Time flies. It’s MARCH now and this month also used to be the beginning month of a year during the ancient time by Russian and also British and her colonies. It’s actually a logical way to start a year because the living earth starts to wake up from hibernation and became visible from the thick layer of pure white colored snow. So it’s time to shift and change.
What you have in mind? Don’t tell me because that’s your personal affairs. But if you are thinking of trying some varieties on your food quest, you may consider stopping by Chynna at Hilton KL. There will be featuring a selection of unique and premium freshwater fish and seafood options from the wild all over river of Malaysia throughout whole month of March.
KL Hilton, Chynna Chinese Restaurant
Thanks to Jac, I was honored to be invited to KL Hilton just before CNY for a food sharing session together with Suanie, Eric and a few magazine editors. I have no idea it was a sharing session about freshwater fish but you know, it is Hilton Kuala Lumpur. How can you resist? I’m no way near a fan of freshwater fish because I do not fancy taking off all the small tiny little Y shape bones and still get poked by some missing one not to mention about the soil taste normally found in freshwater fish will.
Now, this session proved me wrong. Since CNY was around the corner, YeeShang will definitely appear as the appetizer. There are fish slices in there also right? The YeeShang was actually very good. It was not sweet and not too sticky as well. I like.
Just look at those salmons…
The first fish served had a funny name. It is call Pineapple fish or some call it ‘Ong Lai’ fish. According to Chef Lam, the fish is big and the shape looks like pineapple and that’s where the name came from. It was cooked in ordinary black soy sauce where we can find at almost any Chinese restaurant. The difference was, it was done perfectly. Steaming time well controlled leaving a sweet and tender flesh laying on top of the soy sauce. To me, the best part of this dish was mixing the awesome soy sauce into the hand-pulled Chinese noodles.
Soy Sauce Steam Pineapple Fish
Satisfying 1st course
There’s one little side dish generated from this prosperity fish. The huge thin flake scales of it was deep fried and mixed with meat floss. It was surprisingly good. Just imagine the munching sound more like crunching where even the person beside you will surely notice and yes, this was how crispy it was.
Fish scales
Following was the famous freshwater fish, King Patin. It was prepared in yellow curry style with all sorts of veggie including Japanese tofu, cabbage, aubergine etc. The aroma was appetite stimulating, the taste was creamy and it went well with rice. However, I think it lacked of ummph in a way… perhaps it was not prepared with coconut milk. I’m not a very healthy person, am I?
The yellow curry king patin (patin wong)
Last but not least, also patin but it was stone patin with darker skin color compared to the king patin in yellow curry. This dish was something special to me. Vinegered spicy and sour favor was the way the stone patin soaked in. I’ve tried vinegar sauce steam fish at HangZhou China and this was totally different type. The sauce was really strong and thick, the taste will surely numb your tongue. In my humble opinion, I think it is something that you either like it or hate it.
Awesome sauce stone patin
Although there were only 4 dishes, it was more than enough to satisfy our taste buds. The sequence of the dishes was nicely planned from light and thin to gradually moving towards strong and thick savor.
It was a great session with nice samples of food. The hospitality by Belle and Jean was awesome and with the humourous Chef Lam around, it was overwhelming. Just by looking at the pictures below, you should know how friendly he was. Same goes to Mr. Johnnie Gerald Walker who is the F&B Director. I got to take pictures with both the important men and this Eric got 2 chics instead.
Great Hospitality by Team KL Hilton
Chynna, KL Hilton
3 Jalan Stesen Sentral,
50470 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 03 – 2264 2592/2696
Planning for #porkgang CNY took place way before CNY during one of our usual meal outing. We did come to a point almost wanted to book the whole Sanbanto exclusively for our dinner but some suggested that we should do something more Chinese since it is CNY. See, how indigenous we are.
Steamboat is something meaningful during such occasion but I believe most of us had this ‘BALLness’ meal with our families already. Hence, when the idea of PoonChoi came up, I think it was superbly brilliant. This Song Dynasty invented dish, PoonChoi serves the same purpose yet something new to most of us.
Even though #porkgang has been doing all sorts of activities and food session quite frequently, none of them involved full participation by everyone. So by hook or by crook we make sure this CNY dinner going to be 100% attendance and yes it was.
Every CNY dinner starts with LouShang isn’t it?
Surprisingly everyone reached on time and amazingly Haze found her way without getting lost. Navigating and locating of this isolated restaurant wasn’t too easy without the help of GPS. The massive PoonChoi served once we finished with the yee shang. To our surprise, the portion was amazingly huge. It was actually cater for 10 pax and shamefully, 15 of us not able to clean up the pot.
Didn’t realize the top view of PoonChoi I took is not in focus.
Traditionally, PoonChoi is composed layer by layer with all sorts of ingredients in huge and deep wooden or metal bowl. The tasting should go the same way layer by layer because normally it is arranged in such a way that item with lighter taste goes on top and gets stronger as it goes deeper beneath. What you see above is only the top layer and there’s another layer below with marinated stuff.
The bottom layer which almost cleared by the porkers
Top layer on the left and Bottom layer on the right
Basically, I like almost everything except the ‘PaiKuat’ (pork ribs) which was flat dry and the chicken was not fresh enough. The marinated chicken claws was awesome and the vege ‘KaiLan’ was so crunchy and sweet on the other hand. Other than the main dish PoonChoi, the lard rice was another highlight of the night. The brown sauce on the rice was actually lard. The porkers seems to like it a lot but to me, I found the smell of lard was too strong.
Lard Rice. Only last 10 left when we ordered. I shared with Fireangel
Eating in action. Most of the time standing up and fight for food.
Shaolintiger looks happy with the lard rice
Me with chicken claw showing the middle finger
Fireangel ummphh… finger licking good.
1st #Porkgang happy family photo
Ruby | Fatty | Jac | TK | Lingo | FA | Kim | ST | KY | Haze | Sotong | Suanie |Tina | God
It was truly one remarkable dinner full of enjoyment with plenty of satisfaction and great companionship. With only RM42/pax to pay for a scrumptious fulfilling dinner with beers included, I think it was absofuckinglutely worth it.
For google map, click on the above.
PT 11, Jalan Perkhidmatan,
Kg Baru, 47000 Sungai Buloh Selangor
GPS: 3.196949, 101.569118
Tel: 03-6140 2698
Before I’m going to blog about the #porkgang CNY awesomesauce Phoon Choi dinner, I’m going to write the incident that happened after the dinner as for now.
It was rare that we, #porkgang do dinner as early as 7.30pm but we did. Hence, with the way piranha eat, we finished dinner really early and planned for 2nd round at Ruby’s place where we could do some gambling and drinking. Everything went really well (except the karaoke in the TV room was not working) until this horny little #CrazyCasper decided to give me not a single bite but an ABS (anti-locking break system in car) chomp on my finger when I tried to move him away from approaching #FattyEvilBitch.
Castrated Casper giving dry-hump to virgin FattyEvilBitch
I was kinda shocked actually although we all know this #CrazyCasper really bites. I couldn’t move my finger away when the ABS-ing was in progress as it’d cause the injury to be even worse. Seriously, it was freaking painful man.
Bleed alot and wounds around my index finger
Although it is a healthily pampered pet dog, the gang insisted I get a Tetanus jab in order to be safe than sorry. They didn’t want a friend who might be running around with saliva dropping all over the place humping and biting everything that came into my eyes. Therefore, after the delicious TeowChew porridge downtown, I drove back to PJ area to look for any 24hrs clinic. Kelana Jaya Medical Center was the only one we found. The jab was actually as painful as the bite. I could still feel the pain on my arm when I move even after a day.
lucky not on my butt
The nurses & doctor should think that we were abit crazy taking pictures & laughing
Look at the bill below. KJMC claimed that they use only branded stuff and that’s why it is more expensive. Well, when this thing happened middle of the night, I didn’t have a choice, did I? Ruby is so going to pay for my medical bill and buy me DogKutTeh for dinner then only can settle.
Now I need to be on 5days medication & miss Zeta bar session, FML
P/S:-
ABS is breaking system with pulsing breaking movement by having rapid opening and closing of the break pad to the disc brake surface in a cycle up to 15 times per second.
Read here for more or wikipedia it
Most of the people visits Penang for gluttonous appetite towards the delightful nourishment available on this small little island. However, when it comes to Chinese New Year, on top of food, fighting the traffic all the way along constraint and narrow Air Itam’s road is a must to many towards the pride of Air Itam, Kek Lok Si Temple.
In normal circumstances, I’ll never go near places with such terrible traffic condition but for the close view of this, I did mine on the 5th day of CNY after a supper yamcha session was call off. Of course, I didn’t follow the usual main stream most people would use. I took a de tour around the housing area and parked my car slightly more than half a kilometer away from the foot of the temple. Walking, the best way to avoid wasting time in the car stuck in the traffic jam queue.
How can you resist such a beauty?
you can actually park your car further and walk all the way up there but still these lazy people willing to jam all the way up there.
bumper to bumper, slow moving traffic
Kek Lok Si is one of the biggest Buddhist temple in Southeast Asia and it is the only reproduction miniature in Window of the world located at Shenzhen representing Malaysia. Maybe KLCC still not erected by then.
Kek Lok Si’s ‘Old wingz’ Pagoda
Not many really went for prayers
Pineapples with lights
Everything is surrounded by lighting including Buddha
No matter where you are, the only thing you will not miss is lanterns. They are all over the place replacing the normal fluorescent light.
Sea of lanterns this is call ya?
Passage de Lanterns ;p
The highlight of the temple for this year is no longer on its lighting and pagoda but the Goddess of Mercy (Guan Yin) under the Pavilion supported by 16 skilfully crafted giant pillars. This is the 1st year it is fully light up. The whole structure doesn’t look big right? The pavilion rised 82.7 meters from base to tip which is approximately equivalent to 20-storeys building. The Guan Yin on the other hand holds the height of 30.2 meters downsized from initial plan of 120 meters. 30.2 doesn’t sound impressive right? Well, Statue of Liberty marks only 34 meters from heel to top of head and 5 more meters for the hand. Now, comparing both, the Goddess of Mercy no longer really that small right? However, there is one Guan Yin standing mercifully with the height of 108 meters on the sea at Hainan Island, China making her the 4th tallest statue in the world. That’s what you call stupefying.
Brilliantly magnificent
View at Air Itam’s town from the temple
More Pictures here on Facebook
Why are we not given 15 days of holiday celebrating the most important cultural festival for Chinese? Why modern days responsibility caused the 15 days celebration limited to only two official days off? Mentally, physically I still not prepare to start working on the 9th day of Chinese New Year. Official holiday should last till 15th day of CNY, it SHOULD.
My mom is the eldest among her brother and sister, hence, all my uncles and aunties will pay us visit on the 1st day of CNY every year. All will be doing lunch, gamble, chit-chating, etc, till late. Unlike the normal Chinese family will most probably doing Chinese, we do Malay style instead. We do have the 1 Malaysia concept way before the campaign came out, NO?
Nasi Dalca | Spicy Squid Curry| Aromatic Fish Curry with Lady Fingers
Delicious Malay Style Fried Chicken | Aubergine Curry | Cucumber Salad
How much this will cost at normal Malay stall?
We ordered portion for 30 but what available can easily feed 50 of us. Some did lunch + dinner, no kidding.
Our little apartment turned so lively with fun and enjoyment when 30 of old, young, big, small squeezed in with all sort of activities.
Pictures session
The pictures below purposely edited to keep the veterans anonymous and not showing the important activity went on clearly. Since 1st day of CNY was also Valentine day, this old elder lovely couple pound all the young couple with the only bouquet of roses for the day.
You who at Bermuda should be able to identify everyone right?