Traditional English Afternoon Tea at E & O Hotel, Penang

Here are some desserts during a traditional English afternoon tea at E & O hotel in Penang. The English afternoon tea was free using the coupon voucher for members and is valid for 1 year. E & O hotel was owned by the Sarkies brothers and is a premier lifestyle hotel that was recently renovated.

The sandwiches are served in a 2 tier holder with scones on top. There are cucumber sandwiches, salmon, cheese and beef sandwiches. You can have a choice of various types of tea, and my favourite is orange flavoured tea. Each diner has a tea pot to himself.

A closer view of the sandwiches with whole meal bread and plain white bread.

Fine bone china is used at the cutlery. On the left is strawberry jam while the right side is butter. These are fillings for the scones where you can split into halves using a butter knife and spread the jam evenly.

Lunch at Food Gallery

I had lunch at Food Gallery in Penang Times Square a while ago and ordered the above sumptuous meal of fusili bolognise and almond chicken. The macaroni tomato sauce was tangy and well flavored. I added extra cheese powder to pair with the meal. The almond chicken was succulent and crunchy with almond flakes added to the batter that covered chicken. The presentation was appetizing as well and garnished with greens.

 

This was a set meal with a bowl of white rice, sauces, watercress soup and chicken stir-fried with mixed vegetables. This was my mum's order from Food Gallery where we dined recently. Food Gallery is the largest food court in Penang with more than 20 stalls of delicious Penang food cuisine. 

 

My dad loves Italian food and ordered this simple meal of western food with potato chips, coleslaw and pizza.

 

When I was in Kuala Lumpur, I had marmite chicken at Lorong Seratus Tahun restaurant. It consists of deep fried chicken with marmite dip, an egg cooked over-easy way and topped up with vegetables and rice.  Lorong Seratus Tahun serves genuine Penang food like ice-kacang, chendol, lorbak, etc.

 

This is ice-kacang with chendol ingredient of green pandan noodles, some longans, red beans, chopped peanuts, black herbal jelly, corn cream, shaved ice and topped with a scoop of strawberry ice-cream.

 

This is mushrooms that are deep fried and covered with batter to taste with cream sauce dip. It was served at Manhattan Fish Market in Queensbay Mall on the basement level. The food certainly makes me salivate and looking at it might just make you drool as well!

 I had Baskin Robbins ice-cream of chocolate mint and topped with delicious chocolate that was ideal to taste and not too sweet. It is topped with white cream, a red cherry and sprinkled with chopped nuts. I normally stop here in Tapah to unwind when returning back to Penang from Kuala Lumpur. Baskin Robbins has 31% discount on the 31st of the month every time.

 

This is a magnificent paint of food theme and vases of flowers. The framed paintings was taken at a local hotel when I was having buffet breakfast. I love the play of colors and picture composition.

Chinese Food and Buffet at E & O

I ordered this colorful dim sum of pandan green flavor, strawberry red, black sesame seed and yellow corn filled with meat and steamed with white chinese cabbage in a bamboo steamer. It looks appetising with the four different colors that make an eye candy.

This was ordered at Dragon-I Chinese Restaurant in Gurney Plaza, Penang. It consists of steamed brocolli with sliced abalone and black Shitake mushrooms. The gravy melts in my mouth and it was just as delicious as costly.

This was served at E & O hotel in town with small cups of black grass jelly topped with a flower fruit. Before they start disappearing one by one, I took the opportunity to snap this photo at the start of the buffet.

 

This is butter cake topped with sliced peaches, strawberries and blueberries. It was also sprinkled with almond flakes on the side with white cream. Icing sugar is then sprinkled to complete the serving. 

 

These are glasses of pudding with longan, cut dragon fruit and water melon. They certainly look tempting, don't they? I love dining at Sarkies Corner at E & O hotel.

 

This is the seafood corner with fresh prawns, raw salmon and raw oysters with lemon wedges. My second sister just loves fresh oysters and had 17 of them! Then she was down with flu the following day, but thank goodness she recovered quickly after a visit to the family doctor before she flew back to Suchou, China to continue lecturing as part of her job. 

Many Types of Desserts - Cakes, Cream Puffs, Jellies

 

Here are some cakes taken at a hotel buffet dinner recently. These are slices of melted butter cake topped with sinful chocolate, strawberries, green cherries and slices of grapes with rich white cream.  As it was still early when we entered the dining area, I took the liberty to snap some gorgeous photos of the cakes displayed on the buffet table.

 

Doesn't the picture above look tempting? I have removed the background noise using Photoshop so that the focal point is the plate of cheese cakes garnished with cut fruits of various types like oranges, strawberries and apples. The plate is also attractive and makes the food photo stands out.

 

This is a plate of cream puffs sprinkled with slices of strawberries and apples. For this set of dessert photos, I have taken quite a lot of time to remove the black dull background and fill it with white instead. 

This is rose flavored jelly garnished with cut fruits on a colorful dessert plate. The combination of colors from the fruits paired with jelly makes this dessert very tempting and sinful.

This is pandan green cake with yellow butter sponge cake. Pandan is a herbaceous tropical plant with long green leaves. In Southeast Asia, pandan leaves are used to lend a unique taste and aroma to many Thai desserts and some drinks. Pandan leaves can also be used to wrap savory foods, such as chicken. Pandan paste is used in cakes and desserts, as it is sweet and imbues foods with a bright green color. It can be purchased as a ready-to-use paste in Asian specialty stores. If purchased fresh, pandan leaves should be pounded into a paste for use in desserts, adding water sparingly.

This is another gorgeous photos of butter sponge cake covered with cream and garnished with bits of chocolate, cherries and other fruits. Hope you enjoy looking at my set of dessert photos taken recently at a local hotel in Penang during my dining pursuit for the weekend.

Fine Dining at Indulgence Designer-Eating Restaurant in Ipoh

Just last week, I went to Ipoh for the weekend with my 2 younger sisters and stayed in Impiana Casuarina Hotel, a 4-star hotel in the city. At night, we headed straight to Indulgence Fine Dining Restaurant that is nestled within the city of Ipoh. It is located in a large white colonial bungalow with ample car parking bays. A guard was stationed to take car of the cars and diners outside. According to my well-travelled second sister, Pellegrino is only served here in whole of Malaysia and cannot be found elsewhere. Pellegrino tastes like sparkling water for a whopping RM10 per bottle. Indulgence specially imported Pellegrino for its business - so you don't have middlemen to take profit.

For starter, I had wild mushroom soup served piping hot in red dining set with toasted garlic bread. Personally, I still think the mushroom soup in Mizzi Bistro in Penang is the best which is peppered with secret herbs and plenty of mushrooms blended in. This place in Indulgence, though it serves fine dining food, the service is lacklustre.

I had marche which is a selection of mini vegetables canopied by Manchego cheese, topped with arugula and edible nasturtium flowers. For this plate of mainly leaves, it cost RM29.00. Being a Penangite who is spoilt for choice, I think the food does not do justice to the money spent. And it was served in small portions, not enough to fill a hungry stomach. As all the photos were snapped in dim light, the pictures did not turn out great compared to my other posts.

My sister has Cocomo under the seafood selection which consists of kataifi wrapped prawns with honey coated walnuts, avocado dressing on torn chilli-ricotta baked rustic crouton and lobster glaze. The Cocomo was delicious and portions just right. We each (there were 3 of us sisters) divided our orders by a third and put them into smaller individual plates to savour all the dishes ordered.

This is Mooze which consists of orgo 'rice' pasta with calamari rings, crab, coriander and miso soup poured on. Surprisingly, the calamari rings tasted just right and not over cooked. As I went to the ladies, I noted photos of Minister Mentor, Lee Kuan Yew together with the lady boss and chef in a photo framed up and hung on the wall of other photos of dignitaries as well.

Viola is under pasta in the menu and we also had this fine dish of alternating ravioli of porchini and spinach ricotta in an oyster cream with leafy flat parsley. It was delicious to the palate that makes me yearn for more.

Since I still had residual cough, I ordered hot chocolate or known as choco mellow for my drink that comes with marsh mellow and chocolate shads. This cost me RM15, but for the sake of fine dining, I guess, I cannot complain too much.

To finish off the main meals, we had chocolate cake for dessert. It came with strawberries and topped with white milk cream. For the 3 of us, the total bill came to RM221.00 with Cocomo costing RM42.00. For the Americans and Europeans, the conversion rate is so attractive and it stretches your moolah here in Malaysia. That is why, my youngest sister's USA company in Penang sent 4 of their American staff to Penang for a break and the following week, sent more employees here to enjoy the life in Malaysia at very affordable hotel rates.

Glorious Food Pictures for the Week

I have decided to make the photos a little larger for clarity in this blog. By tweaking a little with the width of the main body and side bar, I managed to get what I wanted instead of spending too much time looking for a suitable food template. So what do you think of the pictures? The photo above shows the ambience of the dining area in Royal Hotel along Larut Road in Penang. It displays wall paper consisting of photos of collonial Chinese pre-war houses by the side with cloth covered chairs that make a contrast to the sight.

For the weekend, I stayed in Royal Hotel in the deluxe room with an additional room to work that comes with a fax machine and writing desk. The lounge chair here looks beckoning and comfortable withh plush cushion against the thick curtains.

Here comes the food where we had breakfast the following morning. It consists of toasted slices of bread spread with a myriad of jams and butter. In this close up photo, doesn't it look appetising?

While waiting for my colleague at Royal Lake Club in Kuala Lumpur, I decided to take a little tea break and ordered black forrest cake and butter cake with hot chocolate. Decided to indulge myself a little after coming out from the library while he attended to the contractor for the synthetic turf tennis courts that are being installed by the company. Since my work requirement is to handle all the computer and administration work, I am not required to be physically present on site at the tennis courts.

This was my dinner of quiche that was ordered from Delifrance along Mont Kiara, an upmarket place with many high-end condominiums and many expatriates live here. The quiche was just so-so; I would have prefer if it has spinach in it like the one I have tried in Singapore which was tastier.

Recently, I went to Food & Tea Restaurant in Gurney Plaza and had prawn mayo with rice and soup set. The prawn mayo was mixed with cut honey dew melon and mixed with Thousand Island cream. I kind of patronize this place and will always order the same kind of food as it is quite delicious.

This is chicken lasagna from Delifrance but I find it too oily and did not finish it as I was too full. It looked scrumptious but since they did not have seafood croissant, I had no choice but to order what is available. This will be my last time going to Delifrance in Mont Kiara as the service was slow and bad, even though I love dining at Delifrance for their seafood croissant.

This salmon-egg croissant was ordered in Northern Beach Cafe in Penang from the French stall. It is not often to find a true French man to prepare food for you except for this stall here. The portions are adequate and just right - neither too much nor too little.

I had seafood lamien again in Dragon-i Restaurant in Gurney Plaza without calamari or sotong and extra fish slices to make up for it. It is like eating noodles in soup prepared by trained Chinese chef.

This was my friend's order of stir-fried seafood with pan fried Hong Kong noodles that are crunchy to taste - also ordered from Dragon-i. Gurney Plaza is the high end premier shopping mall that I visit often to dine and also to read books for free at MPH readers' circle since I am a member.

I hope you enjoyed looking at the photos as much as I enjoyed putting them together in this culinary journal of mine. You are free to comment as to how I can improve this blog while I read more food articles in the press to improve on my writing style and food vocabulary.

Variety of Cuisines from a Myriad of Restaurants

Before I proceed, do note that DianaTan.net is my main blog hosted on a personal domain since 2007. Hence, the photos here are my own and not copied. I have full rights to the images captured here for my gastronomical journal in Best Asian Food which is hosted on Blogger.com. The photo taken above is sauteed asparagus with lily bulb which I ordered from a popular Taiwanese restaurant in Queensbay Mall. The food was exquisite and crunchy to taste.

This is brocolli stir-fried with carrots and garlic. I like the texture of the brocolli and the dark green color that was preserved even after cooking with heat. If you over cook the brocolli, it may turn to light yellow in color and may not look so appetising.

This is champaign bubble tea that was especially recommended in the same Taiwanese restaurant that I patronized recently. Despite the name, it is not added with champaign but has a rather exquisite flavor that is unique and delectable. The sky blue color certainly stands out and makes the cool drink look desirable. It was added with brown pearls as you can see at the bottom of the cup.

Still the different dish ordered from the Taiwanese restaurant, this is deep fried prawn roll mixed with other recipes and wrapped up in tofu skin. The order was just right and not too much or overwhelming with big portion.

This photo was part of the collection taken during E & O buffet dinner at Sarkies Corner. There were a myriad of selections to choose from ranging from creme brulee, cakes, nonya kuih, etc. Each dessert was specially made with a personal touch from the professional chefs in E & O Hotel. That is why Sarkies Corner is mostly booked and full of patrons and diners. You may have to reserve for a table to get a chance to dine here on weekends.

I bought this orange sandwich roll sprinkled with raisins from Roti Boy outlet that was recently opened in Gurney Plaza. It has strawberry jam inside which makes it sweet and tangy with a soft texture.

I ordered this ala carte meal from Sushi King that has cheese, chicken on sticks, fully boiled eggs and topped with curry vegetables. The dish was scrumptious but I find the chicken a bit on the hard side but overall, it was a fine dish.

This dish was specially designed for Father's Day at Sushi King which was on 20th June. It was a set meal with some vegetables, noodles in soup, fried seaweed and rice wrapped with tofu skin. The dish was palatable and tasty as well, but you might find it a bit heavy with the noodles included.