We had the buffet at The Islander, Traders Hotel. The buffet was for RM45 nett per head and the nice part was The Islander was giving a buy 1 get 1 free promotion, therefore, we only paid RM 22.50 nett per head. Cool eh

Before I went ahead to enjoy the meal, I managed to take some shots on the dishes available there.

As a starter, we have soup. The soup of the day was the Herbal Chicken Soup. It was sweet and best of all, not salty. Simply sweet to start the meal with a bowl of the Herbal Chicken Soup.

After the soup, here comes the main dishes. Among all the main dishes, I loved the mutton, beef and the curry salmon head the most.

There was a teppanyaki counter available.  There were fish fillet as well as calamari served at the teppanyaki counter.

Also, not forgetting, there was a counter that served chicken and duck meats. The roast duck was the nicest among all those available at the counter.

Once done with the main dishes, it’s always nice to complete the meal with some nice desserts. They have ice-creams, fruits as well as mousse and pastries available. Last but not least, you can also request for a bowl or two of the local favorite, ice kacang.

On the overall, everybody had a great lunch with the lunch buffet. Most importantly, we had a good time getting together … away from work.

Technorati Tags: The Islander, Traders Hotel, buffet

What you need:

• 200 – 300 gms of chicken meat
• 2 tablespoons of oyster sauce
• 1 clove of garlic (sliced into small pieces)
• 1/4 bowl of water (small bowl)
• Basil leaves

Method of preparation:

First of all, cut the chicken meat into small chunks and put them in a bowl. Marinate the chicken meat with oyster sauce. Add a few pieces of the basil leaves into the chicken as well. Mix the chicken and sauce evenly and leave it marinate for about 15-20 minutes.

Next, heat up the wok / frying pan with some oil over a medium flame. Put in the garlic and stir fry till they develop a light shade of brown. After that, put in the marinated chicken meat and stir fry the chicken meat evenly.

Once the chicken meat is cooked, put in the basil leaves and stir fry the chicken and leaves for a short while till they are evenly mixed.

Lift the chicken and basil leaves of the wok / frying pan and serve.

This is how the dish looked like when it’s served:

Technorati Tags: basil leaves, basil, chicken, oyster sauce, stir fry dish

Kampachi is located on the LG floor of the Equatorial Hotel Penang at Bukit Jambul. Kampachi is popular for it’s weekend buffets. You’ll get to enjoy a selections of various Japanese dishes freshly prepared by the in-house chefs.

Have fun with the pictures I took during the lunch buffet then

There will be more varieties available for the dinner buffet as compared to the lunch. That, of course will come with a different price tag. The time and price for the buffet lunch and dinner are as below:

Buffet Lunch (Available on Saturday and Sunday)
11:30 am – 2:30 pm
RM62.00++ (Adult), RM34.00++ (Child)

Buffet Dinner (Available on Saturday only)
6:30 pm – 10:00 pm
RM86.00++ (Adult), RM46.00++ (Child)

Rates are subject to 10% service charge and 5% Government tax. The price above are accurate at the time of posting. For the updated details, kindly refer to the hotel’s website here: Equatorial Hotel Penang.

Technorati Tags: kampachi, japanese buffet, japanese+cuisine, Equatorial Hotel

Due to the long weekend holidays, it was crowded virtually everywhere on Cameron Highlands. Moving around and finding a place to park our car during holiday seasons like this was an ‘adventure’ in Cameron Highlands. Long queues were expected virtually everywhere.

Nonetheless, we still managed to visit a place or two during our short day trip there.

We visited one of the many cactus gardens up in Cameron Highlands. Cactus gardens are one of the attractions up there. You’ll get to see all sorts of cactuses available in the gardens. Below are some photos taken inside the cactus garden we visited.

Another activity that is nice to do up Cameron Highlands is to visit the many tea plantations there. You should walk around the plantation and enjoy the scenery of the plantation along the way. There are also tea houses available in the tea plantation for you to take a short break and have a cuppa nice tea. These are some of the photos I have taken at the tea plantation we visited.

Besides the above, one can also visit the honey bees farms as well as the various marketplace up in Cameron Highlands. You should try the sweet corns widely sold there. They are very nice and sweet when eaten fresh.

You can also visit the many strawberry farms up in Cameron Highlands and have some fun time plucking strawberries yourself.

There you have it. A short day trip up to Cameron Highlands. On the overall, it’s a nice place to relax and also get away from the busy city. Anyway, I would recommend a visit to Cameron Highlands during non-peak seasons or during week days. The traffic on Cameron Highlands can be pretty nasty during peak seasons and long weekend holidays.

Technorati Tags: Cameron Highlands, cactus garden, tea plantations, strawberry farms

What you need:

• 60-80 gms of anchovies
• 3-4 tablespoons of sambal
• 200 gms of prawns
• 1/4 bowl of water (small bowl)
• 1 pinch of salt

Method of preparation:

First of all, soak the anchovies in some water to clean them. Next, once that is done, oil your wok / frying pan. Once the oil starts to heat up, put in the anchovies and deep fry the anchovies. Continue to stir fry the anchovies till the color turns golden brown. After that, lift the fried anchovies up from the wok / frying pan.

Next, put in the sambal and stir fry it over a medium flame. Continue to stir fry the sambal till you can smell the fragrance coming out from them. At this point, put in the prawns and stir fry the sambal / prawns until the both items are evenly mixed. After, add in the water and stir fry the mixture till it boils.

Lastly, put in the fried anchovies into the mixtures and add in the pinch of salt to taste. Stir fry the mixture to have them mixed well. Once they are properly mixed, lift them up from the wok / frying pan and serve. This step need to be done in the shortest time possible to ensure the crispiness of the anchovies.

Check out the dish when it’s done and served:

Technorati Tags: spicy dish, anchovies, sambal, prawns

A couple of days back, after a few recommendations from friends, we decided to visit this little Geylang in Penang. It’s located along Macalister Road directly opposite the Red Rock Hotel. The name of the place? It’s called Sin Geylang (literally translated to be “New Geylang”).

So, do you know what is Geylang popular with? Geylang is popular for it’s Frog Porridge. What else do would you expect me to be mentioning in this post besides Frog Porridge, eh?

As mentioned earlier, the name of the shop is Sin Geylang. This shop specialises in Frog Porridge. They have a few methods of preparation for the frog eg. stir fry frogs with onions and gingers, frogs steamed with soya sauce and chinese wine, stir fry frogs with thick soya sauce and dried chillies or more fondly known as the ‘Kung Pao’ / ‘Kung Po’ method.

Anyway, we ordered 2 frogs to be steamed with soya sauce / chinese wine and another 2 to be cooked using the ‘Kung Pao’ method. We also ordered a plate of their “Yun Nan Tofu”.

The porridge and the ‘Kung Pao’ frogs arrived in clay pots. The clay pots will further keep the dishes hot and fresh as they arrive as well as help enhance the taste.

On the overall, the tastes of the frog dishes were ok. The frogs steamed with Chinese wine was somewhat below my expectation as the taste and fragrance were not felt in the dish. The ‘Kung Pao’ frogs dish was nice and up to expectation. The ‘Yun Nan Tofu’ managed to compliment the taste of the frog dishes.

If you haven’t try this place out, you can check it out yourself if you are in Penang or planning to come to Penang. One important thing to note, it’s opened for business daily except Wednesday. The map to the place is as below:

Technorati Tags: food, Penang food, Geylang, porridge, frog, frog porridge

Along the journey, we decided to have Dim Sum in Ipoh. For those of you who do not regularly travel along the North-South Highway, note that the Penang-Kuala Lumpur express link on the North-South Highway is already opened to public use. Therefore, if you intend to detour into Ipoh along the way like me, please be reminded that there is a Y-split at the spot where the old Jelapang toll plaza was. At the split, the right lane will let you continue on a direct drive to Kuala Lumpur bypassing the toll plazas. The left lane will lead you to the exits to Jelapang as well as Ipoh.

Most of the time, we’ll usually have dim sum at Foh San Restaurant, this time we decided to try out the dim sum at Ming Court Hong Kong Tim Sum as it recommended by my friends from Ipoh. It’s located along Jalan Leong Sin Nam. Just follow the signboards’ direction and drive towards the town center in Ipoh, try look for Hotel Excelsior. It’s the biggest visible landmark that is closest to Ming Court Hong Kong Tim Sum.

The place was really crowded as we stepped in. There were lots of customers standing by the occupied tables waiting for their turns.

After waiting for about 15 minutes, we finally got ourselves half-a-table (sharing the table with another family) to have our dim sum. Overall on the dim sum, besides being rather small in portion, the taste was nice.

Anyway, Foh San Restaurant has moved their dim sum restaurant to a new building directly opposite of Ming Court. Apparently they are trying to ‘challenge’ Ming Court on the dim sum business.

After that, we continued our journey towards Bukit Tinggi. By the way, if you are going to Bukit Tinggi from Northern states like Penang, Perak and so on, the best direction I can give you is drive up towards Genting Highlands and get to Bukit Tinggi from there.

There are 2 ways you can reach Genting. The first one is to take the Tanjung Malim’s exit. Once you reach Tanjung Malim’s town, look for direction to Kuala Kubu Baru. As you reach Kuala Kubu Baru, follow the direction towards Rawang. As you drive towards Rawang, you’ll see the turn leading you to Genting Highlands along the way. The other simpler way would be to take the Batang Kali’s exit along the North-South Highway. Once you exit the toll plaza, just start to look for the direction to Genting Highlands from there.

As you are approaching Gohtong Jaya at Genting Highlands, there will be a roundabout there. Just drive around the roundabout and take the exit that lead you to Kuala Lumpur/Kuantan. After passing the police station, you’ll come to a Y-split. Take the lane that is leading to Kuantan. Keep following the road signs leading to Kuantan until you come to a signboard that says “Berjaya Hill Resort”. Just follow the turn and the road will lead you up to Bukit Tinggi.

The main attraction in Bukit Tinggi is the Colmar Tropicale, a French themed Resort. You’ll be greeted by a bridge that connect the main road to the village once you reach the Colmar Tropicale with a pond beneath the bridge.

There are shops as well as cafes outside of the building along the road in the resort. Check out some of the pictures I have taken inside the Colmar Tropicale below:

Further up from the Colmar Tropicale, there is a Japanese Tea Garden right in the middle of the tropical forest. When we were there, we don’t see anyone using those for any tea session.

On the overall, Bukit Tinggi is a nice place to relax and have fun with your family and friends.

I would suggest to go in a bigger group and have some group activities there. The weather is cool in the evening and the air is still relatively much cleaner than the city. It can be on your list to get away from the busy city life during the weekends.

Technorati Tags: Malaysia, Malaysia holidays, holidays, hill resort, Bukit Tinggi, Colmar Tropicale, Berjaya Hill, direction to Bukit Tinggi, dim sum, Ming Court, Foh San

I was toying around with the mustard leaves I got from the wet market. I shall name this dish “Boiled Mustard Leaves with Calamari and Prawn Sauce”.

What you need:

• 300 – 400 gms of mustard leaves
• 1 piece of calamari (squid)
• Some prawns
• 5 pcs of shallots (sliced)
• 1 tablespoon of flour / tapioca flour
• 1/2 bowl of water (small bowl)
• 2-3 tablespoons of light soya sauce

Method of preparation:

First of all, for the mustard leaves, I used those smaller Hongkies’ stalks. Anyway, just cut each of the leaves off the stalks as shown below.

Boil the mustard leaves in hot water. Once the texture for all the leaves got soften, lift those off the water and arrange them nicely on a serving plate.

To make the sauce, mix the flour, water and light soya sauce with a bowl. Stir well and ensure all the flour get dissolved in the water. Cut the calamari and prawns into small pieces.

Next, oil the wok / frying pan. Once it’s hot, start by stir frying the shallots over a medium flame. Stir fry those till they begin to develop shades of brown. After that, toss in the calamari and prawns and continue to stir fry those with the shallots for a few minutes. Those will get cooked fast because of the size. Then pour in the flour, water & soya sauce mixture into the wok / frying pan. Stir fry the mixture and allow it to boil. Once it boils, lift the sauce off the wok / fryin pan, pour that over the mustard leaves and serve.

The dish looked nice, isn’t it? It’s something different from the usual stir fry vegetable dishes. Have fun trying.

Technorati Tags: Malaysian dish, mustard leaves, prawns, calamari, stir fry, home cooked

What do you need:

• 400 – 500 gms of soft pork ribs
• 2 pcs of corns
• 1 carrot
• Some raw peanuts
• 2 1/2 bowls of water (standard soup bowls)

Method of preparation:

Start by boiling the water. When the water boils, toss in the peanuts.

Next, boil the soft pork ribs in some hot water for a couple of minutes. This is to wash away the blood from the ribs.

Cut the carrots into your desired size. It can be small pieces or slices.

For the corns, cut those into smaller pieces as shown below.

Once the ingredients are ready, put all those into the water with the peanuts. Boil those over a big flame for about 15 minutes. After that, boil the soup over a small flame for about 1 hour. Once it’s ready, then serve. Check in out:

Very simple, right?

Technorati Tags: Malaysian dish, soup, corn, pork ribs

When one is in Malacca, one should get the authentic nyonya pineapple tarts. It’s one of the authentic Malacca delicacy.

There is this shop named LW which specialised in the pineapple tarts. The shop is located along Jonker Street.

When you reach the shop, you’ll be greeted by a giant pineapple tart placed right in front of the shop.

Personally, I prefer the tarts from this shop as the taste is much better compared to others. But again, when it comes to taste, it’s very much depending on personal preference

After that we proceeded to shop in Dataran Pahlawan. It’s one of the shopping complexes in Malacca. Later in the evening, we wanted to go to Jonker Street again but the roads around Malacca town were jammed with cars as there were road closures due to the Wesak Day’s procession.

So, we ended up cancelling the plan to get to Jonker Street. We changed plan to have Satay Celup instead. Satay celup is a Malacca’s signature dish.

It consist of things like fish balls, vegetables, meat balls, mushrooms and other things on satay sticks.

The items are to be dipped into a boiling satay sauce and eaten later when cooked.

Satay celup in widely available around Malacca town. For certain shops that are more popular, there are even long queues of customers waiting for their turns to have the satay celup.

That’s all folks. Hope you enjoyed reading the post above. If you haven’t been to Malacca, hope the above gives you a start-up tips of where you can go and what you can eat in Malacca

Last but not least, if you are looking for a great selection of places to stay with discount prices, you can check out Melaka Hotels for more information.

Technorati Tags: Malacca, pineapple tarts, Jonker Street, satay celup, Malacca delicacy