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Kin Kin Pan Mee at Pandan Indah
I love a good serving of pan mee and the different textures it combines – the smooth, soft noodles with the crunch of ikan bilis and saltiness of mince. Add some chilli and its food perfection! I also always have mine dry as that way I get to choose exactly how much soup I want. My girlfriend,oops, new fiancee! had been telling me how much she wanted to try the pan mee at Kin Kin so we thought we’d go check it out and see what it was like. The place was full when we arrived but we were lucky enough to get a table and so sat down and made our order then waited for our pan mee. When we got it, it looked sooooo tasty and we were very impressed with one of the things its famous for – a soft poached egg on top that has a yolk that runs everywhere when you poke it with your chopsticks!
It was also topped with deliciously crispy ikan bilis and a good amount of tasty pork mince. The noodles were so soft and fresh and are the rounder noodles rather than the wide flat noodles often served. I was also quick to put some of their special chilli sauce made from dried chillis on top of my pan mee and it gave a fantastic flavour – instead of being just burning hot, it still had heat but also lifted the flavour of the dish and went so well with the saltiness of the meat and ikan bilis.
The soup was also very nice and had a slight peppery bite to it that was a great partner to the chilli I’d just used. It was nice to taste a soup that had some flavour rather than so many of the soups that seem to lack flavour. All the added extras also gave it a more pleasant texture rather than being just a clear soup on its own.
All in all, for 6rm, this isn’t the cheapest pan mee you’ll find, but it is worth the money to have a deliciously runny egg go all over your pan mee and mix with some chilli. Its a fantastic flavour combination and really does work well. It was so enjoyable to have a mouthful of food featuring the softness of the noodles, the crunch and saltiness of the mince and ikan bilis, as well as the added flavour of egg all combined with the chilli heat. For this reason, I’ll definitely be coming back again and like I say, while it isn’t the cheapest pan mee, it is definitely worth paying the extra 1-2rm for this tasty treat!
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Cheesecake and coffee from Secret Recipe Pandan Indah
So,this being my first post using my early Christmas present (a Blackberry from my Mum and Dad-thankyou!),I thought I’d do a quick post on what I just had for afternoon tea. Now I know Secret Recipe is a large franchise which will immediately turn a lot of people off since it’s not a ‘hidden gem’ or ‘secret find’ etc,but I like to look at it for what it is – a franchise restaurant specialising in cakes – nothing more, nothing less. While not all of their cakes take my fancy – some are a bit too sweet – there are those that I love such as the green tea cheesecake, chocolate indulgence and their durian cakes. Today I tried their new classic cheesecake which is a basic baked style of cheesecake with a chocolate base and what’s described as ‘meringue’ on top. It’s not a classic meringue and is of a more creamy texture,but it really goes well with the cheese filling and chocolate base. The texture was also rather light which is in contrast to some other cheesecakes which can be very heavy to eat. It was also very nice with my white coffee which I must admit I have been pleasantly surprised with on my last two visits. It’s been quite smooth and hasn’t had the bitterness that so often spoils coffee bought in KL. In direct comparison to some other Secret Recipe outlets I also have to say this has the smoothest coffee,whether it’s from fresher beans,cleaner machines,better barista skills or a bit of each. All in all,a pleasant afternoon tea made even better by their offer of a free hot drink with every cake slice between 3-6pm.
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Afternoon Tea at the Ritz Carlton Kuala Lumpur
High tea is one of the real pleasures that food has to offer. The reason I say this is that it will usually give you the chance to try many more items than if you were to have a normal meal and as they say, variety is the spice of life! Bearing this in mind, my girlfriend and I spent a lot of time looking around Kuala Lumpur and deciding which high tea to try, pricing lots of different places before finally deciding on the Ritz Carlton’s Lobby Lounge due to its timeless style and very well priced high tea – 68rm per each set which can be shared between two people. Some people would prefer to have a whole high tea set to themselves, however on this day we were content with nibbling away on the various little treats that would appear before us rather than setting out to stuff our stomachs.
The first choice to make was which tea we wanted. They have a fantastic selection of teas – over 40! - that cover everything from strong teas (lapsang souchong) through to sweet desert style teas (strawberry). We chose vanila flavoured black tea as we thought it would have a nice smooth flavour that would go with everything we ate. While waiting for out tea to be served, it was fantastic to just sit back in the comfortable chairs and look around the lounge area which is made of beautiful various tones of wood and decorated nicely with a number of paintings and also features classical styled furniture. It really feels as though you are in a true 5 star hotel and the ambience is also nice and relaxing. Once our tea came out, we were very impressed with the depth of flavour it had, a true vanilla infusion which was backed up by a very nice and smooth black tea flavour, the vanilla fragrance of the tea was also fantastic.
After having a taste of our tea we were then super excited to see our three tier high tea spread arrive featured a variety of freshly made treats. The top level featured a quiche lorraine and chicken and corn pie. The middle featured a cucumber and mascarpone sandwich, ham and camembert open sandwich and a smoked salmon, capers and fish roe open sandwich. The bottom level had sweet treats including a chocolate and strawberry eclair, freshly made scone, macadamia honey shortcake with strawberry mouse and chocolate jelly, mango cheesecake with chocolate border, berry macaroon, and also – a berry tart complete with 24 karat gold leaf!
We begun with the savoury treats including the quiche lorraine which had a beautifully fresh and flaky pastry encasing the tasty filling and the chicken and corn pie which was also fantastic – so fresh and it also had proper pieces of chicken instead of the minced chicken so many cheaper quality pies have. After finishing the top tier we moved onto the middle on and started on the ham and camembert open sandwich.
While this was a miniature sized sandwich, the level of detail given was fantastic. It featured multi coloured lettuce, a thick wedge of beautifuly strong camembert and a slice of ham which was topped with a neat looking piece of micro herb. The variety of flavours and textures contained in such a small piece of food was amazing and really shows that its better to go for quality over quantity. Next after this was the salmon, capers and fish roe sandwich.
Once again, the level of detail was amazing, with a slice of beautiful smoked salmon placed over a bed of lettuce before being topped with capers, orange fish roe and micro herb. I found this to offer a flavour that I’d never experienced before, with the smoky flavour of the salmon matching perfectly with the sharper salty flavour of the capers before finishing with a ‘pop’ of flavour from within each small piece of fish roe. It was a true showcase for exactly what flavour matching can achieve. After finishing all the savoury treats we then went onto the sweets, beginning with the scone.
Being a long time fan of scones I was looking forward to this and it didn’t disappoint! It had a nicely light texture and wasn’t dense like so many worse scones are and it tasted fantastic with the beautiful jam and delightfully thick cream that is also offered as part of afternoon tea.
Then we moved onto the beautiful chocolate and strawberry eclair which was probably the richest desert of the day, with thick dark chocolate covering the soft choux pastry which was filled with a very nice strawberry mousse. Next after this was the chocolate edged mango cheesecake which we had a great time eating – first eating the chocolate border piece by piece before savouring the chopped mango combined with the tasty cheesecake underneath. It was a very refreshing cheesecake and the dark chocolate tasted beautiful with the mango. Following this we then got to savour the honey macadamia shortcake with berry mouse and chocolate jelly. Of all the deserts, this one had the greatest depth of flavour and was perfectly balanced – the tartness of the berry mousse went wonderfuly with the honey macadamia and the chocolate jelly was the perfect sweet flavour to complement both. It was another fantastic flavour explosion! We then moved onto our second last treat which was the gold leafed berry tart. This had the most novelty value out of anything we ate since neither of us had ever eaten gold leafing before! It was a very attractice garnish which contrasted very well visually with the bright red of the strawberrys which filled a crispy pastry case. The final treat of the day we the berry macaroon which my girlfriend had been eagerly awaiting. It was everything a macaroon should be, crumbly but yet slightly sticky in the middle and also had a very fresh berry flavour. However, this was probably a touch too sweet for me, as I personally don’t have a super sweet tooth but if you’re someone who does, then this would be fantastic. Overall, we both agreed that this was fantastic value for a number of reasons – the beautiful, classy surroundings; the fact that we had our teapot refilled 4 times (free refills) and the leaves still had flavour; the food was beautifuly fresh and tasty; the price was very affordable for a treat. So if you’re looking for a place to have afternoon tea in KL, whether its for a special occasion or just a treat, then I can definitely recommend the Ritz Carlton.
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Chicken With Feta Stuffed Sweet Chilli Pepper
I felt like doing a bit of inventing tonight and was after ideas for something that would go well with chicken breast, so after going to the local fruit and vegie shop I thought of the following – chicken breast with a home-made sauce made of tomato, onion and mushroom accompanied by a whole sweet chilli pepper with the inside filled with feta cheese. I love the way that tomato goes with chicken and onions and mushrooms are also amongst my favourite ingredients so I thought I’d work towards making a nice pan-reduced sauce that would have a range of different flavours and textures. I was also excited about making the feta stuffed chilli using the large yellow peppers as I’d never done such a thing before and knew that feta tastes grat with chicken. I got excited just by looking at the beautiful fresh vegies I’d just bought and couln’t wait to use!
I chose to use red onion as it has a bit more of a bite than brown onion and its flavour tends to stand out a bit more when mixed with other ingredients. So after chopping up all the vegies, I first sauteed the onion in a small amount of olive oil until soft, then put in the chopped tomatoes to give them plenty of time to soften and mix well with the onion. Last to be put into the mix was the mushroom as I wanted it to not have shrunk too much before being eaten, as can easily happen. While mushroom does have a delicious flavour, it can lose the strength of flavour if cooked for too long and it only takes a bit of extra cooking time to make it hard to notice in the dish. After cooking the chicken breast, I then prepared the stuffed chilli pepper by cutting it in half length-ways and then placing it on the plate before filling it with some tasty feta cheese.
After doing this, I then placed the cooked chicken breast on the plate and spooned on the sauce which after enough cooking time had reduced down to a beautiful texture which was tomato based with small pieces of soft onion and nicely cooked mushroom throughout.
When combined with a piece of the feta stuffed chilli it was very tasty, the crunchy chilli bringing a nice different texture and the feta tasting fantastic with the chicken. I was really happy this all came together and it sure is encouraging when your own food invention works!
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Home Made Pasta
I’ve never made my own pasta before and so after getting a cookbook full of tasty looking pasta recipes, I couldn’t wait to have a go. So tonight was the night and I decided to make some pappardelle which is basically very wide fettucine. I thought this would be a good starting point before I had a go at making filled pasta such as ravioli. So first of all, I mixed the flour and eggs together and then kneaded it until it was a smooth, round ball of dough which is pictured below.
After this, I then left the dough to rest for 30 minutes before I had the task of hand-rolling it. This is made a lot easier and more precise if you have a pasta machine – which I don’t, so I had to resort to using a good old rolling pin. Its made much harder by the fact that the pasta has to be rolled out to be very thin, which involves a lot of rolling and turning. After having done this until it was the desired thickness, then cut it into strands of pappardelle ready to be put into the salted boiling water on the stove.
Just prior to putting the pasta in the boiling water I had also put my sauce on to cook in some olive oil in a saucepan. It consisted of mushroom, tomatoes and onions – a basic but very tasty combination that smelt fantastic.
By the time the pasta had finished cooking, which was only a few minutes, the sauce was perfect and ready to be put on top of the pasta. After putting it in a warmed pasta bowl – to stop it going cold too quickly – I put the freshly cooked sauce on and finished it off with plenty of delicious stuffed green olives to give even more flavour!
The result? Well, I’d never eaten freshly made pasta before and it was so delicious and tasted so different to store-bought pasta. The flavour and texture of the pasta itself was so vibrant and enjoyable and the sauce went really well, with all the various flavours working together nicely, always ending with the yummy strength of the green olive flavour. I was really happy with how this went and can’t wait to make it again!
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Chong Ko Hakka Noodle
My girlfriend and I have developed a really good tradition for Saturday eating – having Hakka noodles at Chong Ko in Pandan Indah. Its location means its only a 10 minute walk away and this walk is also great for letting the food settle in your stomach afterwards.
We’ve also developed our usual order which is original Hakka noodles – mine with fish balls and my girlfriend’s with pork balls, and a bowl of dumplings as well as Chinese tea. The noodles are always a delight to eat and today was no exception.
The noodles were as usual, made perfectly. They have a delicious firmness which shows their freshness and allows you to enjoy their delightful flavour which simply doesn’t happen when noodles are overcooked. The key here is that these are freshly made noodles, and this is indeed the beauty of the dish. Some people would say that this dish isn’t salty enough or doesn’t have enough sauce, but I definitely disagree with this as I believe that it is the simplicity of the flavours involved that actually allows them to be enjoyed fully. I think there is no need to mask such beautiful noodles with a sauce that will do nothing but take over the whole dish. The pork mince used is also very tasty and another good thing is that it isn’t even greasy as a lot of pork mince is. It too has quite a simple basic seasoning which has a pleasant mild flavour and saltiness to perfectly complement the noodles and spring onions which are used as a garnish. Their own chilli sauce is used and is fantastic too! Its a hot chilli sauce with a slight mustard texture which is a great addition when drizzled over the top of the dish and allowed to go all through the noodles into the soup at the bottom.
The fish balls that come with the noodles arrive in a clear soup and also feature the use of spring onion. The soup is quite tasty in comparison to others I’ve had and is nice enough to have on its own. I think the people at Chang Ko have really achieved something here because I generally do not like fish balls, but truly enjoy these ones due to the fact that in comparison to so many others which are basically like rubber, these are fresh and pleasant to eat. Their pleasant texture also gives way to a nice flavour which is neither too weak nor too strong for the palette but is in flavour harmony with the noodles and mince that it accompanies.
Next out were the dumplings, which quite simply could not have been any better. Its amazing how much freshness improves the flavour of food and I believe that this is a huge part of why all the food we have had here tastes so good. The dumplings are packed full of pork, mushroom and carrot and wrapped in a delightfully soft skin that melts in the mouth. What I enjoy about these dumplings is taking a bite and having the soft texture of the skin give way to the firmness and crunch of carrot, followed by the smoothness of pork and mushroom. To have so many different textures and flavours all in one mouthful really is a treat and one that I couldn’t enjoy more. As with the Hakka noodles, there is no strong sauce, no overabundance of salt – instead there is a chef who has the faith to provide a dish which can rely on the simplicity of its flavours to be enjoyable. This really was a very enjoyable lunch and as mentioned I love the fact that the food is not covered in sauce and salt and other additives but is instead made with quality ingredients. What a great way to enjoy Saturday!
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Croque Madam at Delicious Bangsar
Recently on their Facebook page I saw that Delicious was advertising their new breakfast sets for only 9.90++. Being a fan of Delicious I thought this would be another great reason to go there to eat and so headed down to their Bangsar branch. Personally, I like Delicious since their decor is bright and airy and it manages to successfully walk the fine line between being pleasant and pretentious and despite hearing other stories to the contrary, I have always had good service there and found the staff to be pleasant. So back to the two choices – there was Nasi Lemak Ayam Rendang or Croque Madam. For those who aren’t familiar, a croque madam is in Delcious’ case two pieces of bread with turkey ham as filling and then topped with a cheese sauce and poached egg. Being a cheese lover I thought I HAD TO have the Croque Madam and wasn’t disappointed when it arrived.
Firstly, I was very impressed with how big it was when it arrived since I was super hungry and couldn’t wait to dig in! The bread was very nice, grilled and nice and crunchy while the turkey ham brought a nice difference in texture and a pleasant saltiness. I was also soooooo pleased to see that the egg had been poached perfectly to my liking – with a super runny yolk that spilled everywhere and tasted fantastic! However, as far as I was concerned, the hero of the dish was without a doubt the beautiful cheese sauce which was made with four cheeses, all of which are of a different style – cheddar, parmesan, mozzarella and gruyere. Combining all of these together resulted in a sauce that had a fantastic smooth texture from the mozarella, creaminess from the gruyere, slight bite in flavour from the cheddar and extra body from the parmesan. To be able to combine these all was great and was honestly one of the nicest things I had eaten for breakfast for quite some time. The way I could cut some bread, dip it in the egg yolk and then some of the cheese sauce was soooooo nice. It was allso the perfect portion size – enough to fill me up but not to the point of being weighed down and heavy. So for around 11.50 nett it really is fantastic value and oh yeah – it also includes a glass of orange juice which makes it even better value!
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Campfire Cooking!
While I was looking through my hard drive at my pictures, I found these ones from camping at Mount Eccles, an extinct volcano in Victoria, Australia. They brought back a lot of fond memories, and in particular about the fantastic food you can eat while camping regardless of the ingredients used. Before my girlfriend and I set off, we had a big bag full of food packed by my Mum which was fantastic, kinda like a camping picnic!
The food we had was varied and included canned Irish stew, maggi mee, bread, potatoes, corn chips, salsa and fruit. I’ve always loved camp cooking and found it amusing to hear how frustrating other people find it. Amongst the common complaints are ‘It takes too long,’ ‘It’s too hot,’ ‘It stinks,’ and many more. But for me, the experience of building up a nice fire, then waiting for it to burn down to nice white coals to use for cooking is one of the most relaxing experiences possible. Its equally enjoyable on your own or with your friends and is lots of fun in hot or cold weather – although the heat from the fire is more appreciated in winter!
Campground picnic table and fireplace
Beautiful white-hot coals ready for cooking!
So, what we decided to cook for our dinner that night was basically a campfire mix of a few things that we mixed together. Maggi mee mixed in with the Irish stew and heated over the fire, as well as jacket potatoes that had been roasted buried under the hot coals for over an hour and were beautifully soft and tasty. In the jacket potatoes by girlfriend decided to get creative and put in some corn chips and then some salsa on top to create a kind of Mexican jacket potato. It certainly wasn’t a typical meal to eat but it tasted fantastic! It’s amazing how cooking over a fire brings a delicious smoky flavour that makes things taste even better than usual, combined with the fact that the fire was made largely from Eucalyptus trees which have a fantastic fresh fragrance in their leaves. The potatoes were fantastic, their skins had become perfectly smoked due to the coals and were crispy and tasty while the flesh on the inside was soft and tasted fantastic with the salsa.
Our yummy campfire dinner – complete with picnic table cloth!
We were so happy with this meal that when I woke up the next morning, I built another nice Eucalyptus fire, waited for it to turn to coals and then started to cook some more potatoes before my girlfriend got up to help prepare everything else. It also turned out just as nice as the previous night and was truly a great way to start what turned out to be a fantastic day of bushwalking in beautiful scenery.
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My First Attempt At Pandan Chicken!
I love chicken and the way it can be used in so many different ways. Virtually every style of cuisine uses it and it can be cooked in so many different styles, from fried to roasted to barbecued and more, the chicken really is a great multipurpose meat. I also love pandan leaves and the great flavour it can give just as many things – kuih, chicken and even water! (Had pandan water last week at a Thai seafood restaurant, was so refreshing.)
So I thought I might have a bit of fun and have a go at making my own version of pandan chicken. Now I realise it isn’t a textbook perfect effort, but for me it was more about having a go and enjoying the process. So I thought of the flavours I love and decided to put them all together – pandan leaves to wrap the chicken in, serai (lemongrass) and ginger – both chopped and put in the pandan leaf with the small bits of chopped chicken. Admittedly I was quite nervous about the outcome but also pretty excited and when the time came to serve it, I could hardly wait for my first bite.
I just served it with some basic vegies and since I’m trying to eat as many vegies as possible I put some steamed asparagus, carrots and cauliflower on the plate. Not traditional, I know, but I wanted to focus on the flavour of the chicken and have the vegies play very much a backup role.
Anyhow, I have to say I was really happy with how it turned out. Unwrapping the leaves revealed a very tender, juicy piece of chicken with nice flavours of serai and ginger as well as the pandan leaf. Since they were small bite sized pieces, the flavour was able to go right through the meat meaning every bite was nice and flavoursome and cooked just right. Having seen how nice this tasted and also how much fun it was to make, I think I’ll definitely be doing it again in the future.
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Home-made sausage rolls and jam and cream scones!
With both my girlfriend and I in Australia for summer we thought it’d be nice to have some good home-cooked food from Van Loon’s nursery, a plant nursery that also has a fantastic cafe that sells a large range of delicious sweet and savoury treats. The best thing about Van Loon’s is that they sell cakes such as a raspberry sour cream cake that isn’t as common as a lot of other things seen in most cafes. A large amount of detail is always paid to what they make and in terms of taste, the freshness is always very apparent, as is the fact that these are not cakes which have been produced in a factory, but rather have been made individually in their own kitchen. Today for our main we wanted to have the home-made sausage rolls which have always been great in the past and today was no different.
Each serve comes with two whole large sausage rolls and a tasty side salad which comes with feta cheese – one of my favourite salad ingredients. The pastry on the sausage rolls is very flaky and light and crunches nicely in your mouth as you eat it and tastes fantastic with the meaty filling inside. Whereas a lot of sausages rolls are a bland filling wrapped in tasteless pastry, these have a great pastry which covers a very well seasoned meaty filling which tastes even better when dipped in the relish they serve it with! I’ve always loved relish and this one is a fairly sweet tomato and onion based relish which tastes perfect with the sausage rolls. It also serves well to even further compliment the flakiness of the pastry, so these are definitely something I can’t wait to eat again!
For desert, we ordered a classic favourite – homemade scones with jam and fresh cream.
Of all the scones I’ve ever bought, I have to say these are by far the largest, they are massive and not only this but they are also the softest and lightest textured scones I’ve ever bought. Obviously they have a very good, reliable recipe which makes them rise well in the oven as they’re not in any way heavy to eat and go perfectly with a cup of tea or coffee. Today we ordered the date scones, which are absolutely packed full of juicy, fresh dates which I also love. They bring so much extra flavour and texture to the scone and not to mention the fact that they’re the perfect companion for the raspberry jam and nice fresh cream. All in all, this was a great lunch meal to have and it was great to taste some freshly baked food at a cafe which is surrounded by nice plants and flowers. Definitely a perfect meal!
Recent Posts
- Kin Kin Pan Mee at Pandan Indah
- Cheesecake and coffee from Secret Recipe Pandan Indah
- Afternoon Tea at the Ritz Carlton Kuala Lumpur
- Chicken With Feta Stuffed Sweet Chilli Pepper
- Home Made Pasta
More Tasty Posts!
- April 2012
- November 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- January 2011
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
