Supir.

 Salam,

Hari ni jadi supir, drive dari Putrajaya ke Seremban. Keluar je Tol Kajang, perghhh jam bumper-to-bumper. Tak bajet plak jam seawal tu, ingatkan paling teruk pun jam kat Nilai. Sekali tengok message board kat highway tu, 'Trafik perlahan dari Bangi ke Seremban. Harap Bersabar'. Fuuhh nasib baik CC aka the pregnant lady aka my sister tahu ikut jalan dalam. Masuk simpang Bangi, patah balik Putrajaya, cari jalan masuk Dengkil, pegi Seremban ikut jalan dalam. Sampai gak la dalam sejam lebih. Kalau ikut PLUS tu mahu 2-3 jam nak sampai Seremban tu. Time tu dah la lapar gila, nasib ada bawak roti telur dalam kereta, sebab tak sempat makan kat rumah. Maka bersuap lah dua makhluk dalam kereta tu sementara nak sampai.

Sampai je Seremban, terus Ayah bawa pegi area Stadium Paroi, makan kat Nasi Arab Damsyik. Actually a friend of mine yang suggest, so pegi la try. Lagipun setiap kali datang Seremban, asyik makan tempat sama je, makan masak lemak cili api, kali ni tukar selera plak.

It's actually a restaurant in a house. Keliling semua banglo, tetibe satu rumah jadi restaurant.

Indoor seating macam ala-ala Mediterranean. Ade outdoor seating jugak.

Chai tea (tea with peppermint leaves) and their signature drink Mango Lassi. Mango Lassi tu mmg sedap la, tapi Chai tea tu kureng sikit. Tak rasa sangat mint nye.

Set Thalasa Ayam+Kambing, for 3 pax. Ada set Wahid for 1 pax and set for 5 and 10 pax. Tak silap ada ayam and kambing je. Sedap! Nasi tu ade rasa ayam, rasa daging and rempah-rempah semua cukup. Oh set for 3 ni harganya RM50. Served in a dulang.

Licin yo! Haha Overall memang sedap. Cuma yang kurang part menu la, tak macam restaurant arab yang lain. Yang ni mmg simple je. Jalan Jalan Cari Makan pun dah sampai sini. Pasni nak try Sahara Tent plak, or Al Rawsha ke. Yang memang pure Arab-style punye. Oh yg ni owned by Malays kalau tak silap, sebab waiter sume Malays. Sahara Tent tu semua macam owned by Arabs.

A- for food.

A+ for ambiance.

For dinner, CC aka the pregnant lady aka my sister mengidam makan sotong kangkung. Ayah being a caring daddy, bawak la dia pegi satisfy her craving. Last nye bukak sotong kangkung je, kerang bakar and tauhu bakar pun masuk list.

Oh oh, something funny happened tonight before dinner (tetibe English pulak dah). Kelam kabut siap tadi, Ayah dah tunggu kat luar. Terhegeh-hegeh nak iron baju (padahal makan kat tempat gelap je pun gigih nak iron baju) sekali terbakar baju. Ok terbakar tu exaggerate. Macam terlekat kesan burnt la kat baju tu. Dah kelam kabut takde baju nak pakai, pegi sarung je baju Mama. Tak penah share baju ng Mama selama 23 tahun hidup okay, melainkan baju kelawar ke maxi ke. Ni baju berjalan pakai baju Mama. Nasib la okay. Keluar je rumah kene gelak ngan CC and Ayah, sebab baju tu besar sikit, and nampak macam makcik. Dah la tudung pun sarung tudung Indon Mama. Adoi lah.

See? See? Makcik much? 

Eh gambar satu lagi takde watermark. Malas pulak dah.

Ok itu sahaja kthxbai!

Girly Weekend - Part 2

Salam,

As promised, here's the second part of my girly weekend. This time it was with another group of BFFs.

On Sunday, 8 of us gathered at Little White Cafe, Bangi to welcome Aisyah home, and also to celebrate her engagement yo! One of us is engaged, MasyaAllah! 

I reserved for the 10 of us, but only 9 could make it. Me, Tira, Pao, Hawa, Aimi and Aisyah's friends from PennState-Peyya, Resty, Yaya. Zawa couldn't make it to LWC, but we managed to meet her at PKNS afterwards.

You really don't want to put 9 girls together in a cute little cafe. We pretty much treated the cafe like our own, and we talked and talked like nobody's business. Initially, I was thinking of having a private gathering (Ecah I'm spilling the initial plan for you :)), maybe in somebody's house or something. Pao thought even bigger, to book a hotel room! Then I thought of having a tea party, with cupcakes, muffins, together with English-inspired tea set and everything lah. Hahaha me and my angan-angan. I know you would love that, but sorry girl, the plan fell through, next time maybe? I thought, the closest thing to a tea party was to have the gathering at LWC. Jadilah kan? Hehe

I got lost on my way there. First, I thought I wanted to avoid using MRR2 because you-know-why lah. I'd rather drive back to Putrajaya, and use the usual route. But then I said, just try my luck, and yes I was indeed lucky that day, no heavy traffic except for in front of Tesco Ampang. Then when I arrived in Bangi, I got lost! LWC is on Jalan Medan PB 4A, (oh here's their Facebook) but Jane doesn't have it registered! She only has up to Jalan 3A, so the stupid me pergi pusing sana sini cari-cari tak jumpa. To make things worst, my handphone died on the way! Like flat habis. Out of desperation, I stopped by at a burger stall and asked for direction. Too bad the guy had no idea where I was heading. Guess what I did next?

.

.

.

.

I asked if I could borrow his handphone and he said yes!!! Must be my desperate look lah, thanks Abang Burger. Now you kiddo, don't do this at home. It iz very dangerousszzzz!! Kalau dah desperate sangat nak buat macamana kan? Survival 101. Thing is, I'm useless when it comes to memorizing phone numbers. I don't know Pao's or Tira's number by heart. So I dialed my sis and asked for direction. 

'Ko turn dekat ^*&()hkjo**^&^_GJBmnjgk' 

My mind was everywhere, I didn't bother to listen carefully. After what seemed like a good 5 minutes of menghabiskan credit seorang stranger, I hung up and relied on Jane again. 

'3A pun 3A lah.' 

Suddenly, I turned at one corner and there it was 'LITTLE WHITE CAFE' right in front of my eyes. Thank God!

Got into the cafe, hugged Ecah super duper tight (oh I miss you now) and talked the evening out. It was a great time catching up with her and others. Tak cukup kt LWC, we then moved to PKNS Bangi to find a place to lepak, and we settled for its food court. Empty food court, just perfect! Talked, gossiped, talked, looked at Aisyah's engagement pictures, gossiped some more, and it was 8 by then! Resty had to rush home, so off we all went. 

Saying goodbye was the hardest. Aisyah will be going back to the States this Friday to continue with her internship, and she will only be back for good in December. I, on the other hand, insyALLAH will be leaving this September, and not sure if I'll be coming back during summer. So yeah, the feeling of not-sure-when-we'll-see-each-other-again, it's so sad! We had many rounds of hugging-letting go-hugging-letting go we almost cried! Seriously Ecah, if you dropped just one little tear that night, I would have drove back in tears, okay!

But it's okay, it's not a goodbye, it's just 'See you later' eh? (One bear hug for you)

Now, the review part. (Wah so long ah the post?)

I give A for ambiance. English-themed interior deco, I guess. 

All white, me likey :)

*I'm not an interior designer by profession*

I had Chef Salad and Berry Cooler. I was quite full since I just had lunch.

Food wise, I have to say I'm a little bit disappointed. The food is a bit pricey, for the quality. I didn't try what others had, but from they were saying, the food wasn't that great. I took home a piece of their Red Velvet cake. Erm let just say, I've tasted better. I think they could have increased the portion to match with price they are charging. Just my opinion.

The cafe is quite small. I would say they could accommodate about 20-25 people at one time. You can see the whole of the dining area in this picture. Despite the whole food and price thing, I'm totally in love with the deco. It's a personalized cafe, the cafe spells its owner.

Oh I must say, the waiters are nice too. One of them even waited outside and offered to take our picture in front of the cafe. Just that he didn't take it with the signboard -___- Bummer!

Here's some info about the cafe (taken from their Facebook);

Little White Cafe

13-G-1, Jalan Medan PB 4A, Pusat Bandar Baru Bangi, 43650 Selangor

Operation hours: Tue-Sun; 8 am to 10 pm

Till we meet again :)

Congratulations on your engagement my dear Aisyah.

Restaurant Review- The Precinct

Salam,

Sister, brother-in-law and I went furniture hunting last Wednesday (Furniture arriving today, can't wait to have my new favorite thing woot woot!). We  figured there are a lot of restaurants in Precinct 15 that we haven't tried yet. So, we decided to give The Precinct Kopitiam a try that night (God, I just knew Precinct is spelled as PrecinCt not PrecinT. Haha noobsss)

The Precinct Kopitiam specialty is asam pedas claypot. You can choose from ikan pari, ikan tenggiri, ikan parang, ikan kembong and last but not least, ikan SALMON yo! The claypot prices range from RM7.80-RM28.90 (obviously that's the SALMON). I was itching to try asam pedas salmon but then it is to pricey :(

I was a bit jakun to see the waiter using this PDA-kinda-thing to take our orders. They just key the orders in, and the orders will automatically shown on the monitor in the kitchen (at least I thought that's how it works :P)

So all three of us ordered the same thing, asam pedas pari. Sungguh tak creative. When the food came, wah it was sizzling hot mannn. And the fish was hugeeeee. We thought we had to share one claypot, but no, one huge fish for everyone. 

Jeng jeng jeng, now come the most important part of all. The taste! Overall I can say that the food was good, but I prefer the asam pedas to be less 'pekat'. I'm the soup person, give me curry or asam pedas, I would want to hirup em' all. But since the asam pedas here was a bit 'pekat', no hirup for me :( Oh yeah back to the taste. The spiciness and sourness were A-OKAY. 

Oh the claypot set comes with nasi putih and ulam-ulaman too. The taugeh was an add-on.

Not too forget, they also have variety of other menu-cucur ikan bilis, putu piring, laksa, mee goreng, char kuey tiao etc. Oh and they serve cucur ikan bilis with asam pedas yo! Super new thing for us. I was told by Athirah that orang Melaka eat asam pedas with almost everything, including roti canai. Need to try that one day.

As usual, the 'aftermath' picture. 

All in all, a good place to go to if you were craving for asam pedas. But I bet, orang Melaka and orang Johor will say that they can do a better job :) Nice ambiance, affordable and friendly waiters/waitresses (because I asked if I could take a picture of the PDA-kinda-thing and he just smiled and passed the thing to me without hesitation)

*uuuu now my stomach is growling, it's about lunchtime BYEEEE*

Best Steamboat ever!

I grew up eating steamboat. The whole family is just a big fan of it. We used to have a steamboat set at home...until one day, the brilliant me found this one place.

..

..

Johnny's Restaurant!

I first read about it in Remaja magazine when I was in high school. Like it was just fated, Johnny's opened its outlet in Jusco Ipoh right after. So off we went. Since then, bye-bye steamboat at home, hi steamboat at Johnny's. It's the family favorite until now. Every time we gather (we used to live in three different continents at one point of time), there's no question about where to go eat.

Yeah we tried other places occasionally; the all-you-can-eat steamboat for RM25++  i.e Flaming Steamboat in Subang and Setapak, Red Wok in Bangi. But we keep on coming back to Johnny's. It's the battle of 'quality' versus 'quantity'. *Seoul Garden Korean BBQ is different. Will blog about it once I give it a visit later*

At Johnny's, they already pick what you'll get for Set A,B,C. Extra RM10 for Tom Yam soup. Fine. But it's the Tom Yam soup that keep us coming back. Tempat lain, naaaah biasa-biasa je - cair, tasteless, not spicy enough, too spicy.  

We took Set B RM 29.90 (10 items)

 

And Johnny's dip sauce is too die for! 

Other places, they serve 10 if not 20 different sauces (sambal belacan, thai sauce, blend chilli sauce, yong tau foo sauce, black pepper sauce etc) Not a single one stands out! You have to mix different sauces to get a decent taste. 

Johnny's dip sauce has secret ingredients, that Mama has tried to decipher for years. We thought, if Mama could make a similar sauce, then there's no need to 'kayakan' Johnny's owner anymore. But it's just so hard to 'tiru' so we gave up. Fine Johnny's owner, you are five thousand richer because of us.

Thai BBQ Beef Noodle. Yumm-eh.

Just looking at this makes me hungry. What's for breakfast yo?

The aftermath.

Bye now! Gotta go find something to eat. Tummy is crying.

Of Jane and Levain

Salam,

Another weekend passed by, and me being a 'Weekend Nomad' (I just coined the term for myself today), I slept over at Zaf's on Friday and my aunt's on Saturday. Something different I did this weekend was, I drove to KL! What an achievement! (I heard 'Yeay Dila' on the background. Tengs yo!) If you read my earlier entries, you would have known that I'm such a noob when it comes to driving. Noob no more, because I now have my driving mate called...JANE! Jane is actually a GPS, not some new friend I met. Our extended family is used to calling a GPS, Jane, so I guess changing the name to 'Anuar Zain' or 'Michael Buble' just won't cut it. (Excuse the lame me for thinking such names for a GPS)

Just after I got back from the States in June, I kinda annoyed the girls when I repeatedly said how GPS is really useful and that we should get it asap. Sorry girls for being such a spoiled brat :P But yeah, it is proven that I am a spoiled brat because I gain my confidence to drive in KL when I have Jane with me. Sungguh loser, nak ada technology baru nak ada confidence.

So right after work on Friday, I drove to KLCC because Zaf, Hana and I decided to meet there for dinner. My first time going through a heavy traffic jam, I almost fell asleep in the car, no kidding! The whole journey to KLCC, I was thinking of what to have for dinner, and Chili's came to mind. It sounded just perfect when the girls were craving for the same thing as well. Too bad for us, the waiting time was one and the half hours, so we decided to settle for Bumbu Desa instead. From American to Indonesian, such a big leap. Bumbu Desa was fair, but not a place I'd come for a second time. They have Es Timun, which I miss so much from my family trip to Medan last 2 years or so. Unlucky me, the Es Timun was not as good as the one I had in Medan. Guess I just to fly there again then. *When is Air Asia having sales again?*

Then came Saturday morning. I proposed to the girls earlier that we would have breakfast at Levain Boulangerie and Patisserie. Remember I told about it in this post? This time I went with familiar faces, therefore tak segan to camwhoring. We unanimously agreed that the breads/buns/danish were just A-OKAY. But I had something different this time, the breakfast set and macaroons! Well you know, not only shoes and handbags have their 'in' time, food has 'in' time too. Apparently, macaroons are so 'in' right now, I just have to try it. True what they say, macaroons are so sweet. If you didn't have a sweet tooth, you might want to think twice before trying it.

Nany had this octopus bun and some oreo-looking bun (sorry I don't know their names). I didn't try it because I was busy stuffing my face with the breakfast set. But Nany and Hana agreed that the octopus bun was good.

Zaf's. Again, I don't know the names.

My breakfast set. Beef bacon, sausage, scramble egg and toast for RM9.90.

The most talked about macaroons! Or in French they pronounce it as 'makarong'. Something like that.

Hana Banana's first appearance in my new blog :P

Cik Zaf and Cik Nany

Hana's outgrown us! What year were you born in again?

Overall review on Levain: Okay food, with good environment. It is actually a bungalow turned bakery shop. Nice interior decor and they also have car jockey. We missed it, we had to pay some random Indian guy RM 10 for two cars to park in front of Andalus (nearby restaurant). Cekik darah. Btw, the car jockey is just RM2. Price is affordable, the buns are between RM3-6 if I'm not mistaken. I was expecting a place like this to be more expensive than that. You can try Levain for a change. Leave the nasi lemak roti canai teh ais for a day and go for some oreo-looking bun and ice chocolate instead :)

p/s: Another 5-days at work, then I'm off to watch Lat Kampung Boy the musical on Saturday. Jom?