Noble Mansion, Plaza 33

Expensive and exotic. That will be my two words description for Noble Mansion. Another favorites for Chinese wedding events and dinner gatherings, it would be a good idea to book a  table prior to dining there. 

Claypot Fish Slice with Onions

An expensive version of claypot fish slice where you can get it at half the price in some hawker stalls. However, taste wise, it was quite exquisite. The fish slice was sliced reasonably thick for that extra juiciness when cooked with onions. It was well seasoned and brought out the freshness of the fish slice.

Pumpkin Melon Soup

The soup itself was flavorful and addictive to taste. It was a rich combination of melon, pumpkin, dates and Chinese dried oyster.

Sze-Chuan Soup with Scallops

This was definitely one of the exotic dish of the night. The soup was a thick gooey red with condiments such as chilli and mushroom. It is spicy and sourish, a very typical flavor for Sze-Chuan inspired dishes. The taste itself was quite exotic and not everyone likes the taste of it, it is pretty much an acquired taste.

Pork Ribs

Pork Ribs

The pork ribs was the main highlight and my favorite dish of the night. The pork ribs was tender and juicy. It was served up with a rich sauce which was sweet with a tinge of sourness. The pork ribs was also fried to crisp on the exterior. It is an art to fry pork ribs without overcooking the internal flesh. Another touch that made this dish so special was the dates on the top of the pork ribs, it is definitely something different but yet so tastefully done.

Lamb Shank served with bread

Deep Fried Mantou

The lamb shank was a surpring take. I was surprised with their menu of Lamb Shank since it was a Chinese restaurant, Lamb Shank clearly doesn't goes down with Chinese food. And true to it, Noble Mansion should probably stick to what they prepare best - Chinese food. The lamb shank was mediocre and not as well seasoned as what a good western restaurant would prepare. The meat itself was not tender enough with the sauce just being average.

Soup

I'll admit I can't recall the name of this soup. Taste wise - I think its an acquired taste because my brothers disliked the soup since they claimed it had a funny taste but my parents loved it. The soup itself was pretty sourish, with some spiciness in it. Tasted like preserved vegetables soup though. I didn't exactly love it, neither did I hate it.

Double Boiled Fungus with Soya Milk

It's dessert time and it was undeniably good. Nothing beats a soothing hot soya milk together with soft chewy fungus for a Chinese dessert. Not even chinese pancakes!

Longan and Fungus Dessert

Another bowl for the sweet toothed. Sweet from the excessive longans and soft chewy fungus, this is another wonderful dessert to end the night.

All in all, it was a great experience and I was pretty satisfied with most of the dishes. It was a rather different experience from your average Chinese restaurants. However, the price itself is enough to cost a bomb, prepare to fork out about RM 500 for the above meals.

-thevanillapudding-

YouMiQi Cuisine @ Old Klang Road

The name itself pretty exotic, doesn't it? This isn't your typical Chinese restaurant such as with the likes of Oversea Restaurant. It offers something more exotic, a Chinese Shunde-style cuisine where you won't get it anywhere else. It is definitely an eye opener for first timer. It is easy to miss out this restaurant as its location is no where strategic, other than a small two story building tucked away before the Valenza budget hotel. Parking can be difficult and seatings can be even more difficult without a booking. 

Homemade Chilli 

Unlike your typical chilli served in Chinese restaurant, YouMiQi serves up chopped chili in a slightly sour base. It's watery and seem like a harmless seasoning, however, a word of caution - it can be quite spicy! 

Rice Noodles

Fascinating isn't it? Most of us will know it as "chee cheong fun". The rice noodles was thin and surprisingly chewy. There was not much seasoning to it, where soy sauce act as the main seasoning. It wasn't too bad, despite its blandness.

Stir Fried Clams

The clams were stir fried with a micture of onions, shallots, carrots and bittergourd. The bittergourd taste was quite strong though and the sauce was salty.

Herbal Chicken

This taste like the herbal sauce chicken my mom prepares every week. Nothing to rave about.

Water Spinach with Pork Slice

This was quite good. Instead of using milk for the soup, YouMiQi uses rice water. It was surprisingly addictive despite its lack of taste. The pork slice was a wonderful addition to the soup.

Wax Rice

Wax Rice

This is definitely a must try. It is so wonderfully seasoned and prepared that you can't help but going in for the second round. But it doesn't do well with those who have digestive problem because its generally quite oily and heavily seasoned with lard. So, you can imagine the amount of grease.

Pan Fried Fish Slice

Pan Fried Fish Slice

Another simple delicacy with wonderful seasoning. Fish was sliced to bite size and pan fried till the exterior was crispy and the internal flesh was soft and juicy.

Handmade Pork Balls with Preserved Vegetables

Another orgasmic dish - pork balls. First of all, you don't say no to pork balls. Second of all, what beats handmade pork balls? Well seasoned and juicy, that's what you need in a pork ball. Seasoned with preserved vegetables, that's a pretty well combination. Definitely a must try.

YouMiQi Cuisine sets the bar pretty high and you will want to come back for another round, but after you give your wallet a break. The price itself is not cheap. However, it would be an eye opener and a taste bud opener.

-thevanillapudding-

Coffeeshop in Jalan Batai, Pusat Bandar Damansara

This coffeeshop is quite popular among office workers, especially for the Chinese since they served pork loaded dishes. It is located behind the row of Hock Lee Restaurant, it is quite a distance from the offices located in Menara Millenium. 

The guys loved the pork noodles and urged us to give it a try. Hey, I'm always up for good food even it means walking across the busy road in stilettoes. Hahaha. The place is scorching hot and you'll be sweating even before you ordered your food! During lunch hour, it is so packed that you would have to wait for a table, so if possible, head out from your office by 11.30a.m. to get a seat.

I'm unsure about the name of the coffeeshop since I never took notice of it, but it is the last shop behind Hock Lee Restaurant. You wouldn't miss it since the other end is a mamak stall.

They served a variety of dishes but what was claimed to be really good, finger smacking good was the duck wanton mee, wanton mee, fish head noodles and pork noodles.

The pork noodles that looks utterly good which I regretted not ordering!! The girls loved this better.

I ordered the wanton mee since I'm a huge fan of it. But to be honest, it wasn't that good, I've tasted better. The aunty selling wanton mee in TTDI did a better job at it. Maybe its a choice of personal preference - this was more chewy and the pork was generous in amount.

Ratings : 3.5/5

Price : 4.5/5

-thevanillapudding-

Greenview Restaurant

I bought dinner for my family today. I just received my first salary from my first official job, so I guess its a tradition to buy a meal for the family. After all, they have been there to support me all the time. Dad decided to have Chinese seafood for dinner, I wasn't expecting it honestly.

Where else other than the ole faithful Greenview Restaurant? Most of the foodie would at least have tried Greenview once in their lifetime, so I guess they don't need much introduction. Greenview is located in the most un-strategic place where parking is nasty and the road is horrible. 

Greenview Restaurant is popular for their tiger prawn noodles aka "Sang Ha Mee". Everyone who goes there will order that particular dish. It was basically noodles in thick gravy and loaded with tiger prawns. Mind you, the price ain't that cheap either!

Look at the size of the tiger prawn! The noodles was a sinful indulgence of thick starchy gravy. But the main attraction would still be the tiger prawns. Juicy, fresh and mouthwatering. Each bite was bliss. Tiger prawns for the win!

Another one of my favorite dish of all time. Stir fried mixed vegetables with macadamia. I love the crispiness of the macadamia to the crunchiness of the celery, sweet pea and lotus. It is as good as it looks apart from the slight oiliness.

This whole crab is imported! It ain't cheap either. Introducing the imported Indonesian crab cooked in sweet sour sauces. What I love about this crab was their claws, compared to the local crab which has small claws and little flesh, this was the complete opposite. It has huge claws with a whole chunk of yummy flesh soaked in sweet and sour sauce.

Introducing the stir fried chili clams aka "Kam Hiong Lala". This wasn't as good as I expected. Their "kam hiong" wasn't very good honestly, I personally think hawkers serves the best "Kam Hiong" dishes!

Overall, their main attraction was their Tiger Prawn Noodles. Their food is generally good but slightly expensive.

Price : 3.5/5

Ratings : 4.0/5

Greenview Restaurant

No. 6 & 8 Jalan 19/3 
46300 Petaling Jaya 
Selangor 

Tel : 03 7958 1076, 03 7954 9263

Operating Hours : 11.00am – 11.00pm

-thevanillapudding-

Peter's Pork Noodles, Money Corner, Brickfields

Hands up pork noodles lover! This was deemed as one of the most popular pork noodles around Brickfields, we became jaywalkers just to cross the main road to tryout this pork noodles! This place was hard to find, well if you're coming from KL Sentral direction, it was rather hard to be notice since its located across a small alley. If not, it is located opposite the YMCA building.

The coffeeshop was hot and stuffy, but this don't deter so many office employee to sit in the heat and enjoy their meal. There are a variety of hawkers in the coffee shop, the popular one would be the banana leaf rice stall (malay), the chinese mixed rice, the western hawker and the pork noodles stall. 

You can order either the dry or the soup version of the pork noodles. The more popular one was definitely the soup pork noodles. There was a variety of kueyteow or beehoon and you could request for extra egg at RM 0.50 if I'm not mistaken. 

The Dry Pork Noodles with Soup

So I had the dry noodles for RM 5.50 (small bowl), the large bowl was RM 6.50. The noodles were tossed in a rich amount of soy sauce and topped off with a generoud amount of pork lard, though I never take pork lard. But the best way to have the dry noodles is to douse it with some soup, if not you will find it difficult to enjoy your noodles since it was so dry!

The soup was overloaded with minced pork and pork chunks. It was juicy and succulent. Each bite was a burst of flavors, well burst of minced pork that was well marinated. I wouldn't say it was the best, but it certainly was good.

Banana Leaf Rice

Looks pretty good too. My senior chose to have something different instead.

Earth calling to all pork noodles lover, this is the one place that you should give it a shot. 

Price : 4.5/5

Ratings : 4/5

Peter’s Pork Noodle
Money’s Corner
No. 144A, Jalan Vivekananda
Off Jalan Brickfields
50470 Kuala Lumpur

-thevanillapudding-

Homie Recipe, Sooka Sentral

Currently, I'm based in a clients place in KL Sentral and I'm always trying out new places around KL Sentral. I must say this place deserves two thumbs up. Located in Sooka Sentral, it is a medium size shoplot with simple settings of wooden stool and table. 

It can get a little stuffy inside the restaurant because of poor ventilation as the kitchen is an open area. They prepare the noodles right in front of you, the aroma of the pan mee is awesomely declicious. The variety on their menu is limited, which means shorter time of picking what you want to eat.

Barley Soya @ RM 2.80

Their barley drink is good. I love it to the max! Its not a plain ole barley, but you get a surprise in your first sip. Rather than just barley, you have a taste of good ole soya milk mixed with the barley which was totally godly! They served it with a rich amount of barley, gingko and fuzhuk. 

Hot and Spicy Pan Mee @ RM 9.90

Two times that I visited Homie Recipe and in both times, I had this. It was just that good. This pan mee was so delicious and sets itself apart from all other pan mee was because of its sauce and noodles. The pan mee was thick and crunchy, not the thin, starchy type that most pan mee shops serve.

The sauce was just so finger licking good. It was thick, spicy and wonderfully flavored. Thinking about it makes me drools. It was a whole bowl of godliness.

Dry Chili Shrimp Pan Mee @ RM 9.90

My seniors ordered this and it looks pretty good either. 

I would definitely come back for more!

Price : 3.0/5

Rating : 4.5/5

thevanillapudding

Ka Soh Seafood Restaurant, KL

This is dad's favorite restaurant for a good fish head noodles. Located in Jalan Delima, off Jalan Imbi - the traffic is horrendous if you were to come one weekdays. Weekends are fine but I just never like travelling to KL, its just like a whole pack of sardines swimming in a very small confined area. Driving to this area just gives me the headaches because of all the turning and traffic light. 

Comparing to their competitors located on the same street, it was relatively quieter with a few customers visiting the restaurant. Its setting is pretty much of typical Chinese restaurant, so nothing much that I can describe. Their food here is pretty expensive and ripped off because some bloggers also said it was quite touristy. 

Instead of serving you crackers or peanuts, they served a platter of mixed preserved vegetables, better known as Acar. Its sourish with a tinge of spiciness - I know my dad's family back in Perak makes good Acar. I love its flavor combination and the crunchiness the cucumber and peanuts add to the whole platter. Well, I love Acar and this is really two thumbs up.

Brother had the "Kat Chai" which I think its sour plum? Haha. I'm actually not too familiar with it. However, this was rather bland compared to others that I had before. I think its the lack of sugar or perhaps too much water added to it.

The seacoconut that I ordered was a complete ripped off. I felt so cheated. The syrup was bland and diluted. The seacoconut was just depressing in amount, a few miserable seacoconut and they charged a bomb. I think  we would stick to Chinese Tea the next rouond. 

Their signature frog dish was superb! It was one of the best, most mouthwatering frog delicacy I ever had. The frog was coated in a batter that was so sweet and crispy at the same time. However, it is not the the thick crisp that cuts into the top of your mouth, but rather the tender firm crisp that makes you yearn for more. The sweetness of the frog and coating was just bliss. 

I'm not sure what was the cantonese name for this dish. But it was black sauce rice cooked in claypot and topped with preserved chinese sausages. It was alright, nothing great in my opinion. The rice was slightly bland and I had to have it with some chili to enhanced the taste. The chinese sausages were also disappointing because it tasted funny than the usual ones I had.

Introducing their all popular fish head noodles. First of all, this is not the typical fish head noodles you get in shops around SS2 or Puchong. Rather than serving it with thick based tomato and milk soup, this was purely milk mixed with a couple other condiments. It wouldn't be as tasty as the one you have in shops because the soup is slightly bland without much MSG in it, the good thing about it. The other difference was the noodles - instead of typical meehoon or mee, the noodles used was the fat noodles typically used in "lou shu fun". It is not bad and slightly different. 

I would most probably go back for the frog dish. It was total yumz. But with these little dishes, it cost us closed to RM 200 for the meal. A tad too expensive in my opinion.

Ratings : 3.5/5.0

Price : RM 20 ++ perpax

Ka Soh Seafood Restaurant

18 Jalan Delima, Off Jalan Imbi, KL.18 Jalan Delima 
55100 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Tel :03-2148-3207

-thevanillapudding-

Spring Garden, Tropicana Golf and Country Club

Spring Garden is part of the Tai Thong Group - so don't expect anything less than good service and good food complimented with a very expensive pricing. Their interior was of typical oriental design with a super freezing aircond. The waiters and waitresses were well trained to serve you at any time and cost. The captain server was well in their game as they make small chats with guests to ensure that they are happy with the food and services.

The crowds made up mainly of family, rich kids and rich datos with their body guards. Yes, you are able to witness first hand big shot Datos dining around.

Peanuts - typical chinese starters.

Watermelon juice that was decently made which wasn't too sweet, exactly to my liking.

This deep fried fish paste was as good as it looks - it was fish paste mixed with minced spring onions and other condiments. Dipped in a sweet sour chili based for an extra oomph!

I am not a fan of seacucumber, so dad just ordered one portion for himself. I didn't bother trying since I'm not a fan of it.

Chinese stir fried assorted vegetables which was a mix of celery, sweet pea, lotus, onions, carrots, fungus, mushroom and gingko. They were pretty generous in terms of the lotus because I guess that's one of the cheapest ingredients in that whole plate! As good as it taste, I didn't really fancy the sweet and thick layer of oil that you can see. Alot of oil and starch must have went into this dish!

This cod fish was pan fried to perfection and the sauce was totally a big hit. It's Thai sauce - a sweet sour and a tinge of spiciness when you have a taste of it. I love how the onions and cucumbers mix so well with the sauces, topped with the smooth texture of the cod fish.

This is the scallop wrapped in minced meat dish - a small amount of scallops wrapped with chicken meat and deep fried to juicy perfection. However, I couldn't really taste the scallops at all, they must be really stiingy with it. The chicken meat was juicy and well seasoned. The dish itself was rich in taste which I presumed quite a fair bit of sugar was added, plus to get the glossy thick gravy requires quite a bit of starch! 

I don't usually take venison, but venison meat is one of the best. Venison is actually deer meat for those who doesn't know. This was their signature venison dish - venison in ginger and spring onion. It was well marinated and seasoned. Venison meat is generally slightly tougher and chewy compared to your average chicken, but it taste oh so good! 

Typical chinese stir fried KaiLan that is so delicious with a hell lot of starch and some sugar, the vegetable was actually sweet!

Bro ordered the chinese fried rice with salted fish. Chinese fried rice ALWAYS tasted good, if not wonderfully delicious. But the amount of oil they add will be crazy. The fried rice was decent but not my favorite because of their oiliness. 

This dessert is so pretty and I love how they used Martini glasses for it. It's Chinese black herbal jelly with a dose of sugar and longan. In terms of portion, it is pretty stingy for the price we paid.

I had the double boiled soya milk with fungus and gingko. I love soya milk and the good thing about this? It was thick and rich, unlike cheap soya bean that is dilute and overloaded with sugar. This wasn't too sweet, it was actually a little less sweeter than usual which is fine with me. The fungus and gingko, just an added bonus for some health benefit!

Overall, this place has good Chinese food, but the price is seriously expensive!

Ratings : 4.0/5.0
Price : RM 20/dish

Spring Garden Restaurant
Tropicana Golf & Country Resort
Jalan Kelab Tropicana, 47400 Petaling Jaya, Selangor
Tel : 603-7880 7226
Operations :
Mon - Sat
11.30am - 2.30pm

Sun & Public Holidays
10.30am - 2.30pm
6.30pm - 10.30pm

-thevanillapudding-