  Good.

Service:  We had a dedicated staff look after our table

People Engagement: Attentive and interested.

Fav Dish Experienced:  Grilled spare pork ribs.

Best Time to Visit:  After a confirmed booking.

Would I Return?:  Yes.

St Ives, Sydney - Lunch Time

The apple crumble, pictured above, provided a fitting finale to a well made home meal hosted by Jennifer, cooked with the heart, infused with experienced care and devotion and utilising so many ingredients.  Crumbles have been a British and Irish institution, especially since the end of Wolrd War 2 and can be made with other fruits like plum, kiwi fruits, coconut, rhubarb, blackberries and peaches.  An even more interesting choice is for the toppings, whether they are broken biscuits, almonds, rolled oats or breakfast cereals.  Brown sugar is usually utilised to caramelise the toppings.

I was more than happy to have the crumble without any ice cream or cream.

Prawn slices pork rib cuts, vermicelli noodles and deep fried shallots are served in a stock soup above, in the classic Fujian dish, har mee.  The amount of prawn shells that goes into making an outstanding soup must be seen to be believed. The shells are pounded, stir cooked on the wok and then refined to be infused into the main stock.  The five of us at St Ives that arvo had an engaging time participating in conversation - Cheryl was visiting from Penang, An Qi came up from her Sydney University campus and both Janie and Jennifer has returned from a few weeks in south-western Europe.

The kueh seri muka has a layer of sumptious coconut milky topping over a pandanus flavoured glutinious rice base. (as photographed above)  Jennifer's version is yummy gulping, with gentle textures that are not overbearing on your palate. Vanilla bean paste can also be utilised instead of pandanus flavours. 

I reproduce the recipe from My Kitchen.blogspot.com website (all copyrights acknowledged):

Ingredients (8" x 8" tin):

Bottom Layer
250g Glutinous Rice, soaked for 4 hours and drained
170ml Thin Coconut Milk
¼ tsp Salt
Top Layer
2  Eggs
150g Castor Sugar
120ml Pandan Water (Blend about 10 pandan leaves with 120ml water)
400ml Coconut Milk
120g All-purpose Flour
3 tbsp Tapioca Flour
¼ tsp salt

Methods:

1. Bottom Layer: Steam glutinous rice with coconut milk and salt for 30 minutes. Rest for about 10 minutes, then transfer and press steamed rice onto a bottom of a 8" square pan.
2. Top Layer: Beat eggs with sugar until sugar is dissolved. Add in pandan water, coconut milk, salt and green colouring. Mix well.
3. Sift in flours and whisk till well combined. Strain the mixture and rest for 10 minutes.
4. Pour the mixture in the pan with pressed glutinous rice (1) and steam over medium heat for 30 minutes.
5. Cool completely before serving.

Vietnamese-styled drip coffee is served in a contraption unique in shape, inspired by the French and made practical by Indo-Chinese ingenuity.  Janie arranged the delightful process as seen in the photo above, and the taste was a strong combination of a dark brew served with stirred condensed milk. In this instance, I did not have the iced version (cafe da), which is popular in the several ASEAN nations, as the climate is equatorial.  In  St Ives that Saturday, we were well in the throes of an Australian east coast winter.  I was told that the French introduced coffeee to Vietnam and that now many of their youngsters are drinking Starbucks but still have a penchant for their local flavours.   Yes, the metal drip filter (that reminds me of a miniature hat) you see above can be small in size,  but does the trick.

Food Gems - Klang Valley, Malaysia

McCurry Noodles in Shah Alam , the capitalof Selangor State, has the unique proposition of being run by a Scotsman, Colin James Mcculloch, and his Penang Chinese wife.  Their version of this fav street food in the Klang Valley (and also in Australian capital cities) has a spicy kick, a rather wholesome soup and niftly cut chicken pieces served on the bone that somehow draws the flavours better.  (Image above).

I also highly recommend their accompanying teh tarik, lightly tinged with an cinnamon aftertaste. I was taken to try this for breakfast one weekend morning by Yew Ting and his youngest son. The cafe is located at 7, Jalan Juruaudit U1/37 in Section U1 of Shah Alam in Selangor State.

Walking around the Gardens Mall in Kuala Lumpur, I was captivated by two stores, one providing Haagen Dasz ice cream flavours (the Austin Chase above) and the other looking as cottage prettty as it can be (image below, the Delectable Cakes).
Austin Chase originates from Seattle, the home of Starbucks as well, and its main product is of course coffee.   Austin takes pride on the human element it emphasises to produce never bitter and full bodied coffee using all Arabica beans and utilises the Apassionato roasting process.  They also have outlets in Singapore and Penang Island.  The Gardens Mall outlet is one of seven in the Klang Valley of Selangor State.
Delectable Cakes by Su has delightful names for its main product categories  - Fruitcake Parcels, Little Men, Merry Men, Brownie Parcels and Happinuts.  Su studied Construction Management at the UNSW in eastern Sydney but then went to the NotterSchool of Pastry Arts in the USA.

In the proverbial search for the most tasty soy stirred egg noodles in Malaysia, I can now identify with one along  Jalan Juruaudit U1/37 in Section U1 of Shah Alam in Selangor State.  Okay, what a mouthful! Take the easy route, go to the curry laksa mentioned at the beginning of this blog entry and stand in front of this cafe.  Walk across to head around 2pm on an imaginary clock and you shall reach this place that offers charcoal grilled char siew (  Cantonese barbequed pork).  This version here stands above the rest and is better than the ones I find in Sydney and Melbourne.  They make it more juicy because they allow a little bit more fat in the meat chosen, but also the charcoal thing does make a difference.  When accompanied by egg noodles (picture above), the result for the palate is just unsurpassed.
I also recall the lovely roast pork, with crackling skin and moist meat, served at the dinner with university classmates on Sunday, 3rd of June 2012. Yew Ting , Yue Nin, Yit Chan, Susie Cheng, Siew Ngor and Soh Wah had each provided me a lively conversation on various topics for a resident in contempoary Kuala Lumpur. We were seated in an established restaurant, the Oversea at the Armada Hotel in Petaling Jaya - the Oversea Group has a long running reputation serving Cantonese cuisine in both Malaysia and Singapore.  I also noted the quality of the char siew.   This restaurant is also known for its signature claypot dishes with goat meat and braised pork ribs. I also had opportunity to try the steamed fish that evening, unique in its intensity of flavours.  My university mates and I settled somehow settled into a pace as if I had never left for Australia, and that is a treasure I appreciate so much.
One Thursday evening, cousin Lai Han took her Mum and me to a delightful coffee shop outlet, the Sang Choi Kei, along Jalan Kuchai Lama, in the Taman Desa area of Kuala Lumpur.  This gave me a treat of the KL styled Hokkien noodles stir fried with black soy sauce. Rich in taste, slurpy and delicious, my memory of such a dish harks back to university days. This is a specialty of KL, although there are replications of this all the way from New Zealand to the USA.  The same place also served Marmite marinated deep fried chicken, which was a recent discovery of mine in Sydney.

On a Wednesday evening, Kay Bee, Angie and Swee Yuen caught up with me for a late dinner at Pantai Seafood, located in Petaling Jaya in Kampung Sungai Kayu Ara.  I absolutely loved the deep fried pork knuckle, a signature dish that is different from the German version but tasty in its own way!  Another menu item we had was the mantou, the Chinese bread to accompany savoury mains  and this was just perfect to eat with the pork knuckle pieces.

Other dishes of note from Pantai are the otak otak tofu (interesting combination of Chinese and South-east Asian, otak otak being my fav steamed spicy fish fillet mousse wrapped in petite banana leaf packages); the Hakka-styled braised duck; baked pork ribs; stir fried Japanese snails, garnished with dried shrimps and chili padi; steamed clams from Scotland, tempered with minced garlic;  and the baked Alaskan crab with salted egg yolk.  Pantai is operated by the Unique chain of restaurants, which are also in Ipoh, Perak State and other spots in the Klang Valley (Cheras, Subang and Section 13 in Petaling Jaya).

Ole Ole Bali, Empire - Klang Valley, Malaysia

Bali conjures images of sultry seasides, the lingering aroma of Keretek (cloves) and a place where time moves at its own pace. The air is humid tropical, the food is spicy and the living can be easy. One wakes up wrapped in a  sarung, that delightful wardrobe that does allow air to flow through. One views the moon in the evening through different eyes. Bob took me to the Empire one evening in early June outside Kuala Lumpur, near the suburb of Subang Jaya, where amidst the shops in a modern shopping mall, a restaurant called Ole Ole Bali beckoned. Ole with the same spelling has been used by J.K. Rowlings and Mark Twain.  It is also the expression used by Spanish bullfighters in the bullring.

I was not disappointed by the saffron coloured rice, the centerpiece in my dinner set chosen. (picture above) Surrounding this were a variety of concoctions and a generous serve of marinated chicken. There were crispy bites of crackers, bits of fresh red chili, a sambal sauce, deep fried garlic, fresh shallot garnishings, beans, stir-fried local spinach (kangkong) and a Hainan -inlfuenced condiment, all laid on fresh banana leaves.  The restaurant was full of diners on this Friday evening and we sat outside.  We both had fruity and refreshing drinks served with fresh mint leaves. I noted nearby tables had deep fried wings as part of their cumi cumi goreng ( fried snacks like calamari).   Another dish that caught my eye was the nasi kambing bumbu, a combination set like what I had in the pictures shown here, but served with goat meat or lamb cutlets. 

The prices asked are above average but the menu does provide variety.  There are standard dishes like soup buntut (oxtail) and the es campur (ice shavings with sweet shredded cocount strips, honeydew bites, jackfruit, sago and banana blends),  but do try the sate lilit, which is seafood on a lemon grass flavoured skewer, accompanied by two types of sambal.  Surprisingly, Ole Ole Bali also offers Western styled meals, including pasta, which echoes the predominance of tourists for many years back on the island itself.  For dessert, they also  have the interesting combination of ice jelly with the flesh of the rambutan fruit.

The same chain has outlets in Sunway Pyramid, Solaris Mont Kiara and Mutiara Tropicana in the Klang Valley of Selangor.  My impressions of the visit to Ole Ole Bali at the Empire Shopping Centre, Subang Jaya, are:

Atmosphere:  Crowded, suburban.

Location:  Shopping centre

Taste:  Interesting, not quite Sumatra or Java.

Service:  Quick

People Engagement:  Acceptable

Fav Dish Experienced: Nasi ayam bumbu.

Best Time to Visit:  Early dinner.

Would I Return?:  Yes.