Good Food, Great Company

Planning a holiday is no easy feat, what more planning a budget holiday. But a girl’s got to do what a girl’s got to do, and so she had been buried in planning for holiday. Don’t envy her, instead go out and plan your holiday now! Besides that, I had been settling back down in Malaysia, after my short but great stint in Manila, though I would say settling down had been amazingly quite smooth, it is almost as if I had never left. But I did, because I can remember vividly my wonderful time in Manila, it’s like a happy and adventurous chapter in the journey of my life, which I would say have warrant another post, or many posts on another day! For those my dear reader, I am sorry that you would wait cause now the focus is that tham jiak is back in town and being blessed that she is, not shortly after she got back she had been invited to a wonderful food review! This time she gets to dine with duo Frat and FBB, and at same time she finally got to meet the famous Aly. Nothing beats a nice dinner with a nice group of people.

So on with the food review of today, we started off nicely with garlic bread. I for one have never been really crazy about garlic bread, especially those dried hard ones with some miserable hint of garlic, but for this one, Monte’s did it really well. The bread was soft with crunch at the right parts and it has been generously lather with creamy garlicky butter. It is good enough to even eat it on its own, which I nearly did finish it till I hear there are soups coming, so I restrain to leave a bit for sake of dipping, I just like the act of it, for sheer habit or what not but I do. The soups came and did not disappoint in the dunking part, especially for the Oxtail soup that was really flavourful albeit a bit on salty side (but be forewarned I have low tolerance for sweet or salty either way) and as for the carrot pumpkin soup it was creamy and with subtle taste of both.

Then on came the appetizers to whet our appetite of course, I was already gearing up for more after a good dose of garlic bread. The escargot turned out to be good, kind of a pleasant surprise as I had few bad ones before, though I wouldn’t say that this was utterly authentic but it was whetting my palate for sure. Then next was the Juice Scallop and living up to its description, it was juicy and oh so tender. Though I would prefer to have more flavourful sauce, the pumpkin puree that they were resting on was alright with complementing texture.

After that came my new found favourite dish to eat nowadays – salad, and yes I am on a diet so there, but this one is not your ordinary salad per say. This one is a warm salad, with nicely cooked prawns, eggplants and topped with fresh cherry tomatoes and some greens. Certainly a nice twist to my usual cold salad repertoire though I wouldn’t say it was my favourite.  

Finally then came the real deal, our main course to fill up the remaining space of our stomach (not inclusive of the special compartment for dessert of course, who among you dare to say that you can be so full from food you cannot fit in dessert anymore).  First up was one of the two favourite of the lot that we had which was the pan-seared cod. I may be bias because I was always a fish lover, but still I must this one is really delicious, as the cod is fresh, cooked just right and the sauce was a flavourful companion. The next favourite, though I cannot decide which I liked more was the 8 hrs lamb, and as the name says, it was carefully braised for 8 hours in a special sauce and thus producing a dish where the meat is about to fall off itself and which literarily melts in your mouth, no kidding! I must say this is definitely one dish I would recommend to order if you are ever at Monte’s.

The rest of the main meal were the spaghetti marinara which was a classic dish that we all know but I would say that I like this version much, mushroom chicken which was served with herb rice and was indeed really paired well together thus not a surprise that this was one of the bestselling lunch dish due to its value in money while filling one up for the day and lastly the prawn and fish combo which I only manage to get hold of some big prawns that were freshly grilled.

With the stomach now filled up nicely, now came the part to fill up the secret compartment that was always reserved for desserts!  We had classic desserts which always seem to please many people for generations like bread and butter pudding, Hershey’s chocolate cake and carrot cake. I must say though the bread and butter pudding looks quite dry at first, it turned out that those thick dry crusts are the key part of this dish that gave it an interesting mix of flavour and texture, salty and crunchy in contrast to the rest of the sweet and fluffiness. While the chocolate cake (something I find hardest to take picture of next to a slab of steak) didn’t wow, it also didn’t disappoint and would certainly fulfill any chocolate lover (yes I am one) in need of a fix. The carrot cake was what I normally would make at home, crumbly and moist but most importantly not overly sweet, which of course please me very much and which also spur me to make one myself soon, though the icing was not the cheesy type that I would have preferred as the perfect pairing.

Oh and I just realize we have another mini secret compartment that was always there to be filled up with after meal drinks don’t we? Normally I love to wash down with a nice cup of coffee (if it is still early in the day as I have a coffee curfew so that I wouldn’t stay up late into the night) else tea or even alcohol will have to do. For this time, Susan Lee, Monte’s owner insisted that we tried a new special drink that she had discovered by chance – Green Tea Café Latte, which of course pique my interest as I am an avid fan of coffee and green tea! Who would have known these two can go so well together, kind of remind me of my favourite ‘cham’ (local coffee and tea mix) but with a Japanese twist instead! Certainly a good drink to end the meal and it was well worth breaking my curfew for.

Well who would have known then, tuck in a cozy little corner of the Bangsar Shopping Centre (BSC) would be a family sort of restaurant that would certainly have something for every members of every age. I would say, with its new chic décor, it also in some ways to penetrate into the younger market where it can be a nice meal reunion or celebration of sorts place. Did I also mentioned really value for money? Give it a try and let me know what you think.

Monte's Restaurant

Bangsar Shopping Centre,

F112, 1st Floor, West Wing 

03-2094 1112

Fellow tham jiak kaki reviews:

Aly

FBB

P/S: Much thanks to Susan for being such a gracious host, Dinesh and FBB for the invite, Frat and Aly for the lovely company.

Uniquely Mixed

Most people in the Philippines save the few Chinese that remains with their ancestral Chinese surname or a few indigenous that keeps their own too, have Spanish surnames. A close local friend told me it is because at some point in history, a law was passed during the Spanish occupation that everyone should adopt a family name for easy administrative purposes, thus the names were coined since then, with Spanish influence of course. I personally like their names where one name reminded me of a tycoon, another of astronomy while one about a venturing girl.

****

Asian in looks, with mixtures of Chinese and Malay with some little Spanish, Filipinos may have features ranging from chinky eyes (as how the locals call for those eye slits that Chinese are famous for – yes like mine), to big round eyes similar to the Malays and mix of brown and yellow skin. One thing which is frequent here though is that most Filipinos have small frames and low in stature, I felt immediately at home here being of somewhat similar, I have to admit. In fact, many here commented I look like a Filipina, and most people I met will converse with me in Tagalog (their local national language) naturally for the first time and I had countless taxi drivers insisting I look deceptively like a local. Maybe that is how I get to blend in easily, something I am quite thankful for.

****

“There are Starbucks everywhere here!” I exclaimed as we walk passed one at an obscure highway stop.

“Yes, because we Filipinos,” B started explaining “want to live the American dream”

There is no doubt that many, if not all, Filipinos that have the American dream, and why not? In land of America it seems that anything is possible, it is where dreams go and be realized. It was said that long time ago, Philippines nearly became a part of America, just that war happened and the rest as they say, is history. Nevertheless, I do meet a lot of Filipinos who their heart is strongly rooted in their own homeland, who would willingly stay and grow the country, but sadly there are even more that look at, live by and dream of America.

****

As you can see, as how Carlos Celdran aptly puts it, Filipinos are a mixture of sorts - Spanish in name, Asian in looks but American at heart, just like its most famous dessert halo-halo which literarily means mix-mix.

This icy dessert had reminded me of our Malaysian Ais Kacang, minus the the kacang (no kidding), where there is shaved ice drenched in condensed/evaporated milk or just milk and sugar and then mix in with various ingredients of sorts. The usual suspects are red mung beans, sugar palm (kaong), coconut sport (macapuno), jackfruit strips, purple yam (ube) paste, crushed young rice (pinipig), leche flan and caramelized banana. Some even say that it is not complete without a dollop of ube (yam) ice cream, and only ube flavour for the authenticity!

As we can see even the ingredients are mixtures of culture of red mung beans from the Chinese, leche flan from the Spaniards and shaved ice from the Americans (source from Wikipedia). From my 100 days stay there, I learn that, as ironic as it may sound, being a mixture of sorts and of no distinct identity is what makes Filipinos unique. Just like how the mixture of halo-halo that sort of make you think that the dessert couldn’t make up its mind on what it wants to be that makes it so uniquely delicious.

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One of the best authentic original halo-halo I tried (with nearly all the ingredients mentioned above) turns out to be from one of the famous chain restaurants in the Philippines – Chow King. (first picture above)

Chow King

Almost everywhere in Metro Manila and beyond!

Another variation of halo-halo (picture above), stripped down to nearly bare naked of essentials – leche flan, macapuno (coconut sport) and caramelized banana, was truly a league of its own for its really smooth shaven iced doused in creamy sweet milk and its minimal critical ingredients.

Razon’s of Guagua

Scattered around Metro Manila

The Many Sides of Manila and It's Food

“Add 30 peso, heavy traffic!” said the taxi man.

“What?!?” I feign incredulity, this is not the first time I was asked of this.

“Yes ma’am, heavy traffic, taxi cannot make money” he continued.

Somehow this line make me relent, at times some taxi man are rude in asking for more money on top of their meter, but this one just tells me honestly why he needs it. Maybe it is just how frankly he tells me why he needs that extra. So I just said “OK!”

It is not always like this in Manila, I have many times met more kindness than I can ever have expected, once a taxi man said I can pay whatever amount I seem fit since the destination I went to was just so near, it caught me off guard, but I paid as how much I think is right with tips to boot.

I find that I actually enjoy tipping, after living a life of an ‘expat’ (some of them refer me as that though I don’t feel such as that word makes one think of extravagance life but trust me it is not),but still new habits are learnt when one is in a foreign land. I never tip when I was in Malaysia, I guess somehow it doesn’t seem like the culture to me then but as the saying goes, when in Rome, do what the Romans do. I have learnt here that not many are that well off, many earn their wages through sheer hard work and many of them are in the service industries. So if the restaurant does not charge for service (most of them do not), then I would leave some tips so that the servers could earn a more decent income. Besides, at most places the service is good, I am always greeted with a smile, and they are mostly attentive and genuine.

Food I must say though there are hits and misses, but who am I judge when I have only been to only so few of them, many good ones still uncovered I believe. In the metropolitan area which are dominated with few chain restaurants, it is quite hard to avoid them (being one who always think that chain restaurants are just a small step away from ‘fast food’), some did disappoint but many does surprises you with their good food and how they have maintained the quality despite the huge expansions and the some for even the longest time of existence. I guess this is just how Filipinos show their fidelity, if the food is good, they will keep returning to it religiously, thus allowing a selected few chain restaurants to boom across the metropolitan faster than you can say “Sarap!” (means delicious in Tagalog) This is after all the country where their home-grown fast food chain, Jollibee (just love the catchy name) out beats McDonald by a seriously high margin; at nearly every corner that you turn, you will see the happy bee with a chef hat smiling at you.

Nevertheless, I have in fact tried quite a number of local dishes, many times in various restaurants, just to find them differ slightly (sometimes widely) from one another, and then on to find my favourites among them. So let me introduce you to them slowly, each food that the locals here enjoy day in and day out and where to get the best of them and what varieties you may just find (mind you some or most of them would be coming from the said chain restaurants, I guess they are a chain for the same reason?). First let me start with a dish, as you all know me, the one who praises the pork relentlessly, would of course start with one which is the pork sisig.

Pork sisig is one of the well known pulutan (food to go with drink), where normally people order when they are out having a beer or some alcohol. It was said to reduce the impact of alcohol on the stomach and the name itself actually meant to be ‘taken in small quantity’. But as for me, I ordered it anyway as appetizer or main meal even, because I simply love it. There are two groups of pork sisig lovers, those who love the crunchy ones while those on the vice versa, for me I belong to the former group. I just love to have a crunch on my pork sisig but nevertheless I do enjoy the other types too. Pork sisig would serve better to those who don’t really know what it is made of, but just if you are brave enough read on now else skip to the next paragraph, you have been warned! It is made of chopped pig’s head (hair removed and tenderize and yes entire head!), then boiled and grilled/broiled then finally fried with chopped onions and served on a sizzling platter with vinegar and kalamansi juice (Asian lime).

Normally they like to serve the pork sisig at the last cooking part where they would ‘fry’ the mixture in front of you on the sizzling pan, even sometimes cracking a raw egg over and cook it along. Once served, you can then squeeze over the kalamansi  to taste yourself and voila, you would have a perfect crunchy pulutan or simply a good dish to  go along with your rice.

For my favourite crunchy pork sisig:

Krocodile Grill

Greenbelt 3

Esperanza St., Ayala Center

Makati City, Metro Manila

Other branches

A cross between the crunchy and the soft, a lot of people's favourite:
Gerry's Grill
Glorietta 5
Level 2, Ayala Center,
Makati City, Metro Manila
(02)856-4443, (02)856-3544
Sunday to Thursday 11am - 12midnight
Friday and Saturday 11am - 2am
Other Branches

Another pork sisig with a twist, added with mayonnaise but nonetheless uniquely tasty:

Giligans ‘s Island Restaurant and Bar

Greenbelt 1

Esperanza St., Ayala Center

Makati City, Metro Manila

Other branches

Chill at Uncle Chilli's

If you're looking for a place to chill with good booze and music, yet still have a hearty meal, Uncle Chilli's is the place for you. I came here once when we had the previous food review Toh Yuen, which has to-die-for Chinese food and if you have not read about that yet you must here, and that time I had a had a great time, performances were great and drinks kept on coming! But it had never occur to me that one can have a complete meal right at this place itself while still enjoying the drinks, the atmosphere and the crowds.

I must say it is a bold concept by the Hilton PJ folks, but the bold achieves great things right, so hopefully this concept works out. I had a great time there and had been thinking of right occasions to bring my friends as well. This is the kind of place where you just want to go for a good meal, have a good chat and then continue to party without adjourning to elsewhere. Beware though if you plan for a quiet night of talking, you would need to leave at night before the live performance starts.

So with bold concept of the place comes bold concept of food? Not quite so but I must say I totally enjoy the unpretentious and hearty meal that they offered here in Uncle Chili’s. We started off with Caesar salad, I for one was never really a fan of this salad, but this one here has the right balance on balance of creaminess yet fresh, but I think the winner was the perfectly cooked egg, just the right softness with slightly gooey yolk, ah who would have thought the best food in life is one of the most basic one at that, and it could only have been better if it was a perfectly poached egg instead. Hah, pardon me.

Then on came the Crab Bisque, such indulgence for an appetizer, but nonetheless it was delightfully rich, creamy and smooth to the palate. I would definitely order this if I come again, only that this time I might request for less salt.

Then came the excruciating decision making part, where we had to decide between seemingly delicious mains – Uncle Chili’s burger with guacamole and spicy salsa (just typing this makes me want to have it now) or Tomato glazed black cod with seared scallop in saffron broth (sounds truly elegant and inviting) or braised lamb shank with onion confit (definitely sounds like comfort food to me). So after gnawing and gnawing on my fingernails, I came to conclusion to go for the black cod, but of course after we had a compromise with the rest to order burger and lamb shank for sharing. Ah, how apt, this tham jiak was excited at the prospect of trying everything!

But first with her choice, she was very please indeed, as it was definitely the best of the three, at least for her, as the saffron scented broth was really flavourful while the cod and the seared scallop was exquisitely soft yet toothy. The beans were also a clever addition to the texture dimension of the entire dish.

As for the rest of the mains, the Uncle Chili’s burger holds true to its name for being a signature dish, standing tall and wide, it holds promises of huge juicy meat patty with loads of generous filling squeezed in between it. The fries were also addictively good as it were crisp and nearly devoid of oil. Though I must say I would have preferred better kick of salsa and guacamole, the main star as we can quite see was actually the burger itself.

Besides that, the lamb shank was good, as the meat was soft and juicy while swimming in a good measure of broth. The sunny side up egg gave it a little perk too.

Of course then, after a full and satisfying meal, will then come the next favourite moment for this tham jiak – the dessert! I find it that, no matter how full one can be from all the food, there is always a spare room in there that has the space for desserts. Is it only me or is it so for everyone else as well? I hope you would agree cause it would be quite a shame to miss the dessert here as the one we had was pretty good. Nicely assembled was the warm chocolate pudding with amarulla pudding, which is topped with a peanut butter crunch and then piled on with macadamia nut ice cream. Is your mouth watering yet? The whole assemble was cleverly thought out, with enough crunch, slightly warm creaminess and chocolatey sweetness atop with some cold ice cream.

So there goes, a nice dessert to end a nice meal of the night which was started with some nice appetizers, but of course the most important of all, was accompanied by a nice bunch of people to make it a truly enjoyable dinner. Once again thanks to the lovely people in theQguides.com and Zest PJ for having this tham jiak enjoy another wonderful meal at Hilton PJ.

Uncle Chilli's

Hilton Petaling Jaya

No 2 Jalan Barat,

46200 Petaling Jaya,

Selangor, Malaysia

Menu

The Tale of Tutti 'Chocolatey'

I went up the stairs of a shop lot somewhere in TTDI, in hopes to do threading which is most likely the only single girly-pampering thing that I do, and only to be met with a locked gate. Then it hit me, a distant memory of the last round I was there, the lady mentioned that they would be shifting, but for me the life of me I could not remember where she said exactly but it is suppose to be somewhere in vicinity of TTDI. So I walked down and head directly across the road with a spring in my step. How come? Because I am heading towards dessert that would at least dampen the disappointment in my heart. 

3 minutes earlier

I was driving slowly passing through the road where the TTDI pasar (market) stalls had started their business really early of the day, it was barely evening yet. I was looking left and right, trying to keep myself entertained while I crawled across the street, maneuvering skilfully around the flocks of people that were walking around mindlessly. Then suddenly a bright little shop caught my eye and my heart leap to my throat, Tutti Frutti! There was a sudden flashback.

Few weeks earlier

I scroll through the post about Tutti Frutti in TTDi at masak-masak and think to myself, finally a frozen yogurt chain in Malaysia (again?). This shop is at least somewhere I can relate to and might be able to go when there is a chance. So I happily note it down in my tham jiak memory, salivating at the thought but right after forgot about it as usual. I actually do have an extremely long list of food to try in this part of the memory.

Back to the Moment

Apprehensively I push open the glass door, to be greeted by a clean white interior and few industrial looking silver ‘machines’ and a counter embedded with containers that holds many goodies and delights. So I walked over, looked at the available toppings, zooming in straight on M&M lookalikes and then a lady came over to greet me and sort of explain to me shyly while I listen shyly so you see, so I was even more apprehensive when I approach the huge industrial frozen yogurt dispenser. I pick up the paper cup in oppose to the plastic one because partly because of the cute red printing but mainly it is because it is much bigger. Bigger cup more yogurt! So firstly I pull the lever, too soft and the shy lady ask me to pull harder, so I did and to my delight it start squirting out McD ice cream look alike, and being first time I sort of stopped too late and got huge amount of the original flavour. Oh yes, I picked that besides the choices of probably 6/8, flavours  few that I can remember are original, chocolate, vanilla, strawberry and kiwi. Naturally I picked chocolate (my favourite!) for the next flavour, you can mix as many as you like as they charge by weight, so less chocolate this time as I got better control of the machine, and then head on to the toppings counter. Next I pop in M&M’s lookalikes and some mini versions of Coco Pops, ah I should have made this a chocolate indulgence but oh well. Then I placed it less apprehensively onto the weighing scale by the cashier and was guessing the price in my mind when I was told - RM12.50! (priced at RM5.30/100 grams)

And oh boy, the chocolate was oh-so-good, chocolatey, creamy and smooth; you would not believe you are eating yogurt (healthy one at it)! And not to mention my chocolate toppings! But the original though was bit disappointing, not as smooth, sort of tangy, it was good but not addictive enough. I wished I had more of the chocolate and less of this, but I may be biased here, I am a chocoholic. Though I must say the selections of topping is quite limited and unappealing, especially the ‘fruits’ one as it is mainly cocktail look alike, and the gummy bears do look less fresh and sticking to each other. I might give this outlet another chance again even though the price is a bit steep, if not for the toppings then definitely for the chocolate yogurt! Of course the sort of M&M’s and mini coco pops are also good sinful additions that calls for me!

Tutti Frutti (same row as KFC)

11, Jalan Tun Mohd Fuad 3,

Taman Tun Dr Ismail,

60000 Kuala Lumpur.

037725 2101

11am-11pm (if I am not mistaken)

List of other outlets here.

Cyber Series 2: Hot, Hot Dengkil Chilli Fish

Me, becoming a spicy eater

Once upon a time (was it that long ago?) when I was still a little kid and growing up in Taiping, I used to be one of those Malaysians that people would say to “What! You cannot eat spicy ah? How to be Malaysian like that?” So sheepishly I would smile and then continue with whatever I am eating. But now, after intensive trainings due to my tham jiak-ness where I would brace myself to eat spicy food just because I want to try it or I like to eat it so I have to feast with tears welling in my eyes, nose sniffing all the way while mouth keep opening and closing like a fish out of the water, and then further more I add in gung-ho when eating out with A and M during our Bangkok working days, I want to show I can devour all things spicy in Thai and boy do the Thais know their chillies, I became one of those who can eat nearly all levels of spiciness without subjecting to tears and rushing for a gulp water.

Spicing up work-life in Cyberjaya

As I mentioned about A and M, they were actually my ex-colleagues from the heydays of Bangkok traveling, the time I learn up the skills that had so far determined my path in my career, and also apparently the time I sharpen my skills of ‘spicy eating’, and then after that we three have parted in our own ways while still keeping in touch and somehow after that as fate has it, we three united once again in, of all places, Cyberjaya, where A became my colleague once more while M became a ‘neighbour’. So naturally we three goes out for feasting again, like how we did in Bangkok, and my tham jiak-ness is definitely nothing foreign to them at all after witnessing my eagerness and passion in surfing, noting down and going all around for food. Before I join the Cyberions, A and M have been quite a while at that location, therefore sparing me of all the hard work of hunting for good food and solving the ultimate question of what to eat in Cyberjaya!

A name in context

There is one story though that I think worth mentioning in this post due to its appropriateness of the context and story wise. During our time in Bangkok, there was once we were out eating with a client, a Thai guy and he called my name as such “lah cheeelll”, which amused them immensely as A thinks that it sounds like him calling me la jiao (chilli in Mandarin) and thus the name was coined to me. After numerous times of calling me la jiao, soon it morphed into once a while calling me by the name lat jiew (chilli in Cantonese) because we normally converse in Cantonese.

Finally, the hot, hot chilli fish!

Therefore, A happily said one day when we were heading out to lunch “lat jiew, I am taking you to eat lat jiew yu (chilli fish)”, while snickering away. Yes I may be rolling my eyes at the lameness of the joke but secretly my heart skip a bit at the exciting thought of eating both of my favourite things together – chilli and fish. This particular dish, when mention with chilli, it truly meant chilli whereby you will be presented with kon chin ma yau (fried threadfin fish till dry) swimming (pun not intended) in a thick slightly sweetish sauce that is laden with loads of chilli padi (bird eye’s chilli) and red chilli sliced thinly. Just looking at it may make a non spicy eater seized up, but don’t let the mini chillies deter you, this dish is in fact not really spicy, just with hint of it and it goes really well with the dark sweetish sauce and superbly crispy fish. Although I must admit that I have long since surpass even my own expectation of my ability to eat spicy stuff, where nowadays I can eat hot dishes without breaking a sweat while people around me had started imitating the ‘fish out of the water’. Nevertheless, trust me on this fish, it was so worth the spiciness if you’re afraid and I have seen even M, the one we used to laughed at for not being able to take spicy food, enjoys this dish happily.

And the lesser accompaniments

Also for this place you may ordered the usual Chinese eatery dishes of stir fry vegetables, my favourite would usually be the cheng chao fan shu yip (clear stir fry sweet potato leaves), but once we were recommended to try their steamed beancurd embedded with fishballs on a bed of lettuce leaves, something special but not what I really like, especially that I have a high standard when it comes to fish balls, they have to be rich in taste of fresh fish. The rest of the dishes I tried were mostly home cooked style, the ku lou yok (sweet sour pork) does not make the cut for being too floury and sweet, but thankfully the stir fry pork with ginger was good with real home made feel.

Burp, Dengkil rocks!

So it seems Dengkil boasts many good foods, like the nasi lemak that I talked about, if you know where to look. Lucky me to have A and M showing me around, so now I passed on yet another humble and assuming yet amazingly delicious food to you who may scratched your head on what to have for lunch or dinner if you are a Cyberion or just happen to be around the neighbourhood of Cyberjaya or Putrajaya.

Restaurant Sin Ki

Jalan Besar,

43800 Dengkil,

Selangor

The Taste of Happiness and Freedom

Every animal has its place in this world. Every animal has its right to live. So does a chicken. If needed to be bred for food, then at least they should be bred humanely. Free range is the way to go, where the chickens are free to roam the plains and live the way they would want to live, well yes in certain confined parameters, but who doesn’t live in such parameters, even us do. Anyway back to the chicken, so have you ever thought about those chickens cooped up in a tiny cage barely enough for them to stand straight all their live and then slaughtered for food? How can one eat an unhappy chicken? In fact does the chicken even know it is living? In light of current movements where we start to understand where our food comes from, and we start to care where and how it comes to right in our plates, then definitely we need to know that even if those we consume are in the food chain and in course with nature, we should at least have done that in most humane way as possible. Even animals killed another animal with grace (mostly), and so we should likewise have done the same, be it we hunt them or more ubiquitously now in modern times where we rear them.

So here I introduce to you about a company called Sunshine Chicken (how apt!) with a heart that owns a 15 acre farm up in the highlands of the outskirts of Kuala Lipis, Pahang. Although a fairly new company, they had definitely started on the right foot in my own humble opinion, where they retain a sort of kampung (village) environment of lush green fields and fresh clean air as their setting for free range chicken farming. Here is sort of like chicken utopia, where they are allowed to live almost freely as animal. According to Sunshine Chicken, “Happy Chickens makes tasty chickens! Stress free means toxins free, makes our chickens taste more like chickens and less like something manufactured. “ . Also one key point to note was that they fed their chickens the natural ma cho, which literary translates as horse grass, it is well known in our Chinese community for its good natural properties. Even at home, J’s mum plant ma cho for own consumption, where she would boil the stalk parts for a refreshing drink! It tasted like light sugar cane water minus the whole load of sweetness. If you think this has already been special enough, wait till you hear about the castrated chickens. That’s right, castrated, and which they are also known as a Capon. According to my favourite information site online, the Wikipedia, the castration produces a unique type of poultry meat where the male would accumulate more body fat and in overall often to have more tender, juice and flavourful meat in comparison to a normal chicken.

Being a tham jiak, and having a huge good bunch of foodie friends, allowed me to explore this wonderful happy and fatty too in some, chickens, where indeed it was seriously tastier, I kid you not. Thanks to Babe in City - KL and Gerald, who organized this great outing and for inviting me to it. As we can read at babe’s blog, we all have gathered at Kedai Makanan Chef Tam in Selayang, I got there easily thanks to my GPS. Here we were served with both the aforementioned special chickens. We had the ma cho kai roasted deep fried and then hung to dry. Indeed such a unique preparation that had most of us thought roasted, no wonder it had such crispy skin yet do not taste oily at all! Thumbs up to the chef! As for the capon, we had it at its natural best, where it was just simply steamed with some salt – steamed yim kai. And for this, I may so attest to what had been explained by dear Wikipedia, it has a superb texture which is toothy yet juicy! With accompaniment of the minced ginger that pack a punch and a flavourful soft rice that was cooked with the steamed chicken broth, I swear I could eat just these as a meal itself!

But apart from the chicken being the main thing of the entire affair, somehow the seafood does take a piece of their own 15 minutes of fame. With fresh seafood sourcing directly from their famous neighbour Jin Chwan Seafood Garden, we get to eat the fresh, plump and creamy oyster which was one of those rare ones that does not have the sang mei (the sort of metallic taste that you get when eating seafood that are not fresh). We also had the steamed Garoupa from Sabah which was in another of Chinese simplicity to present the best out of the fresh fish.

Also to accompany our meal, and also to probably clean our palate from all those indulging food, we have the tofu and the stir fried green vegetable. I really liked the tofu where it was fried to create a ‘casing’ that gave a light crunch before you get to the smooth silky part. I truly enjoy this humble dish, which may actually be not so humble anymore judging the skill needed to prepare it.

This meal has truly been eye opening, I learnt a lot that when one cares where does the food comes from, be it free ranged animals to live fresh seafood, it does wonders to the end product of the dish. Like the philosophy I hold to when it comes to cooking, get the best and freshest ingredient, half the job has already been done to make the dish good even before you cook it. Therefore, try free range chicken if you want to cook up a feast, you may get them from Sunshine Chicken through these places or contact Gerald if needed. As for those who would like to savour them with skills of a chef, I would certainly recommend you to try out Chef Tam’s.

Kedai Makanan Chef Tam

6A Jalan Bidara 2/4,

Taman Bidara, Selayang.

603 6138 8751

12pm-3pm, 6pm11pm

Jin Chwan Seafood Garden

9 Jalan 2/4,

Taman Bidara, Selayang

603 6138 2633

Business Hours:

8am-10pm

Sunshine Chicken

45-2, 2nd Floor, Jalan Menara Gading 1,

Medan Connaught

56000 Kuala Lumpur

6039102 3950

Here are some of the lucky tham jiaks at that time:

Babe in City - KL

Cumi dan Ciki

Fat Boy Bakes

Eu Hooi Khaw

Pure Glutton

Back to Earth

I felt like as if I have dropped out of this Earth. Does transitioning of years (man-defined even but with backings of astrology sorts of course) has anything to do with it? Does everyone fall out and return just like me? Or am I the only one? < insert mysterious tune at the background > Since we are at that , why not ask who am I? Where does the world comes from? Pardon me as I have been a tad philosophical recently due to reading a really good book that weaves the history of philosophy together in a 400 page story – Sophie’s World. The amazing thing is, a good friend introduced me to read it, so I went in search in the MPH bookstore and found there lonely one book and quickly grab it and ran to the counter with it under my sleeves lest somebody came to fight with me for it! I got out alive and thus been enjoying reading tremendously. Just about weeks later, I casually saunter into the same MPH bookstore, and walk around, lo and behold at the middle of the store on the tables where they usually showcase pick of the week or bestselling books, there are mountains, yes mountains!, of Sophie’s World stacked up on the table mocking me. At that time I was wondering if there is a conspiracy following what I read (such arrogance) but now on retrospect (writing does this to me), it seems then that they normally feature books that they just restocked (I bought the last one remember) so maybe to just get the books moving! Bah, I hope this assumption is wrong as we would not want our ‘pick of the week’ to be actually truly ‘new stock of the pick’, it takes the novelty out of it, it would even be slightly, just slightly better if it is ‘rokh’s current reading’ right?

Anyhow, back to Earth for me, we should be talking about food! See how I explained that I have dropped out of Earth, it seems I am still floating in and out of it, I wonder when I would settle down. Nevertheless, the world keeps spinning, people keep eating and I am still tham jiak. So just to kick start the year, I am reviewing this dear little blog of mine, after the four years anniversary, I found that there are few popular posts of all time in this blog, and I feel that it would be nice to share a little glory of this humble blog of mine, and also to put into retrospective where I want to head this blog towards. So without further ado, let me present you Tham Jiak’s top 8 (8 because Chinese New Year is just around the corner and the number 8 is especially auspicious for us Chinese, as it has the same homophone as ‘fortune’) blog posts:

Bak Chang
Oh this was definitely one of my own favourite posts too, as I learnt the ‘dying’ art of making Chinese bak chang. I was really worried then soon one day this will be lost to our current and future generations, as many now choose to purchase the commercial ones or eat at restaurants rather than make their own. Making them with Lai Ma that time was truly exciting and in short, though this may make me sound real young and over enthusiastic, simply awesome! I love how we had walked down the street from her house to an old wooden tim chai (sundry shop) nearby to get the bamboo leaves and the peas to the whole process of preparing all the ingredients which seemed like an endless list of things, but when you get down to it, it isn’t all that immense after all, then to the cooking of the meat and then frying of the rice to scooping all of the fillings onto the leaves and to what seem like my honest attempt to wrap them all in and then lowering them into boiling water while uttering some sort of prayer that it will not all turned loose and became a huge mess. After the whole endeavour, the bak chang came out perfect and somehow it tasted extremely good, thanks to all the heart and sweat poured into it. So go on and read about it all here, and who knows, you may make a resolution to make one for yourself this year?

Penang Food Diary
Oh how can I forget this food adventure of J and mine, at the food haven up north of Malaysia. Thinking back on all the food we had consumed in a span of one day, and yes ONE day, makes me shudder. I felt I had ate for the entire week! One of the most memorable dishes that I had in Penang that time, apart from my all time favourite Kek Lok Si laksa of course, is the Mee Mamak. The sinful plate of red stir fried noodles has a huge myriad of flavours all packed into this seemingly simple dish. Now I have a sudden hankering for it. Ah, it will definitely be on top of my list if I ever go visit Penang again.

Teochew Steam Fish

Ah, so it seems that a lot of people googled for this recipe and I hope it did certainly helped many of them to have this dish grace their dinner table and feed many tham jiaks out there. Though I would have loved to re-enact this dish instead with a huge fresh fish, but nonetheless what I managed to concoct the other day remained fresh in my mind. The recipe was definitely a keeper and one day I shall attempt it again when I get my hand on some good fish.

Egg Tarts

This was definitely one of my favourite attempted recipe, one that is truly Chinese yet able to satisfy my sweet tooth. Since young I have loved this dainty dessert and especially so after the Portuguese egg tarts made their inception in Taiping. Although this recipe of mine was not of my favourite Portuguese egg tart (the idea of puffy crust still scares me, but one day I shall brace it like how I did for my Sponge Cake), but I still love the soft eggy and slightly sweet filling and the cookie-style crust was quite good too.

Bangkok Food Post: A-Roi
Yes I do have to admit that, although I have been to Bangkok for numerous times, yes even at one point I am there more than I am in Malaysia, this had been the one of the very few post on Bangkok food, and it turned out that the crowd pleaser was the street snacks. I guess sometimes when one go to someplace too much, they took for granted all the good food that they can have all the time there and forgot to document everything down as if it is really precious. Looking back now, I really do miss a lot of Bangkok food, and someday I am so heading back there again (though I also had numerous time swore I did not want to go back after many, many flights), not just for the shopping, which was unbelievably cheap, but definitely for all the a-roi (delicious) food there. Oh I have a sudden vivid recollection of my favourite, one must be forewarned when reminiscing on food that it will leave a huge longing in the heart.

Char Siew
Now I know that so many people out there shared my sentiment to this meat call pork, and one that have been barbecued to point of charred skin but locked with all the sweet meaty juiciness inside. Ah, just trying to describe this special dish again makes my mouth waters. Anyhow, I have indeed wrote a long post of praise to it, so head on to read all about and where to get your hands, or rather teeth in this case on it, and the best ones at that. What are you waiting for?

Pandan Leaves
Although this post was also about Hak Lor Mai, the sweet Chinese dessert that uses Pandan Leaves, it seemed that the whole information in regards to pandan leaves was the main attraction to people. Probably I took this leave for granted, having it embedded in our various local cuisines from aromatic Nasi Lemak to kaya (coconut jam) to kuih-muih. It is no wonder that these plain looking leaves in disguise of a wonderful yet not intruding aroma that it imparts to anything it came in contact with, in this case cooking with would garner so much attention to this date. I am so grateful that it is one thing that is easily obtained in Malaysia.

Chee Cheong Fun: The Breakdown

It seemed that this guest post of mine from my dear friend L is here to stay definitely, with her extensive research and also eating of course on the many types of Chee Cheong Fun that one can find in Malaysia. We might not have covered the whole Malaysia entirely but even then, we have already manage to find four variations of totally diverse style and sauces, but all with the main ingredient of steamed rice flour sheets rolled up. I for one feel the need to inject here that, although I have tried so many of the types mentioned, the Taiping style Chee Cheong Fun is the best and shall always hold a special place in my heart, bias I may be, but it is really tasty, one must try it at least once in their lifetime!

So there you have it, the top 8 posts of this blog. From here I would announce my return to planet Earth, and I would like to resume some sort of normality, then again what is normal? Nevertheless, stick around a little longer as I have a long postponed write up on chickens, and I promised it is going to be interesting, think free range and castration (yes, you read this right). Till then, happy eating and cheers to a 2010 that would be filled with loads of good food!