Xin Nian Kuai Ler 2015

Wishing everyone a blessed, happy, prosperous and most importantly great of health in this year of the golden ram. 

Xin Nian Kuai Ler! 

Gong Hei Fatt Choy!!!

Tefal: Families that Eat Together, Stick Together

Tonight, all Chinese will gather for a reunion dinner and it will not be short of rice. Rice is something that hold abundance in food hence every household will ensure that their rice bin will be filled to the brim to usher in the new year. It also signify the whole year will be filled with food too!

At work, I have the opportunity to worked with a few Tefal rice cooker models and I really have to vouch that the rice turned out fluffy and perfect. Well that too if you stick to the tips and tricks. Tefal have some here together with some interesting information.

Those who are travelling back to celebrate the new year with a reunion dinner tonight, have a safe trip home ;-)

Mandarin Oranges Popsicle

Hullo... yes I know, it has been a while. It hasn't been a good start to the year of snake for us at least. Boi Boi had a bout of acute tonsillitis over the entire first week of Chinese New Year (CNY) with 3 doctor visits slotted in between. On the 2nd day, we had to take him to A&E when his ulcers grew a big as 20 sens coin and his temperature hovers and at times fluctuates to 38.6C. It was so bad to the point that I had to wake up every hour just to check his temperature.

The MO had wanted to admit him but we refused since we just need to have his antibiotic changed. He was kinda worried and made us to promise to bring Boi Boi to come back and visit the pediatrician on the 4th day when he opens for business.

A&E was so crowded on 2nd day of CNY, waited for 2 hours

It just took the very very experienced pediatrician (btw he's in his early 70s) one look to confirm his situation and to prescribe the correct antibiotic. The poor boy had to take 2 types of them! Luckily he was still up and about in high spirits... waking up early and sleeping later than usual *roll eyes*

By the 6th day, the ulcers have mostly cleared up and that's when he really gets to eat. The past few days have been challenging of just eating cold food ranging from dipping bread in cold milk, yoghurt with soft fruits, ice cream and cold somen and soba noodles. No complains though cos they love them all.

As for us, the adults, we were practically house arrested for that week with no visitation nor feasting, not even to pai nien with my parents until the 6th day of CNY! You can imagine the amount of CNY goodies stacked in the house!

We have 4 boxes of mandarin oranges (some were gifts) and many of them started to rot until I cleared my fridges as the week go along which I managed to finally stuff all of them into the fridge. They should be able to keep for a long while more in there!

Every year, there's always this headache on how to clear them up and last year I decided to turn some into popsicles. Super easy except the pain of removing the slight bitter membrane to extract the mandarin segments. One just need the mandarin orange segments and juice. The ratio of these 2 would depends entirely to you. If you love more bite, more segments then.

Stuff the mandarin oranges segments into popsicles molds before pouring some of the juice. Store in freezer for a few hours and voila... something to cool down the Chinese New Year heat.



So any other ideas to use these mandarin oranges up?

Kung Hei Fatt Choy 2013

Review: Reunion Lunch at Sek Yuen

**Non-Halal**


Today's the third day of the lunar new year. How has the new year gone so far with you? Am sure all the visitation filled with feasting, drinking, and gambling are still on going. This year, we have asked my mother not to toll herself to cook our reunion lunch. Since I knew Sek Yuen Restaurant, the legendary old school Chinese restaurant in Pudu which is still using firewood stoves, would be open for lunch on new year's eve, I booked a table for 10 to feed the family and even pre-ordered the food. We preferred the non-aircon side as we find the servers were more jovial and helpful.



I walked in from the back and saw a queue right till outside the doorway. Wow whatever is that for? As I walked further in... ahhhh... they were queuing to take-away yee sang (raw fish salad) and pei pa duck (a type of roast duck). Then we saw a familiar face and turned out to be my brother's friend. She said she queued for 45 minutes just for one pack of yee sang, hmmm...



The pace at the yee sang station is frantic! There were 2 people assembling the yee sang onto plates and the take-away orders. 2 - 3 people preparing the pomelos, crunchy nam yue crisps and an uncle busy shredding carrots, radish, and etc away. Just to note, all these are done using a well-worn cleaver by hand and grated using a mandolin and as we sat down for our entire 2 hours lunch, he has been slicing non-stop! I've a video of him here shredding kaffir lime leaves, just check out the speed!

It took quite a while before our yee sang arrived. Dad prep the fish (only one type available here is sang yue - snakehead) by squeezing in the lime juice and toss in the white pepper powder and 5 spice powder. Then he add the fish onto the colourful and myriad ingredients of shredded radish and carrots, sweet pickled young papaya, pickled ginger, pickled leeks, deep fried yam strips in red and green, pomelos sacs, nam yue (red fermented tofu) crisps, coriander leaves, toasted sesame seeds and crushed peanuts. The dressing is a concoction made of plum sauce.



Once the fish, dressing and some peanut oil are poured onto the yee sang, everyone at the table would grab their chopsticks and start to toss the yee sang whilst spewing out all the good sayings in Chinese wishing everyone good fortune and best of health. As my youngest brother devoured his yee sang, he declared that this is the most authentic and very old school tasting yee sang he has ever had! We all agreed with him ;-)



Next came the signature Pei Pa Duck. "Pei Pa" is actually a Chinese musical instrument. The Pei Pa has a halved pear shaped sound box, a crooked neck with 4 - 5 strings. Hence the name of this roast duck dish.

Image from Cultural China 

Normal roast duck would be roasted whole but Pei Pa Duck has the body flatten and spread out like the sound box of a Pei Pa, while the head is the narrow part of the body. The duck is then seasoned and air dried before roasted in firewood here in Sek Yuen. The taste was great but the texture of the meat is a little on the tough side. My mom commented that usually Pei Pa Duck is not so meaty and flatter which I agree with her. Maybe the duck is a little on the large side as the other time we ate, it wasn't so meaty.



We have a beancurd dish which consisted of Yue Wart (fish paste), Dau Kan (beancurd sheets), Tofu (beancurd). Quite plain and ordinary. We also have a platter of Hai Joe (crabmeat balls) which is made of a mixture of crab and pork meats, wrapped in beancurd sheet and deep fried. Sorry no photo of them.

This signature vegetarian dish of Kah Hiong Chai (Hometown Vegetarian literally) is everyone's favourite. Everyone concurred that it's very very fragrant of nam yue (fermented red beancurd) and well seasoned.

I took the recommended Thai-Style Deep Fried Garoupa since we would like to have a whole fish for reunion as opposed to BoiBoi's fave of Sweet and Sour Fish Slices. This didn't went down well as the fish is over fried making it dry and there's too little Thai sweetish and sourish gravy to go round.

As we already have Pei Pa Duck, we opted for 8 Treasures Trotter instead of Duck. The trotter is fork tender and stuffed with delicious fillings of chestnuts, gingko nuts, lotus seeds etc making up 8 ingredients in the fillings enough to name them 8 Treasures. Given a choice, I would go for the duck as there were more meat where else the trotter is mostly skin and fats as most of the meat has been removed to put in the stuffings.

All 10 of us are impressed nevertheless with the old school offerings with tastes of how they were like when we were young. All the above dishes with one big bowl of rice (dai dau farn :p they usually serve small metal bowls of steamed rice but if there are too many people, they serve rice in one large bowl) and tea came up to RM299.80 (sounds prosperous already!). 

Don't miss this Chinese New Year to pay a visit to Sek Yuen for authentic old school yee sang and dishes. I'll post more of Sek Yuen later of the other dishes we have on normal days.

Sek Yuen Restaurant
313-315, Jalan Pudu, KL
Tel: +603 9222 9457 (non-aircon)
+603 9222 0903 (aircon)
(You'll have to call the correct number to make your reservation of the section you preferred!)

Xin Nian Kuai Le

Xin Nian Kuai Le from our family to yours!

Happy Yuanxiao/Chap Goh Mei

Today is Yuanxiao or also known as Lantarn Festival, more popularily known as Chap Goh Mei (in Hokkien). This is the last day the lunar new year is celebrated. Phewww... all business back to usual :p

 

Review: CNY Set Dinner @ Shark Fin House

**Non-Halal**

Before Chinese New Year ends, I better post this Chinese New Year set menu that we have partake for our reunion dinner. We have been calling Ming Room and Noble Banquet but they are either fully booked or we have to take the first seating at 5.30pm! After more calls, we managed to get a table at Shark Fin House which is a lesser known restaurant within the Oriental Group of Restaurants at 7.30pm. Perhaps people are shying away cos of the name of the restaurant? Anyway, their menu is quite similar to Ming Room and slightly cheaper :p

Capt'n Hook placed the order of the cheapest set menu available at RM738++ for a table of 10 pax. The menu we have that evening was:

新 年 齐 捞 生 (三文鱼捞生) 

Salmon Yee Sang

春 启 万 家 门 (竹笙凤展翅) （每人每） 

Double-Boiled Stuffed Shark’s Fin in Chicken Wing & Bamboo Pith

凤 凰 来 报 喜 (杏花鸡拼鲜虾捞Rojak) 

‘Hang Fah’ Chicken & Fresh Prawn Rojak

顺 利 庆 有 余 (香芋竹枝顺壳煲) 

Braised ‘Soon Hock’ with Yam & Beancurd Skin in Clay Pot

横 财 就 手 (蚝士发菜猪手蔬) 

Braised Pork Trotter with Dried Oyster & ‘Fatt Choy’

新 春 乐 满 堂 (生炒腊味糯米饭) 

Fried Glutinous Rice with Waxed Meat

甜 蜜 过 新 年 (冰镇雪梨白玉丹) 

Chilled Snow Pear with Sea-Coconut

双 星 齐 新 年 (千层马来糕拼脆皮窝饼) 

Thousand Layered Cake & Chinese Pancake

After the dinner, we did a count and realised that out of the 8 courses, one is the yee sang and 2 were desserts. So we only have a soup plus 3 dishes and a rice dish. Hmmmm... Capt'n Hook mentioned it's not really as worth it as Standard Chartered Bank's Extravagant 8 promo at Gu Yue Tien. I concur to that but we have a couple of old folks with us who can't climb stairs hence this was the alternative. 

Let's just see how did Shark Fin House fare then. The Salmon Yee Sang came with everything on the serving plate including the sauce which was placed on one side. We all noted that the amount of salmon slices is rather generous. We were given extra long chopsticks to toss our yee sang. This yee sang is tasty enough but a little dry here and there as the sauce was not throughly poured all over. Saved time for them but not so great for diners.

Next we have ermmm

Double-Boiled Stuffed Shark’s Fin in Chicken Wing & Bamboo Pith. This is a refreshing change indeed from normal starchy soup. The clear broth is filled with natural sweetness of the stuffed chicken wing, dried cabbage (choy korn) and bamboo pith. (OK pelt me with stones now!)

‘Hang Fah’ Chicken & Fresh Prawn Rojak consisted of 3 items on the plate. There's a plate of rojak, some stir-fried cubed chicken with bell peppers and onions and of course the hang fah chicken. 

The only weird combo here is the rojak lol cos the taste sort of like overwhelm the other 2 dishes but the rojak does tasted good though. There were thinly strips of turnips, cucumber, yau char kwai but I didn't manage to grab any prawns.

The hang fah chicken is basically having removed the chicken meat from the skin, fish paste is then spread onto the skin before covered in almond slivers. Lots of work and this version has crispy skin on top and crispy almonds at the bottom.

This claypot contains big chunks of marbled goby! Accompanying the fish are generous portion of yam, gluten puffs (mien karn), Chinese mushrooms and beancurd sheets. Thumbs up generally from everyone as the fish is fresh and the sauce was well seasoned.

The next dish that can't run away from Chinese New Year menu! Usually it's warng choi chau sau (pork trotter) or hoe see fatt choi (oyster with black moss) but this claypot has both combinations inside!!! Chunks of melt-in-the-mouth pork trotters indicated this dish has been braised for hours! Married with large dried oysters and black moss with a tasty gravy, this dish is screaming for rice.

Even though there were very little dishes BUT the portion of each dish is super huge. We have to packed most of the dishes back. Looking left and right of our table, seems like our neighbouring tables are doing the same too! And so we came to our last savoury dish,

Fried Glutinous Rice with Waxed Meat. Actually the rice here looked like steamed glutinous rice and the texture is soft whilst retaining just a wee bit of chewiness which went well with the older folks. Very very tasty but my only gripe is there's too little waxed meat and mushroom or rather they were chopped so tiny that we can't chew on them even though the taste is there.

We ended our dinner with 3 desserts. First was a chilled snow pear with sea coconut which tasted pretty normal but good as a refreshing end after a heavy meal.

Then came BoiBoi's favourite Chinese Pancake and my favourite of Thousand Layer Cake but the waitress said it's Malai Goe (Malay kuih). Both varieties are good especially the steamed cake. Not sure how we managed to wiped the plate clean! 

Since the elders have rather good feedback on the food, I reckoned this place can be added to our list for future family gatherings. Service was surprisingly good and prompt even though it's jammed packed. The only thing is there's always Imbi Palace, across the road, in competition!

Shark Fin House is located at where the first Tai Thong Restaurant used to be and it's opposite Imbi Palace. Parking is fairly easy as there were a couple of open air carparks opposite and besides Imbi Palace. Else valet parking is available at RM5. 

Since today is St Valentine's Day, wishing everyone a very happy Valentine's Day! Love from all of us at Babe in the City - KL ;-)

Shark Fin House No. 51, Jalan Barat,
Off Jalan Imbi ,
55100 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 603-2143 9966
Business hours:
Open daily (including Public Holidays)
11.00 am – 3.00 pm
6.00 pm – 11.00 pm
Map

GPS Coordinates: 3.143409,101.715379





I'm submitting this for Muhibbah Malaysian Monday blog event. This event is the brainchild of  Shaz (Test With A Skewer) and Suresh (3 Hungry Tummies). Read more here.

Xin Nian Kuai Le

May the year of Rabbit bring you joy and prosperity, plus most importantly... your dining table will be laden with lots of good food throughout the year ;-)

To those who are travelling be safe and do tune in to the radio for flood announcement. Have a safe journey home for a heart and tummy warming reunion.

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Warmest wishes,

Babe_KL, Capt'n Hook and BoiBoi

Review: Standard Chartered Bank's Extravagant 8 at Elegant Inn Restaurant

**Non-Halal**

As per our previous review, we got invited to another round of Standard Chartered Bank's Extravagant 8 menu. This time Elegant Inn Restaurant at Menara Hap Seng. This promotion has already started since yesterday and will continue till 17th February 2011.

To usher in the lunar new year, Standard Chartered Bank is collaborating with 8 top Chinese restaurants in town to offer Extravagant 8 menus priced at RM888++ for a table of 8 pax. Details of restaurants and menu plus terms and conditions can be found here.

We were welcomed by Jeannette Han, the owner of Elegant Inn. She's really the walking dictionary of Chinese ingredients and food! Apparently I was told that each meal with her around, we get to learn loads of information on the items that we're eating.

We started off our dinner with Bountiful Harvest Salmon Losang. The difference here is that all ingredients used are fresh and no pickled items are on the plate. The salmon slices, jellyfish and abalone slices are served separately on another plate. Well, there's a very good reason this was done this way as our waiter Ah Loong starts off by wishing us a prosperous year ahead. 

When he dishes in the salmon into the fresh vegetables plate, he said the fish ("yue") represents "nien nien yau yue" (every year is bountiful). Jellyfish is known as "hoi jit" in Cantonese, hence "Jit Jit Siong Sing" (raising higher with each steps) in our career, Malaysian economy, stock market etc. This was when Jeannette intercepted and said most importantly Elegant Inn will "Jit Jit Siong Sing". LOL. The abalone ("bao yue") represents "bao lor marn yau" and "ying yau chun yau" which essentially means one will get all his wishes come true as much as he wants, well about there lah my translation :p



The condiments and sauces do represent good wishes too! Oil represents "choy wurn guan guan loy" which means prosperity will come boiling hot. Plum sauce brings "dai kat dai lei" (good luck coming in a big way) and crushes peanuts represents "far hoi fu gwai" (prosperity abound when flower blooms) and "sang yee heng loong" (more businesses abound). 5 spice power represents "ng fook lam moon" (errr more prosperity) and even the crackers represent something which is "pien tei wong kum" (whole floor filled with gold).



If you're interested, you can watch Ah Loong in action here but he speaks a little soft though.

Woohooo such a meaningful dish eh??? All ready for tossing... and we tossed our way to a bountiful and healthy year ahead. I liked this yee sang as everything tasted so fresh. Like Capt'n Hook described this as a refreshing salad.



Did you know we don't need to serve shark fins to represent your wealth especially at wedding dinners? Seafood soup with top grade seafood would do more justice. Don't look down at this soup tureen as you can only see the chicken inside. This clear broth is double boiled in the tureen for 4 - 6 hours!



When the treasures from the tureen are unearth onto a plate, just look at the exquisite ingredients used! There are "kum wah for tui" (Chinese ham), kampung chicken, top shell from US, dried scallops from Japan, pork ribs and cordyceps flowers.



I loved this soup as I prefered "ching" soup with it's natural sweetness from all the ingredients used.



Next came everybody's favourite... Golden Fried Estuary Garoupa with Chinese Leeks. Well, Estuary Garoupa is also known as Giant Garoupa (the same as those we ate at Gu Yue Tien) or "lung dunn". Over here, the fish fillet is served deep fried on a bed of clear gravy that came with stir fried Chinese leeks, spring onions, celery and bits of "har korn" a type of dried tiger prawns that Jeannette personally brought back from Hong Kong. The fish is perfectly fried and the skin, omigosh is so crispy! Everything on this plate has been executed very well and the vegetables complimented the fish. I've asked the price of this dish ala carte and Jeannette told me it's around RM200, so I think it's better to get out your Standard Chartered Credit Card or find your way to get one to order this Extravagant 8 menu!



This Crystal Prawn - Signature Salted Egg Yolk Style dish is not available in the menu and only specially made for this Extravagant 8 menu. Prawns are replaced in their signature crab in salted egg yolk. Seems like they will only cook this when the restaurant is not overly busy as it requires the head chef to spend 20 minutes just to stir the yolk to the right consistency. The salted egg yolk here is subtle and each prawn is coated lightly with them without over cloying the freshness of the prawns.



We took a break here for a photo moment of Chef Wesley Ng (pssst he's so young horrr and so handsome!) with Tim (he's handsome too ya) presenting the Golden Boneless Stuffed Chicken with Chicken Tomato Salad.



Golden Boneless Stuffed Chicken with Chicken Tomato Salad is the other highlight of the menu. The chicken is deboned and stuffed with prawn paste. A side of the chicken slices salad on tomatoes made the dish very refreshing.



We must bring BoiBoi for this as I know he would really loved this boneless chicken. The skin is sooo crispy and I did not feel it being oily at all! Just look at the prawn paste underneath... not really a paste eh cos can still chunks of prawns there.



Braised Sea Cucumber with Dried Oyster, Fatt Choy & Mushroom is the must have prosperity dish for Chinese New Year. I'm not really a fan of sea cucumber and dried oyster but I did took a bite off Capt'n Hook's portion. The sea cucumber is really thick! Loved the texture too. Since sea cucumber is Capt'n Hook's favourite, he took second helpings. Did you see the size of the dried oyster???



Next up, the rice dish of the evening. We have a Braised Seafood Rice with Australian Scallops, Fresh Crabmeat & Abalone Sauce in Lotus Leaf. It's my first time savouring such a unique rice dish. The rice is already flavourful in the lotus leaf let alone the generous topping of the fresh scallops and crabmeats.



We ended the dinner with a Chilled Japanese Pumpkin Sago with Green Bean and Pan Fried Traditional Rice Cake & Hazelnut Cookies. We were told not to stir the dollop of green bean and eat it up in one mouthful to generate the mouth feel but then a bit too late cos I lifted the spoon for a picture and there goes the green beans. I can taste the natural sweetness of the pumpkin which is not too heavy to end a dinner.



The nian gao (traditional rice cake) is just plainly pan fried, not oily at all too. If you can read Chinese, perhaps the hazelnut cookies represented something prosperous too :p



Check out what my other dinner companions have to say about this menu:
PureGlutton
Eu Hooi Khaw
Marky
Jason

Thank you once again to Tim and Standard Chartered Bank for the lovely evening, plus of course to the Queen, Lyrical Lemongrass, conveying the invite to us.

Here's the full menu with Chinese as well:

旺福年之宴

PROSPEROUS YEAR MENU    

玉兔贺岁鱼生捞 七彩鱼生捞 （三文鱼&珍鲍片）

Bountiful Harvest Salmon LOSANG  

凤凰楼顶花仙子 虫草花响螺炖土鸡汤

D.Boiled Village Chicken Soup w Cordyceps Flowers & US Top Shell  

龙皇御用玉龙舟 黄金封煎大龙趸

Golden Fried Estuary Garoupa w Chinese Leeks  

喜见金蛋嘻哈笑 招牌咸蛋黄炒海明虾

Crystal Prawn - Signature Salted Egg Yolk Style    

金龙玉凤鸳鸯配 鸳鸯金衣龙袍鸡

Golden Boneless Stuffed Chicken w Chicken  Tomato Salad  

发财好事囊中物 海参扣蚝史发菜花菇

Braised Sea Cucumber w Dried  Oyster, Fatt Choy & Mushroom  

渔民欢裹丰收年 荷香鲍汁海中宝扣饭

Braised Seafood Rice w Aust Scallops, Fresh Crabmeat & Abalone Sauce in Lotus Leaf  

绿野仙踪黄金梦  绿沙日本金瓜露

Chilled Japanese Pumpkin Sago w Green Bean    

名利扬眉高高升 手工榛子酥饼拼香煎年糕

Pan Fried Traditional Rice Cake & Hazelnut Cookies

*** RM888++ for 8 persons (Exclusively for StanChart Card Members Only)

Terms & Conditions:

• Prior reservation required.
• Promotion is not valid on 2 February 2011.
• Applicable for dinner only.
• Package is for 8 diners only.
• For additional diners, this set is chargeable at RM111++ per diner for a maximum of 13 diners.
• Valid for in-house dining only.
• Elegant Inn reserves the rights to replace any item of the similar value.
• Each Cardholder is entitled to one table per day.

Elegant Inn Restaurant @ Menara Hap Seng
2.01 2nd Floor, Podium Floor
Menara Hap Seng
Jalan P Ramlee
50250 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 603-2070-9399


Elegant Inn Restaurant @ Taman Connaught
16 Jalan Waras 1
Taman Connaught, Cheras
56000 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 603-9130-2626
Please note this branch opens on Fridays, Saturdays & Sundays only
Operation hours: Fridays: 12:00pm - 2:30pm & 6:00pm - 10:30pm
Saturdays & Sundays: 10:30am - 2:30pm & 6:00pm - 10:30pm

Review: Standard Chartered Bank's Extravagant 8 at Gu Yue Tien Restaurant

**Non-Halal**


We received this invitation by Bald Eagle (Tim) via Lyrical Lemongrass to review Standard Chartered Bank's Extravagant 8 menu at Gu Yue Tien Restaurant. This promotion runs from 20th January till 17th February 2011 specially designed for Standard Chartered credit card holders to usher in the lunar new year. The best chefs from the top 8 Chinese restaurants in the Klang Valley have prepared very special Extravagant 8 menus priced at RM888++ for a table of 8 pax. Diners will receive fortune cookies at the end of these special meals.

Note that this promotion is associated with the number 8 where it symbolises "fatt" or in English - prosperity in Chinese for a prosperous dining experience ushering the year of Rabbit. The 8 participating restaurants are:

1. Li Yen, Ritz Carlton Hotel
2. Shanghai, JW Marriort Hotel
3. Celestial Court, Sheraton Imperial Hotel
4. Tai Zi Heen, Prince Hotel
5. Zing, Grand Millennium Hotel
6. Gu Yue Tien Restaurant
7. Elegant Inn Restaurant
8. Chynna, Hilton KL

We have been hearing raves reviews on Gu Yue Tien's Chef Frankie Woo but somehow never got to the restaurant to give it a try. Chef Frankie was shuttling between the kitchen and our tables, describing on the dishes, on how he started and all. He come as a very very humble person even though he is considered one of the successful chef in Malaysia. Started working as a mechanic at a tender age of 13 before moving on to a coffee shop at 14. With sheer determination and ambition, he finally became a chef at 23! 

We started off with a Chinese New Year "must have" dish -  Norwegian Salmon Yee Sang. As expected, we can never expect to get the norm here. 

Totally a new style of yee sang


The trio of oil, crushed peanut & sesame seeds and fruity sauce

Since Chef Frankie advocates eating healthy, he created this yee sang using fresh thick slices of Norwegian salmon, green and purple coral lettuces (from Genting Highland he says), Californian golden raisins, pear, pomelo sacs, topped with thinly sliced kaffir lime leaves and crunchy lam yue (red fermented beancurd) crackers. 

Ready to be tossed 

After the trio of oil, crushed peanut & sesame seeds and a fruity sauce made of strawberries, we tossed our way to good health and prosperity. I loved the strawberries in the sauce, it really brings out the salad.

After tossing

When done, we waited in anticipation for the Soft Boiled Egg with Foie Gras! This dish was created to represent Asia in a charity event for James Beard Foundation.

The soft boiled egg with the top part of the shell cut off, drained off the egg white and in its place, a foie gras sauce is poured in. How brilliant! The delicate and creamy yolk paired with the delicious sauce, this is definitely Heavenly for egg lovers. I can see that all of us are egg lovers at the table as I see everyone savouring the concoction with their eyes closed enjoying every moment of it. 

I'm so glad when told none of the participating restaurants will be serving shark fins. 2 thumbs up for Standard Chartered. Our Assorted Seafood Soup came abundant with FRESH seafood like prawns, crabs and scallops, none of those artificial crabsticks! Now this is what I called a real seafood soup. There are also addition of dried scallops and soft silky tofu. This thick soup is not starchy at all and lightly tinged orange due to the roe in it. Vinegar is provided but seriously I think it will ruin the soup rather than compliment it. 

The next dish was really the highlight of the evening. I heard whisperings of "Iberico", "pai kuat", and "pork" as we go thru our dishes. 

The Salt Baked Spanish Iberico Pork Ribs was served whole but of course, it was sliced, yes sliced not chopped, as it was soooo tender!

Instinct does come naturally as none of us bothered with the fork and knife provided. All of us were not shy to use our fingers and start chewing and licking the ribs. The meat fall off the bone effortlessly. Seriously, one of the best ribs done this way I have ever tasted. The salt marinade was just perfect. There were fewer people on the other table and were glad that they passed over the remainder. Not to be wasted, such great ribs.

Next up was Steamed Giant Garoupa with Minced Ginger &Yellow Bean Paste. Not knowing giant garoupa is lung dunn, the silly me asked Chef Frankie how come this fish is not served whole. His eyes turned round and big when he replied me *blush blush*. It was then he told me it's lung dunn, very huge. The one served to us was 36kg (my BoiBoi is 38kg now)!!! This one fish he mentioned can serve 25 tables = 250 people!!! Anyway, the best part in this fish is the skin :p gelatinous and crunchy. 

We took a break when the Steamed Glutinous Rice with Fresh Water Prawn & Wax Meat was served for a photo moment with Bald Eagle (Tim) and Chef Frankie. There was a saying "Never Trust a Skinny Cook" but this skinny cook is one hell of a creative cook whom you can trust! 

Jeng jeng jeng... the plate is virtually filled with huge fresh water prawns. Aly's eyes were dancing looking at them :p

Just check, there's a lotus leaf layer at the bottom filled with a thin layer of plain glutinous rice. In the middle lies the various wax meat of lap yuk (wax pork belly), lap cheung (Chinese sausage), yoon cheung (liver sausage) and lap ngap (wax duck). On the outer ring, you can see the huge fresh water prawns. 

As we lifted the prawns off, the glutinous rice was marked with the reddish oil from the shell and roe. Wow! I was the last to scoop my portion and that was when Chef Frankie came in. He told me that I ought to mix the rice and wax meat all up before scooping. Not sure what the others have missed out but my portion certainly was so flavourful from the wax meat and also the reddish prawn drippings.

I was glad we are down to our desserts as I was really bursting to the brim already. We have individual servings of Chilled Mango Cream with Pomelo. I liked this version which is very light and not sickly sweet. Chef Frankie's version of Pan Fried Nian Gao (a steamed sticky glutinous rice cake) has black and white sesame seeds on them which made the nian gao very fragrant. 

To sum up, this was really a memorable Chinese New Year dinner. The menu was not only extravagant but it was certainly of value for money for the kind of ingredients and quality given at Gu Yue Tien Restaurant. If you're a Standard Chartered credit card holders, don't wait ok, better hurry and book a table! 

Thank you Tim and Standard Chartered Bank for the lovely evening.

Oh yeah, I'm gonna show you how a pro-food blogger work :p LOL

Check what others have said about this Extravagant 8 menu:

iamthewitch

Aly's Wonderland
KYSpeaks

Gu Yue Tien Restaurant
Lot B5A Chulan Square
92 Jalan Raja Chulan

50200 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 603-2148 0808 

Opening hours:
Lunch: 11:30am - 2:30pm (Daily)
Dinner: 6:30pm - 10:30pm (Daily)





I'm submitting this for Muhibbah Malaysian Monday blog event. This event is the brainchild of  Shaz (Test With A Skewer) and Suresh (3 Hungry Tummies). Read more here.