If Your Plan A Failed, There's Always Plan B

There was one time colleague A asked another colleague B during lunch time, where to go for lunch? So, colleague B replied,"We are going for Plan B.". Colleague A then asked,"So where are we going for plan B? I didn't know we have a plan A". Hahaha. Colleague A didn't know Plan B is the name of the place that he's going to eat in.

Joke aside. Last week, thanks to Nuffnang's interest group #NNTasteBuddies, I got to taste a variety of food from Plan B that I haven't tried before. There are just so many choices in the menu. We went to have a food review session in Plan B, Bangsar Village. Henry, Mai Sarah, Saimatkong and Jun Zheng were there too.

Now let's starts with the coffee. Plan B has their own blend of roasted coffee, which I found is quite nice. I had Flat White and later an Australian Iced Coffee.

A scoop of vanila ice-cream in the iced coffee. Nice. I don't even have to put in the syrup.

Now let's eat!

Avo Quino is kind of of dish that one will order for breakfast and it's vegetarian food.

Avocado and poached eggs? My kind of thing.

We were told that one of their more popular pasta dish is the Asian-Style Soft-shell crab spaghettini. This a kind of a fusion dish. Rich butter sauce covered the spaghettini and a tinge of curry leaves. Yums. Recommended to be shared if not it will be too jelak.

Looking for pasta with more greens? Look no further. We tried the Arugula Pesto Spaghettini with seafood (please not the seafood is optional). Aroma of pine nuts from the pesto sauce is nice. Pasta is cooked al dente.

In between the heavy stuffs, we added something refreshing like the Som Tam Crab salad, which is green papaya salad. BIG Group's marketing people love it.

Nasi Lemak Goreng is a combination of two of our all time favourite mamak food, nasi lemak and nasi goreng kampung. I like the sourish sambal, it's so appetizing.

Going for some tea time snack? One can opt for Spicy Fish Tacos. To me not very spicy at all. Fish is cooked just right. Sweet potato fries as side is something not normally found but it's the norm for Plan B.

Not a fan of fish? Why not go for the Char-Grilled Kimchi Chicken Burger? Burger is tender but I will like the kimchi to be a little bit more sourish.

Oh, Plan B just revamped their menu, some of the food we tried are new in the menu. They took out my favourite Ox Tongue Sandwich :(

Now the mother of all comfort food must be the Buttermilk Fried Chicken. Crispy skin and the meat still juicy and tender. It's so sinfully good.

Now even though we are quite full already, we still make rooms for dessert. The Coconut Cake is nice.

But the Apple Sugee Cake is awesome! Warm apple sugee cake eaten with the cold vanilla ice-cream is da bomb. I think it will paired very well with coffee.

Plan B is really a good place to look for comfort food and a cuppa. Plan B has outlets in Bangsar Village, Mid Valley, Publika, One Utama, Paradigm Mall and Ipoh. Click here for the address and business hour.

House of Tang at One Bangsar

One Bangsar has many restaurants that serves cuisine from different countries. It's like an International affair there. Honestly, I haven't been to One Bangsar even though I drove passed it quite a few times when I passed through Bangsar. Alas, last Wednesday I finally have a chance to dine in one of the restaurant there.

House of Tang, I've read a lot about this Chinese restaurant that serves up some very nice dim sum but I was there last Wednesday for a meal of dinner. Jason, Ai Wei, Christine, Chris, me and three other friends gathered to celebrate Lex's shifting to Singapore without Lex being there. Nah, just kidding, it was just a gathering of us foodies for a makan.

We started off with Braised Seafood in Scallop and Shark’s Fin Soup (瑶柱海味烩鱼翅). With all those ingredients, this is one very rich shark's fin soup. While it tasted not too bad but I still prefer shark's fin soup with clear broth and cooked with Yuen Nam ham.

Braised Seafood in Scallop and Shark’s Fin Soup (瑶柱海味烩鱼翅).

Continue on, we have a little bit for appetizer from the dim sum menu. Unagi Puff with BBQ Sauce (烧汁鳗鱼酥) is one of it's kind of dim sum that I had. The skin is very crispy and the unagi is very easy to bite and juicy too. It's a very interesting and nice dim sum.

Unagi Puff with BBQ Sauce (烧汁鳗鱼酥).

Assam ‘Tom Yam’ Garoupa Fish (亞參冬炎石斑魚) is up next. I must say even though the fish is cooked a little bit too long but the assam 'Tom Yam' sauce saves the day. The sauce goes very well with the fish. I especially like the part where the fish meat has a little bit of fish oil. Nice.

Assam ‘Tom Yam’ Garoupa Fish (亞參冬炎石斑魚)

One of my favourite dish of the night is the Braised Pig Trotter (红烧元蹄). Okaylah, I'm always bias towards pork but this pig trotter is really cooked al dente. While the the meat is tender there's still some chewy collagen beneath the skin. I can taste premium soya sauce was added in the sauce. I ate a lot of this pig trotter even though there are still a few dishes on the way.

Braised Pig Trotter (红烧元蹄).The appearance is so nice.

OMG. Can you see the collagen. LOL.

Let's have some internal organ after we had the trotter. So, Stir Fried Pork Belly with Preserved Vegetables (咸菜炒猪肚) is what we had next. I like that the pork belly is cooked right with the springiness and chewiness still intact but not to hard to chew. I have to say the chef did some steps to treat the preserved vegetables making it not overwhelmingly salty. Just the right saltiness. Thumbs up.

Stir Fried Pork Belly with Preserved Vegetables (咸菜炒猪肚)

Okay. That's quite enough of meat already. Let's have some vegetable to balance up the meal. Shen Jiang Homemade Bean Curd (申江自制豆腐) is just what we needed. Look at the gravy, if not because I was alredy 2/3 full, I will order a bowl of white rice and pour the gravy all over the rice. The homemade bean curd is quite rich with soya bean taste, lightly fried on the outer later yet the inside is still very smooth and soft. I regretted of not ordering the rice now T_T.

Shen Jiang Homemade Bean Curd (申江自制豆腐)

Imagine the soft and smooth tofu with rice.

Let's have more greens. Pigweed Simmered with Whitebait and Wolfberry (银鱼杞子灼苋菜). I can say that this dish is very good for the eyes because there's Wolfberry in it. Very nice vege dish.

Well, lucky I didn't order the rice because the last dish is Fried Yee Mee with Diced Prawns (虾茸干烧伊面). I like the yee mee because it's not soggy, just the right texture yet it has absorbed the sauce. Now I'm really glad I didn't order rice. I also sapu most of the kai lan at the side :p

Fried Yee Mee with Diced Prawns (虾茸干烧伊面)

It's time for dessert. We ordered Herbal Jelly with Water Chestnut and Ginseng Roots (参须龟苓膏炖马蹄) to wash down our meal. The taste of ginseng roots is quite strong but I like it. A good dessert to takes of the heat of having to work night shift for me.

Herbal Jelly with Water Chestnut and Ginseng Roots (参须龟苓膏炖马蹄)

Overall the dinner at House of Tang is very pleasant and the food there is very good. By the way, no MSG is used in preparing the dishes here in House of Tang.



Address:

House of Tang
One Bangsar
No. 63B, Jalan Ara, bangsar Baru, 59100 kuala Lumpur.
Tel: 603 2282 1111 │ Email: dine@houseoftang.com.my
Website: http://www.houseoftang.com.my
Click here for map.

Launch of Delicious Times & D'Lish New Menu!

Last week I got the invitation to the Launch of Delicious Times & D'Lish New Menu! from Jason that is extending the invitation to his flogger friends. As usual I always be on time to any event except when I have to work late. I reached D'Lish, Bangsar Village almost 7pm sharp. Bumped into Mike Yip in the car park. Registered myself and got a copy of the 1st edition of Delicious Times and a sticker to put my name on.

Yes. I'm Simon and I am delicious.

After a while two popular floggers that I know showed up. WMW and Meena. Delicious Times is the in house magazine by the Delicious Group which owns and manages Delicious and D'Lish restaurants and cafes. That night was also the launching of D'Lish new menu and we of course get to sample some of the new items in store.

The pastries in D'Lish are so tempting.

I also forwarded the invitation to Coco whom in turn brought Maggie and Jack to the even.

These are the salads that will be on the new menu in D'Lish. I managed to try Grilled Seafood Salad With Glass Noodle. It's a bit of a Thai style kind of salad. The sourish taste on the glass noodle tasted like lime. A very appetizing salad.

The Salads available in the new menu.

Grilled Seafood Salad With Glass Noodle.

Mushroom Salad.

Next up, we saw a lot of the staff there moving around with spoons on a tray. They are serving variety of Canapés. I managed to taste all the Canapés. Some hits and misses though.

Spoonfuls of Smoked Salmon On Rösti. The smoked salmon is very nice but I found the Rösti a bit too dry for my liking. Maybe it will be better on a normal day where there's no rushing in orders. It was a full house that night with so many guests. Even WMW that doesn't quite like seafood down a spoonful of this, so the smoked salmon must be very good.

Spoonfuls of Smoked Salmon On Rösti.

Nothing new about the Spoonfuls of Char-grilled Baby Octopus with Harissa. It's quite a normal dish that one can find anywhere.

Spoonfuls of Char-grilled Baby Octopus

I like the Spoonfuls of Vietnamese Spring Roll. Very refreshing. The taste is not overwhelmed because the fish sauce used is just nice to lighten up the rather bland ingredient in the spring roll.

Spoonfuls of Vietnamese Spring Roll.

The tomato soup in the Tomato Soup with Grilled Cheese Sandwich is my kind of tomato soup which is not too sourish. I remembered I had tomato soup in a Spanish restaurant during my visit to London a few years ago that it was so sourish and all the other dishes also has tomato, I almost puke from the over sourness. Dip the grilled cheese sandwich in the tomato soup and you'll get a new whole taste.

Tomato Soup with Grilled Cheese Sandwich

First, I'm not too sure whether this is Peking Duck Roll because the taste is quite forgettable for me. Mike Yip seems to like it very much. He didn't eat the other Canapés at all but he took like 3 or 4 of this Peking Duck Roll.

Peking Duck Roll.

The Skewers of Haloumi & Watermelon Salad is kind of a weird tasting Canapé for me. Imagine eating a marinated watermelon with cheddar cheese. Maybe it's just me that can't accept new combination of things. The Prawn Cocktail on Baby Romaine is something that I can relate to. Fresh shrimp and fresh lettuce. A nice match match.

Skewers of Haloumi & Watermelon Salad and Prawn Cocktail on Baby Romaine.

Woah. That was quite a lot of food and that's only half of it. Now we take a break and talk a bit about football (soccer for you Americans out there). The Barclay Premier League just ended and The Blue (Chelsea) was crown the winner. Such a coincident that it's the same colour as Celcom Blue Bear.

Cute right the Celcom Blue Bear.

After BPL just ended for the 2009/2010 season, the next big or I dare say the biggest event in football will be South Africa World Cup 2010 this coming June. I'll be supporting Bearmany (Germany for those of you that is still guessing :p). The coach of Bearmany, Joachim Low provisionally will be fielding stars like midfielder Michael Ballack (whom coincidentally is playing for Chelsea in BPL) and striker Miroslav Klose of Bayern Munich. Almost half of the Bearmany team made up of Bayern Munich that beat *ahem* Manchester United and made it in to the Champions League final.

Look like Bearmany this time has quite a strong team. So excited. Oh, by the way if you want to download wallpaper or the Bearigamy of the Blue Bear, you can click here to choose your free download or if you are a Celcom subscriber, you can dial *118# for more mobile wallpapers, games and ring tones.

Okay. Let's get back to the food from D'Lish. Moving outside, I found the grilling station. Guess what's cooking?

My favourite of the night is of course the Grilled NY Strip. Grilled to perfection in medium-rare doneness. Look at the nice pinkish colour (I swear I didn't photoshop the picture, I don't know how to use PS). A piece or two of the NY Strip is nice but too much and it'll be quite jelak. Unless if it's cooked to medium-well then I can take more :p

Grilled NY Strip

The Chicken Hot Dog is very nice too. It's quite big too, you know. With English Mustard, tomato sauce and onion, also the sesame bun that is very good. It's a very nice snack.

Chicken Hot Dog

It's so big that it can fit in my mouth.

There's also the Mini Beef Burger and Mini Turkey Burger. Personally, I prefer the Mini Beef Burger which is juicier than the Mini Turkey Burger that is quite dry.

Mini Beef Burger and Mini Turkey Burger.

On the sandwiches side, there's two new addition to the already many variety of sandwiches in the D'lish menu. These two are not your normal sandwich. The two sandwiches immediately become my favourite sandwiches. Why? Because you don't find too many cafe using Ox Tongue and Salt Beef to make sandwich. Top with pickle and hot English Mustard, what more would I ask for?

Ox Tongue, my favourite.

Open Face Salt Beef and Open Face Ox Tongue On Wholemeal Bread.

Two new pasta that can be found in the menu are the Corn Beef Spaghetti with Thai Basil and Crab Puttanesca with Penne. WMW finds the Corn Beef Spaghetti quite oily but it's quite alright for me. That is why food is quite a personal liking, each of us have different likes and dislikes. The Crab Puttanesca with Penne is quite good too, not like the normal pasta sauce that use tomato.

Corn Beef Spaghetti with Thai Basil.

Crab Puttanesca with Penne

All the nice dishes were then balance up with some nice cupcakes. I am not a fan of cupcakes but the one in D'Lish is not too sweet which is my cup of cake (pardon my lame pun).

During the launch event, we were entertained by Adibah Noor. Not only she can act, this woman can really sings too. Such a powerful singing. Go and support her new album. Take a listen to one of her single, Terlalu Istimewa, really nice. Maybe I should borrow the album from WMW. She bought it on that night.

The entertaining Adibah Noor.

There's also a comedy sketch on the current By-election phenomena.

Edwin Leong is one of the comedian in the sketch.

It was such a nice event. Nice food. Nice song. Nice friends. Nice drinks (Carbonated Fruit Punch ^_^). After a fulfilling (my stomach that is) night, I made my way to Mid Valley to catch Iron Man 2 which is a nice movie. Such a satisfying night for me.