Blogs and such...

After all these months, I am still baffled by Blogger!  The settings doesn't seem to saved right, the fonts go haywire, the pictures cannot be dragged, etc.!!

Is it me??

I need a crash course on using Blogger!  Or maybe I should change to Typepad or something?  But I am glad I found LinkWithin widget...I think it is cool.  Check out my blog posts, and see if you can see anything different  :)

Today I had a small "achievement".  I drove around town, without paying a single cent for ERP!  Ha!  Quite proud of myself for thinking all the ERP-less routes...hehehe.  But my parking at the building opposite my office was quite a killer!  $12.35!  Oh well, it's like 7 hours of parking, so not too bad ya!

I'm so looking forward to my China trip.  But I had to get Mumbai out of the way first!  Praying very hard for me to recover from flu, and have a safe journey.

Satay House

When I want to have good Indonesian food in a clean air-conditioned environment in Jakarta, I will go to Satay House.  

The food never disappoints, and they update their menu every so often, so you can try something new everytime you visit.

Orange juice with young coconut flesh

This drink is very refreshing!  The orange juice comes from the green oranges that is so abundant in Indonesia.  I don't know what they are called though.  But they are extremely sweet and juicy and makes great orange juice!  The coconut is a nice touch to add to this already refreshing drink.

Salad....

Hmmm....I forgot what this is!  Some sort of tofu salad...I think.

Satay!

This is the highlight of Satay House!  Ok, as the name implies, they specialize in Satay!  This is I think the Satay Ambengan.  This comes with some gravy which is delicious.  I just cannot be bothered to eat Satay in Singapore.  I don't like the sickly sweet taste of the meat and the peanut gravy.  I much prefer Indonesian Satays as they are more savoury.

Nasi Ikan Asin Pepes...

Nasi ikan asin pepes - Salted fish with rice "baked" in leaves.  Yums!  This is their special of the month.  Deliciously soft fragrant rice with spices and chilli baked in leaves.  The rice has absorbed all the spicy goodness, and I just can't stop eating them!  We ordered another portion after we finish the first one....hehehe...

The rice comes with the ubiquitous fried tofu, fried chicken, and sambal belachan to add more "oomph" to the rice.

Lontong Cap Gomeh...

Lontong cap gomeh - it's rice "cakes" with curry vegetables, tofu, etc.  There is a lot going on in there!  But they taste yummy.  Beware of the chilli padi they throw in in abundance, and lurking innocently in the gravy! 

Soto Ayam...

My favourite Soto Ayam.  I have no idea what goes into this, but it's simply delicious.  One thing is Indonesian food is hardly served piping hot, which suits me just fine!  I cannot drink piping hot stuff, burns my tongue and make me miserable.  Ha!

  

Soto Timlo..

Soto Timlo - again no idea what goes into the soup, but this doesn't taste as good as the Soto Ayam.  Indonesia is so diverse, that there are so many variations of just Soto alone!  But this is what makes Indonesian food so interesting.

Posting this makes me crave for Indonesian food  :(  Hope I can make it back to Jakarta next month or something.

Orient 8 @ Hotel Mulia, Jakarta

The Grand Entrance

Another part of the Grand Entrance

I was totally blown away by the stunning decor of Orient 8 @ Hotel Mulia!  It is fast becoming one of my favourite hotels in Jakarta.  They serve good food, and the hotel is just so uniquely decorated.

Roses!!

I love those big columns of fresh white roses!  It looks like a wedding is in progress...hehe. Orient 8 is Hotel Mulia's latest restaurant, serving Thai, Vietnamese and other Oriental food buffet style.  

Dainty appetizers on ice...

The cold appetizer section consists on small bite-sized morsels, and everything looks very appetizing!  I took some of these to start off my dinner.  They were yummy.

Olive oils & Balsamic Vinegars...

They have a variety of olive oils, balsamic vinegar and other condiments for your salads.  Can you see those test tube thing in the wine glassess?  You can conveniently just pour the sauces from those tubes!  Cool!

Food...

I couldn't get good shots of the food because of the dim lighting, so I didn't really take a lot of pics of the food, but I took tons of pics of the place!

Tom yum...!

I couldn't get enough of their tom yum!  You basically can just pick and choose the ingredients that you want to add into the tom yum soup, and the chefs will whip up a steaming bowl of spiciness in no time!  They also have other soups like beef, so you can have a bowl of beef pho!

Chefs at work...

They have an open kitchen concept, so the chefs can prepare the soupy food right in front of you. I think this is really fun, and of course Indonesians are just naturally friendly people, making you feeling at ease with them.

Centerpiece...

Private Dining room...

There are several private dining rooms in the restaurants, and they are all differently decorated. This is my favourite room among them.

I'm seriously considering holding my wedding there!  Do you think it's a good idea?!

Puncak, Jakarta

Made a weekend trip down to Jakarta in April for 清明节。I went up to Puncak, to visit the temple where we placed my Father's ashes.  It is about a 1.5hrs car ride from Jakarta town to Puncak.

This is the car that brought us around that day - Honda Elysion.  One of my favourite MPVs...I feel like a kid in that car, especially when I sit right at the last row because it is so spacious!  :)

After the visit to the temple, we headed off for lunch at the popular Chinese restaurant - Sindanglaya.  I would rather eat Indonesian food, but the aunties prefer Chinese!  Oh well, will have Indonesian food when I'm back in Jakarta town.

Very "old school" condiment containers are placed on each table.  The deceivingly mild looking chilli sauce is actually very powerful!  

This is the kangkong in hotplate!  I like kangkong, and the quail eggs are a nice touch to add to the dish.  There were supposed to be beef slices in the veggies, but the meat looks too pale to be beef!  I'm seriously suspecting it was horse meat??!  :(

This is a Hakka favourite dish - fried eel with fu mak.  Fu mak is a vegetable, and I still don't know what is it called in English.  But it is yummy! 

Another popular dish in the restaurant is the carp with beehoon.  I am not a fish fan!  So the fish just doesn't appeal, especially when it's so pale.  But the aunties love it lah.

The beehoon soup is good though.  It's good to slurp something warm and slippery in the chilly weather.  We were high up in the mountains of Puncak!

But to me, the star of this restaurant is their boiled chicken in with garlic sauce.  Yummy!  This is one of those dishes where you can only get it in Jakarta, and get good ones!  I think it has something to do with the kampong chicken that they use?  

The 4 aunties plus moi did a good job of polishing off most of the food.  Yummy...but I think I would still prefer to eat the local delights, such as the steamed chicken rice, tong seng, satay, etc.

Ok, time to plan the next trip back!  Anybody want to join me?  :)

Teppanyaki @ Shima

I was filled with anticipation when I stepped into Shima for Teppanyaki dinner.  It's been awhile since I had a proper Teppanyaki dinner cooked professionally, and getting my bonus is a cause to splurge, yes? :) 

I was kind of disappointed to note that the restaurant had become much smaller!  It used to be 2 storeys high, with a Teppanyaki section, a Yakiniku section, and a main dining room.  There used to be also a sitting area where they serve matcha ice-cream with the best Azuki beans after your meal!  But now it is only single storey, and with not much space around...so sad.

J ordered the Lobster set meal with US Ribeye - just because I'm buying dinner?? - Duh!  And I had the Shima set meal with Beef Fillet.

Tempura!

My set meal comes with a mixed Tempura.  I have not tasted ebi tempura this good for a looong time!  The batter is thin and crispy, and you can still taste the juicy sweetness of the shrimp!  This is how I believe real Tempura should taste like?  I had 3 ebi and didn't say a word about sharing it with J....hehehe...because I was enjoying it too much to share them!

There was also an eggplant tempura, pumpkin (or was it sweet potato) and a green bell pepper which I gladly passed to J!  No like green bell peppers!

Soft shell crab

J's meal comes with the Soft shell crab.  I don't really eat soft shell crab, because I think the way the soft shell crinkles in my mouth just make me feel like the crab is still alive!  Aaarrggghh...but J enjoyed his crab as always!  I stole a piece of his mushroom tempura...yum :)

Cooking in progress

The Chef started to get busy, preparing our first few dishes.  J's lobster can be served either as sahsimi, or cooked on the Teppanyaki grill.  We opted for cooked lobster, thank you!

The lobster is cooking under the cover, and the salmon is slowly simmering in the sake contained in the aluminium foil folded into a box.  Meanwhile, 2 slices of onions are being grilled away at one side, as well as the salmon skin!  Can't wait to taste the food!  

Salmon in Sake

If you think the Salmon in Sake looks small, well it is small because it is only half a slice of salmon!  The Chef had kindly portioned the food into 2 so that we get to share our set meals.  I simply love salmon cooked this way, and they still serve it in this shell shaped steel (?) plate!  It has been served this way eversince I had my first dinner in Shima, which is eons ago!  Hmmm...I wonder if I can get the recipe for the sake sauce...

Salmon skin & Lobster

See that strip of salmon skin?  Yes, it has been cut into 2 too!  But it was still deliciously crispy and had me wishing I had more of it.  The lobster was cooked in some buttery sauce which is just heavenly!  Add some of the seafood dipping sauce, and you get a buttery piece of lobster with a hint of vinegar so that it is not so "jelat".  I ate my lobster slowly, hoping to savour the taste longer...

Lobster shell

The lobster shell is not spared!  The Chef poured sake into the shell, and let it simmer for awhile before serving the whole thing to us.  The sake is strong!  But this would be a nice soup to have when it's freezing and snowing outside.  But too bad, we are in Singapore!

Garlic Fried Rice

Humble Garlic Fried Rice just taste so much better when it is Teppanyaki-ed.  I wonder how many kilograms of garlic does Shima uses everyday, because most of the dishes are smothered in garlic!  Hey, I am not complaining, just curious :)  The garlic fried rice is very fragrant and you can really taste the bits of crunchy garlic in it.

Beef Fillet and Ribeye

The two types of beef are cooked simply with nothing but tons of garlic, salt and pepper.  Just the way I think good beef should be cooked, and the result is just pure beefy goodness.  The beef fillet is tougher than the ribeye, but both are equally satisfying.

Fried mango with vanilla ice-cream

We were quite full at the end of the meal, but the waitress suggested we try the Fried Mango with Vanilla Ice-cream.  I think J was sold at the word mango, and we ordered it.  But it is worth the calories and splurge!  Half slices of mango "fried" on the Teppanyaki grill, and then splashed with Cointreau, before a scoop of ice-cream was put on top and drizzled with butterscotch.  Sigh...what more can I say except....dig in!

It was definitely a great meal, and an experience that I will not soon forget.

Melben revisited...

Melben never fail to satisfy even after numerous visits.  This is the place to go for J, especially after his monthly stint in China.

During this visit, I noticed that some dishes had been taken out of their menu - like their Chicken in Thai sauce, which is one of my favourites.  So I decided to order dishes that we never had before.  

Guinness Stout Pork Ribs

The Guinness Stout Pork Ribs is too sticky sweet for my liking.  I will stick to the Mongolian Pork Ribs from now on!  I prefer the Mongolian because it is more savoury with slivers of onion and capsicum to add flavour to the dish.

Spicy Claypot Tofu

The Spicy Claypot Tofu is yummy - egg tofu, egg, minced meat, prawns, chilli sauce, and spring onion.  Fail-safe formula for a gooey saucy dish to pour over your rice as gravy.  But I don't know why it comes in a wok instead of "claypot"?  :)

Black Pepper Crab

The Stars of Melben are obviously their crab dishes.  This time, I decided to have the Black Pepper Crab, instead of the usual Claypot Beehoon Crab.  The black pepper has a nice spicy kick to it, which is really nice, but I didn't have much appetite that day and only managed to eat one claw.  

J demolished the rest of the crab and pork ribs, while I struggled to finish the tofu thing.  But it is always a pleasant experience to dine in Melben because the service is always efficient and friendly.  

Hmmm...must arrange dinner @ Melben soon with a few good friends so that I have an excuse to pop my last bottle of Vasse Felix Silver Knight.  At $3 corkage charge, it is a shame not to bring a bottle of nice wine to accompany their excellent crabs!