Zestful Eats

This blog is mainly written by me, IcedNyior, but occasionally, I get the beau to write the posts. So this will be tagged “He Eats”. Hehe…enjoy!

- IcedNyior

So after having a problem on where to eat, we decide to go to Italiannies at The Gardens. As its name, it is an Italian theme restaurant that serve Italian food (duh >.<). They have an “open air” style seating outside the restaurant and plenty of seats inside.

The restaurant setting is (as quoted from my girl) nice, romantic and high class. Oh and quiet too, nice place to have a romantic dinner but be sure to ask table further away from their kitchen.

Anyway after we seated, complimentary bread with olive oil plus balsamic vinegar was served. The bread was nice, seems that they baked it fresh daily. Was asking my girl whether do we have pay for it or not if we decide not to eat there XD Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been craving for some Palak Paneer so I suggested to my fren that we eat in Indian Kitchen, a small place that serves northern and southern indian dishes tucked in the middle of Jalan Telawi 3 amongst the rows of bars and cafes.

We went around early afternoon and thus, the restaurant was quite empty because the lunch crowd hasn’t came yet. We decided to order a few items off the menu after asking the helpful waiter to explain the dishes.

Garlic Naan (RM4) & Cheese Naan (RM5) - The naan here is not round (like in some mamak shops) but in a big tear/pear shape. Not that it makes a difference actually. I like that it doesn’t taste ‘floury’.

Mango Lassi (RM7) – Its quite thick and yellow. Full of mango taste and slightly sour. I thought it was quite nice – tho better if it was colder. Fren didnt like it tho.

White Rice (RM3) - A bowl of white rice. A bit expensive. No free refills (its not a banana leaf shop after all)

Palak Panner (RM14) – Spinach mashed and cooked with goat’s cheese. This dish is creamy, almost like a soup and is excellent for dipping naan in.

Chicken Tikka (RM 14) - Boneless Tandoori Chicken. This one was nice. The marinade was flavored with spices and was slightly spicy. The meat was tender and juicy

Mutton Rohan Josh (RM18) - As you can see, its a really creamy sauce with chucks of mutton inside. This was not spicy (even tho we did ask for it to be spicy) and the sauce was really good. What I didn’t like was the mutton appeared to hv been cooked separately, then just tossed in the sauce. So the mutton tasted bland.

All in all, the food was pretty good. Well except that the mutton was a bit of a disappointment lah. The ambiance was also nice. I liked how there was a aircon and non-aircon area. Also, there wasn’t the overwhelming smell of food even tho they had an open kitchen (separated from the eating area by a clear partition). The waiters were also helpful to explain the items on the menu because they weren’t any descriptions.

I think we will be coming here again. Oh yes, after some googling, i found out that you can actually order items off the menu if the owner – Shiva – is around.

Indian Kitchen Restaurant
NO 15 Jalan Telawi 3, Bangsar Baru, KL.

I had an interview at The Gardens today so I brought Gladys along because she hasn’t been to The Gardens. Anyway, we decided to have tea at The Yogi Tree. Their tag line is “real food cafe & yoga boutique”. Its a really nice cozy corner restaurant with ample sofas and comfortable seats and tables.

We had the Afternoon Tea Set (RM38.00). The tea set includes a pot of tea, scones with cream and jam, a cake and sandwiches. We had a pot of Rosehip tea – a reddish tinted slightly sourish tea. They were out of scones so we had to choose between an additional dessert of our choice or more sandwiches. We chose the sandwiches.

G chose the Chocolate Truffle Cake which was an awesome awesome rich chocolatey cake. It was moist and creamy. Its served with some clotted cream. Sorry for the bad cake picture coz we were hungry and attacked it before remembering to snap a picture.

This is the yummy sandwiches we got. This is a double portion (due to the fact that they were out of scones). The open faced sandwiches are with salmon with some kinda really nice sauce which I can’t really put my finger on. The other sandwiches are chicken with something like pesto. Absolutely delish!

Yogi Tree has a 10% Service charge on top of the prices. It was a good RM41.80 spent on tea with my sister. A bit pricy but so yummy

The Yogi Tree
Lot F237B, 1st Floor,
Garden Galleria,
Midvalley City.

Tel : 03-22826163

Yes, I’m a big fan of banana leaf rice even though sometimes its a bit too expensive. However, G brought me to this place near SS2 called Kanna Curry House for an affordable banana leaf rice.

There are three places to sit in Kanna’s. One is inside where its air conditioned, the other is an open air restaurant (like a normal kedai mamak) and finally tables and chairs across the street under the trees. We sat inside because it’s easier to order and we don’t smoke.

G had a Thosai Rawa (RM1.50) and I had banana leaf rice (RM4.80). The mamak came with a clean piece of banana leaf and piled on the white rice. Then the usual three types of vege are served. On that day they had cabbage, cucumber and long beans. It also comes with the papadum.

We also ordered the sotong goreng (RM6.50). Yes, the picture above is a huge plate of fried sotong with onions. I had one Fish Cutlet (RM2.00) which was dry and rather tasteless. We had three drinks – Milo Ais (RM1.80), Limau Ais (RM1.40) and Mango Lassi (RM4.00).

Directions to get to Kanna Curry House : From SS2, if BHP is on your right, drive straight till you reach a T-junction with a traffic light. Turn left and continue down that road. Turn left at the next T-junction after the shoplots. Kanna Curry House is on the shoplots on the right side.

Sorry for the lack of updates but I’ve been busy with exams and schoolwork. Then I went to Kota Kinabalu, Sabah for a friend’s wedding. I used to stay in KK for 7 years and there is this one restaurant that I never miss to go everytime I’m in town which is Little Italy. Rach, Derek and I went to Little Italy on Sunday night to satisfy my craving to eat their sandwich.

Calzone (small) – Alla Salsiccia (RM19.90). Its basically a folded pizza. This one has lamb in a tomato based sauce

Puccia di Pollo – Chicken and Mushroom sandwich. This is what I have been craving for. (RM18.50)

Sal. Casereccia (RM32.90) – Lamb kebabs. This is really nice and juicy. I can’t rmbr what’s the full name of this dish but that’s what is written in the receipt.

Little Italy Pasta and Pizza Corner is a small corner restaurant at the heart of town near Wisma Merdeka that is a great hit – especially with foreigners. So do go early because this place is always full especially during meal times.

Little Italy Pasta and Pizza Corner,
Ground Floor, No 23,
Jalan Haji Saman,
88813 Kota Kinabalu, Sabah,
Malaysia.

Tel : 088-232231

The bf and I have been wanting to eat at a Japanese buffet for some time now. The nearest for me would be Shogun but I’ve heard that the food quality has dropped/is not so good so I didn’t want to try it. Plus, there’s always a huge line and I hate waiting.

After googling and reading other food blogs, I found that Rakuzen or (Raku Zen) in Chulan Square offers an All You Can Eat for lunch (1.00 – 3.00 pm) on Sundays. This was even better than eating a buffet because you can just order and they will make it fresh for you.

The presentation and setting of our table. We had green tea. The green leaf shaped thing is wasabi.

The very extensive All-You-Can-Eat menu. You can order everything and anything from this menu

Soft shell crab temaki (handroll) and assorted Sashimi

The soft shell crab temaki was nice but there wasn’t anything special about it. The assorted sashimi tasted quite fresh – no yukky fishy smell. Its 2 slices each of maguro (tuna), shiromi (white fish), sake (salmon), ika (cuttlefish) and tako (octopus). It was my first time eating the cuttlefish raw – can’t say I like the taste,. I love the tuna tho (the reddish meat). The octopus was kinda rubbery but that is expected.

I just love this Chuku Lidako (and so does my sister who was so jealous when I MMS-ed her this pic). Its baby octopus cooked in a reddish sauce and sprinkled with sesame seeds. I really love the Japanese cold dishes and so does the bf.

Chuku Lidako (baby octopus) and Edemame (boiled green soya beans)

Then we edamame which are boiled green soya beans. Aree likes these beans. It has small fine hairs outside the pod and you only eat the beans inside. These tasted like they were perhaps boiled for a bit too long because they were a bit squishy. Yummy nonetheless.

Mixed sushi

We also had a plate of mixed sushi. From the top left : Tamagoyaki (omelette), ebikko (shrimp roe), inari (sweet bean curd stuffed with rice), inari (eel), ni hotate (boiled scallop), wasn’t really sure what was the 2nd one, octopus, ebi (prawn), cuttlefish, salmon, white fish and tuna.

Mix skewered grill

We also had a plate of mix skewered grill. It was two sticks each of shiitake mushrooms (which you can’t really see on the pic but its the far left), shishamo (smelt fish) and yakitori (chicken). Its my first time eating smelt fish which is commonly known as pregnant fish. Its stomach was full of fish eggs but for some reason I just can’t accept the taste of smelt fish.

Green tea icecream

OH MY GOD! This was SOOOO good. Let me repeat that. It was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO good. I had 2 scoops (wanted more but the bf looked at me one kind already). Im usually not a big fan of green tea but this icecream utterly blew me away.

Besides all the food that I took pic of above, we also had

• - Chilli ika (chilli cuttlefish) which wasn’t that spicy either
• - My absolute favourite Chuka Kurage (seasoned jellyfish)
• - Chawanmushi – steamed egg. Also so very sedap and silky smooth
• - Agedashi Toufu – Fried taufu (tempura) with sauce. This one was not so nice. The sauce lacked taste and the taufu was big when it should be smaller.

As you can see, we had so much to eat and I found it very worth it. I would so come here again if I had the money

Rakuzen Chulan  Square
Block B Lot 2A Chulan Square,
92 Jalan Raja Chulan, 50200 KL
Lunch: 11:30am – 3:00pm (daily)
Dinner: 6:00pm – 11:00pm (daily)

All-You-Can-Eat
Every Sunday (1.00 – 3.00pm)
Adult : RM55++ per pax
Child : RM28++ per pax

For reservations, please call: 03-2145 6200