Canton-i @ 1Utama Shopping Centre PJ

Canton-i needs no introduction - for those who are familiar with KL's dining scene, they would know that this restaurant is another offspring of the people behind the highly successful Dragon-i chains. While the latter offers Shanghainese cuisine (including xiao long bao), the former serves Hong Kong style cuisine. I've been here countless times until I lost count and I rarely blogged about it as this place has been blogged to death! Given the fact that I only ordered a dish or two everytime I came here (and most of the times the same dish all over again... yes I'm predictable), I didn't feel like writing any post.

Until now - when there were more than 2 diners (4 this time and in this case, my in-laws), it meant more dishes and not the same boring post. Its interior was mostly white with Oriental theme.

Most of the time when there's elderly around, a pot of Chinese tea is a MUST - in our case, a pot of Oolong priced at RM10 per pot.

A huge lemongrass fan - how could I resist ordering the lemongrass with iced jasmine tea? A bit pricey at RM10.80 per glass though!

Deep fried pork intestine and fish congee (RM11.80) was shared between all of us. The intestine and fried fritters were served separately to ensure their crispy-ness.. how thoughtful! As usual, the congee's texture was silky smooth and flavourful which won the elders' approval.

Apart from that, we also had the 3 combinations of roasted meat (RM32.00) - char siew, roasted duck and siew yoke. I found that all the 3 meats were good - just enough to be shared among us.

However, the siew yoke stood out from the other two - I love its crispy skin plus the 50/50 ratio of lean and fat meat. Crackling sound could be heard once I took a bite on the delectable meat.

Grilled eggplant with special meat sauce was definitely another dish worthy of mentioning. My love affair with eggplant started during my university years. I just loved how this aubergine plant absorbed all the flavours that are used to cook this dish. The sauce was flavourful but not too salty and I could taste the sauce with each and every bite of the eggplant.

Braised garoupa belly with garlic and pork belly (RM32.00) was another hit - the fresh & flaky garoupa meat combined very well with the sinful pork belly.

To balance our rather heavy dinner, we ordered the stir fried lotus roots with celery and macadamia nuts (RM16.80).

Leo's verdict - to be honest, I had better and if you asked me, I could even mention which place with the best char siew, siew yoke and roasted duck. But then, those good places are quite far from where I live. Plus you can get all 3 varieties under one roof. For the prices, the dishes are definitely not cheap but it's convenient (inside a shopping mall) because it's near my place.

Canton-I
G-208, Ground Floor
1-Utama Shopping Centre
Bandar Utama
Petaling Jaya

Disclaimer:
1) I'm not paid to promote/endorse any particular event, restaurant or person in this blog. ALL are based on my unbiased personal opinion.
2) My reviews are based on my personal taste and preference and therefore may vary for others.

Vietnam Kitchen @ 1Utama Shopping Centre

Mention that you want to go to 1Utama on weekends and the image of being caught in a massive jam came to mind. Well, unless you go there early in the morning. Imagine that you want to relax and shop in the comfort of a shopping mall only to be greeted with the sight of everyone jamming into the mall, and you had to spend a very long time just to secure a parking spot (unless you are really lucky!!). Once I took about 45 minutes just to find one and it was so freaking far away from the entrance... sigh!!! But now 1Utama turn out to be my favourite place to go :) why? All because parking is not an issue anymore!

My first time here was with a customer but since I was on official business, I could not simply whip out my camera. But that's different story when I'm with family... wherever I go these days, I would bring along my camera. The HM didn't complain when I was with Ixus but now started to make noise as I have changed to bigger and bulkier Canon EOS DSLR :P anyway, that's another story altogether...

Vietnam Kitchen is located on the 2nd Floor of the new wing of 1Utama Shopping Centre, which is on the same row as Chili's and Dragon-i. Its menu is placed at the entrance for passerbys to peruse.

Its inside was spacious and cosy.

Contemporary design mixed with some traditional elements was used as decor.

Grilled lemongrass pork chop set @ RM16.90 - comprises of Vietnamese spring roll, a bowl of soup, salad, egg, and rather thin piece of pork chop. Forget about the soup, the salad was mediocre at best, spring roll was good but slightly oily. The pork chop however has a distinct lemongrass flavour and slightly charred. It would have been perfect it it was a little bit thicker and tender. For someone who loves lemongrass and pork, this is a must-try item.

Vietnamese Sesame Chicken @ RM12.90 - essentially it's some kind of deep fried chicken coated with caramelised sauce and sesame seed. Crispy on the outside while moist on the inside, this dish won us over with its sweetish taste and the aroma of sesame.

Cucumber lemon soda @ RM6.90 - odd combination but rather refreshing :)

Leo's verdict - To be honest, Vietnamese food is not really on top of my eat-list but I was in for a surprise. It changed my perception and now whenever I crave for Vietnamese food, either this place or DuViet (Uptown 37) will be my choice.

Vietnam Kitchen
Lot S312, 2nd Floor,
1 Utama Shopping Centre,
Lebuh Bandar Utama,
47800 Petaling Jaya
Tel:03-7724 1336

Disclaimer:
1) I'm not paid to promote/endorse any particular event, restaurant or person in this blog. ALL are based on my unbiased personal opinion.
2) My reviews are based on my personal taste and preference and therefore may vary for others.

Journey to Ipoh Day 1 - Bagan Pasir, Teluk Intan & Kampar (Part 1)

The clock was ticking! Once the prince comes out, Jenn & I knew that we can't afford to travel like this anymore. We will be grounded at least for 6 months... yup! Having children is not easy and requires a lot of responsibilities (as parents), and let's not forget countless of sleepless nights. Throw in the stress when the baby gets sick and it completes (more or less) the nightmare of being someone else's dad or mom :P when Sher Ryn came into my world, she really tested my patience. I admit that being someone with short temper, I got upset whenever she behaved badly... but she also melted my heart when she smiled. Now I can't even imagine on how to take care of 2 little children!

One month or so before Keith came into our lives, both of us had the opportunity to travel to Ipoh - business purpose and to attend my friend's wedding. We took off from PJ after having light breakfast - we wanted to save space for the seafood feast later in Bagan Pasir. YES :) to the one that everyone has been raving about! Locating this place wasn't hard, as I had gone for rekki few months earlier while on my way up North (business trip).

To be honest, this place looked a bit rundown and the makeshift wooden public toilet was still there - you'd know where the residue would end up at... lol! You would also notice that they have renovated part of their restaurants into swiftlet's house.

It was rainy season during the time we went to Suang Le so there wasn't much live seafood to see... all the makeshift plastic tanks that you'd pass by on the way into the restaurant were mostly empty. I only saw some flower crabs and clams. To our worries, we asked the waitress if there was any other seafood available... and we sighed with relief when she said YES.

We chose to sit in the back part of the restaurant that overlooks the river and fishing boats. This part was definitely cooler and windier compared to the front part.

Purposely took this picture in Black & White to make it nostalgic (^_^) love this one!

Feel free to help yourself to get all the things that you need for lunch - spoon & fork, chopstick, glass, bowl, plate, etc...

After taking our orders, they brought in a basket of prawn crackers. I wonder if those were FOC :P feeling hungry, we grabbed a packet and I tore it open with my teeth. Very good tasting indeed!

The first dish - Steamed clams with ginger shreds, cili padi and fried onions - wow-ed us! The fresh and succulent clams were prepared in a simple way and the best part was that the stock (soup) at the bottom of the stainless steel plate was oh-so sweet & savoury!

Next was salt-baked prawns & mantis prawns. In fact, those were the very last remaining mantis prawns that they had, since supply had dwindled during the rainy season. Perfect choice I'd say. Not overly salty, the crunchy prawns were so delicious that I ended up devouring the shell too but since the shell of mantis prawn was harder, I didn't attempt to do so.

to our delight, both meats were fresh, juicy (moist) and sweet. A closer look at the peeled mantis prawn (Jenn was my hand model). A right choice to order the prawns prepared this way as I could taste the natural sweetness of the flesh. If they have any more of those mantis prawn in stock, we would have ordered the second plate.

Instead of the usual white rice, we opted for seafood fried rice that was full of wok hei & non-oily. Throw in egg and prawn bits and it was good enough.

Their Kung Pao baby squid deserved a special mention. This was one of the best Kung Pao sauce that I've ever tasted in my life! The sticky, sweet and not overly spicy sauce enveloped each and every baby squids in the plate. At the end of the meal, I was still turning the curry leaves and onions away in the hope of finding the very last piece of the squids.

Take a closer look at me! You want to taste me.. don't ya? I'm very crunchy you know? :P

The Kam Heong crab came highly recommended by the waitress and it didn't disappoint at all. Lucky for us, the shell was crushed as they didn't provide any utensil to pry open the thick and hard shell at all. Its flesh was good and sweet too!

Our steamed red snapper with soybean paste sauce was the only thing that we did not like. Even though the fish meat was fresh and flaky, the sauce was disappointingly bland and very starchy.

In the end, we finished almost everything except for the fish and some fried rice. The waitress who took our orders earlier was actually surprised as she said that the portion that Jenn & I had could easily serve at least 4-5 people. We were feeling greedy obviously :P

Leo's verdict - we definitely had ordered too much food than we could handle. In the end, the bill came at slightly less than RM100 which we considered dirt cheap.. judging at the amount of seafood that we ordered. even though the river was not exactly clean and you could literally see a lot of garbage/waste washed up the river bank, the great food makes up to the flaws. It was rather windy that day so both of us could dine while the cool breeze swept through our faces. I could not ask for a more better companion when it was Jenn who enjoyed the seafood feast with me.

Directions to Suang Le River Restaurant @ Bagan Pasir (from Kuala Selangor towards Sekinchan/Sabak Bernam) : After passing by Kuala Selangor town, drive for a good 15 minutes or so. Take note of a signboard to Kg. Bagan Pasir on the left side of the road. Turn left at a rather sharp curve to some residential area. Go straight until you reach a junction at the end, and keep to your left. You’ll see a row of houses built on stilts on your right, with reasonable amount of trash washed up on the grounds. After a while, you’ll see Suang Le River’s signboard on the right (taken from J2kfm's blog... thanks bro!)

Other posts on suang Le River Seafood Restaurant:
Precious Pea
Masak-Masak
J2kfm Motormouth from Ipoh

Suang Le River Restaurant & Karaoke
Bagan Pasir, 45500
Tanjong Karang, Selangor, Malaysia
Tel No : +6019-690 6788 or +6019-233 5296

Opens for lunch and dinner.

Disclaimer:
1) I'm not paid to promote/endorse any particular event, restaurant or person in this blog. ALL are based on my unbiased personal opinion.
2) My reviews are based on my personal taste and preference and therefore may vary for others.

XO @ IOI Business Park, Puchong

October has been a relatively busy month for me... business generally peaked starting from this month until Chinese New Year and therefore, I had to be more aggressive in marketing as well as sourcing for materials. Not an easy task considering that I have to pay cash for materials to my suppliers while giving terms (ranging from 2 weeks to 2 months) to my customers. Business was so bad in 2008 & 2009 that it had quite an impact on my company during the 2 years period. Oh well... this year is better and hopefully I can get it back on track!

As most of you already know, Puchong has come a long way to become on of the busiest area in Klang Valley. I could still remember how it looks like back in 1997 when I came to study. Then I lived in this area for a few years till 2006 before moving to PJ. Now my sisters are occupying in the house in Puchong. Fast forward to 2010... having spent most of my time in PJ area, I hardly went back to Puchong. But there were times when I missed my siblings so much.

One of my suppliers informed me that he had opened a Shabu-shabu styled restaurant in the new IOI Business Park Puchong. I took the opportunity to ask them out for dinner to catch up on each other & at the same time, to try out this new place. As soon as they knew that I was footing the bill, they dressed up faster than a rocketship and joined me there.

Named XO, it wasn't hard to locate this outlet as it was facing outwards next to the old shoplots in Bandar Puchong Jaya. There was still some tables available and we quickly looked for a table inside the restaurants, as I couldn't stand the heat outside.

Its interior was brightly lid with tables and chairs placed closely to each other in order to utilise its space - something I'm not fond of as it could get crampy once full capacity was reached!

One thing for sure was that they have numerous choices of dipping sauces for you to choose.

All you have to do is to pick what you want to eat and bring it to your table... you will be spoilt with the choices

Choose your soup base - we had the chicken soup, herbal soup and also tomyam soup. Forget about the tomyam and stick to the former two.

Some of the fraction of what my sisters and brother had taken... starting with thinly sliced pork strips.

Wantan filled with minced pork meat.

Abalone slice.. normally I wouldn't order this but they took at least 3 plates!!!

Fried fu chuk... fresh from the kitchen and we were one of the fortunate fews (as we sat near the kitchen) to be able to get our hands on these. Crispy and non-oily!

Bittergourd with minced pork stuffing

I forgot its name but it was good!

Didn't have time to take all the pictures of what we had eaten so I walked to where they put all the food and started snapping :)

My 2 beautiful little sisters.. don't let their petite size fool you! Their appetites are bigger than mine.

Leo's verdict - according to the boss (who was so busy attending customers), they prepared the food using the freshest possible ingredients. However, the price didn't come cheap as I forked out RM200++ at the end of the meal. Judging at the amount of food and type of food that we had taken, I'd say that it was a little expensive but the freshness of the food justified the pricetags. Located right next to The Pork Place, parking is rather hard to find as Puchong Jaya is always congested days and nights!

XO Shabu-Shabu
No A-GR-33A, IOI Boulevard
Jalan Kenari 5, Bandar Puchong Jaya
47170 Puchong, Selangor.
Tel: 8076 5348

P.S: Non-halal

Disclaimer:
1) I'm not paid to promote/endorse any particular event, restaurant or person in this blog. ALL are based on my unbiased personal opinion.
2) My reviews are based on my personal taste and preference and therefore may vary for others.

Famous Seremban Favourites @ Aman Suria

"Dear! Do you know that the boss of this place is actually a MBA holder?" Jenn asked me as we arrived at the famous FSF one morning. "How do you know that?" I asked her. And she cheekily replied "Now that's the difference between a Chinese educated and a banana boy". She promptly showed me the newspaper cuttings pasted in front of the entrance.

I know that FSF (short form for Famous Seremban Favourites) has been around for quite some time now. Why not? This place (and another char siew stall in 747 which is also in Aman Suria) has been blogged to death by now. Just Google the name and you shall be rewarded with all the results.

For those who do not know this place, it can put a doubt in your head if you come here on weekends as it looked pretty deserted (just look at my picture). Plastic tables and chairs took up most of the space as normally this place would be packed during lunch time on weekdays.

Fret not! If you have second thoughts, simply look at the row of char siew hanging together in lines waiting to be chopped into pieces and you'd probably start drooling. The barbequed sauce (or was it oil?) was still dripping down as I took the pictures.

Other dishes that this place offers!

Our orders didn't take a long time to arrive as we were practically the first few customers of the day! My plate of wantan mee with char siew & siew yoke was the first to arrive. Compared to the 747 (or SFS to some people), the mee tasted much better here as it was softer and spring-ier. It even tasted better with the accompanying mix of sauces. Siew yoke was ordinary so nothing much to talk about that. The piece de resistance, of course, would be the famed char siew. Perfectly marinated and caramelised, it had the same melt-in-the-mouth texture as the 747. The slightly charred edges of the char siew provided the much-needed smoky flavour that I adore. This picture didn't do the char siew any justice as I requested for leaner part of the char siew but believe me, you will be sent straight to cloud nine if you opt for the sought after "half lean half fat" char siew (bun fei sau in Cantonese).

Being a Hakka, Jenn ordered the Hakka mee together with the char siew. While the noodle's texture and colour is similar to wantan mee, Hakka mee normally comes with minced meat and oil (almost no gravy although there are other versions of Hakka mee throughout the country.. such as the famous Chong Ko noodle in Kuala Lipis that Axian covered in his program). Paired together with the delicious char siew, these two were simply a perfect match!

Beverages were OK although not flavourful enough to my liking.

Leo's verdict - I have been coming back for a few times after my first visit not only because of the char siew but of the dining environment. to those who have gone to both 747 and FSF, you'd know by now that you have to sit by the roadside at 747 (as it was rather hot and stuffy to sit inside) but in FSF, the place was clean, comfortable and most importantly, airy! I was not sweating at all at the end of the meal (it's a different story in 747). Although I still prefer 747's version of char siew, the char siew in Famous Seremban Favourites is not far behind in terms of taste plus the noodle is definitely better than the 747!!! Other than char siew, FSF also serves meatball and fishball without any preservatives! coming here on weekends is a breeze but prepared for chaos if you come here on weekdays!

P.S: Non-halal

Restoran Famous Seremban Favourites
80-1 Ground Floor, Jalan PJU 1/3B
Sunway Mas Commercial Centre
47301 Petaling Jaya
Tel: 017-279 8582

Disclaimer:
1) I'm not paid to promote/endorse any particular event, restaurant or person in this blog. ALL are based on my unbiased personal opinion.
2) My reviews are based on my personal taste and preference and therefore may vary for others.