Dinner at Ming Garden Restaurant in Penang Times Square

 

I had dinner at Ming Garden Chinese Restaurant in Penang Times Square last night. It is located in Birch the Plaza building on the second floor. The address is below:

Ming Garden Restaurant

77-2-28 Penang Times Square

Penang.

Tel: 604 226 9977

Above is a snapshot of the grand entrance with pixue or some Chinese mythological creature that is believed to bring luck and prosperity to its owner. I love the bouquet of red roses on the table with pamphlets of different cuisines and prices to choose from. Since it was opened yesterday, there were congratulatory bouquets of flowers to the owner and also look good to welcome new visitors.

 

Here is the decadent ambience with velvet covered chairs and embellished with buttons behind to complete the dining furniture set. Complementary maroon serviettes match the color of the velvet-covered chairs. At the top, large lotus-designed lights hang precariously over the tables. There are private function rooms too for those who wish to dine quietly away from the glare of the public eye. Usually millionaires and the well-heeled will choose to reserve a private function room to eat in complete privacy. There were about 3 very large screens showing Andy Lau's concert performance in Hong Kong and audiences bopping to the lively rhythm. It sounded more like Michael Jackson's Thriller but sung in Cantonese.  

 While waiting for our set dinner, we were served Chinese tea and 'acak' as appetizer prior to the food. 'Acak' consists of julienned carrots, cucumbers and yam bean seasoned in vinegar with peanuts and chilly added for that extra oomph. The taste was piquant and spicy, teasing the taste buds for more to come.

 

This is the real appetizer as part of the set dinner with a spoonful of fresh scallop, bits of fried scallops served above the braised asparagus. It is garnished with parsley, julienned carrots with a purple petal of an orchid. In the dessert glass are 2 pieces of some crunchy batter mixed with delicious condiments. It was just heavenly tasting them. 

 

The next dish of the set menu was braised shark's fin soup with crab meat in casserole. The shark's fins soup were scrumptious and the crab meat fresh and tangy. There were generous portions of them too.

 

This is stewed sea cucumber with mushroom and fish maw wrapped in aluminium foil. A dark purple orchid with green parsley embellish the meal. Inside the aluminium foil was also pacific clam, black Shitake mushroom and abalone mushroom. The thick gravy was just as tasty as it looks. 

 

The next dish was deep fried grouper fillet in Cuba style but I accidentally deleted the photo as I was trying to remove spare pictures. The above meal was the second last dish before dessert and consists of  fried ee-fu noodles with crab meat. All the meals were served in small portions so that they are not too overwhelming and filling. They were of appropriate portions enough to fill a hungry stomach. 

This is the finale of the set meal and the sweet dessert consists of coconut with longans topped with ice cubes in syrup. The Chinese tea helps in the digestion and washes down the remaining oil. On the whole the six course set dinner meal for two cost more than a hundred ringgit (USD 33.00) which is quite reasonable considering the tastiness of the meal.

Travel to Hong Kong

best 

My youngest sister (left front)  and I (in brown on right  behind) flew to Hong Kong on my birthday month in July and met up with my second sister (in green). Here, Mirinda ( in blue opposite me) was our tour guide for the day and brought us to a Chinese restaurant known as The Moon in the upmarket shopping mall in The Elements where they  have Ballys, etc. In this shot, the four of us were seated waiting for our serving for dinner. We could not get by in Hong Kong without Mirinda who could speak Cantonese and guided us besides being our spokes person. By the way, Mirinda has a tiny condominium near Shatin MTR train station that cost a whopping RM 1.2 million! (USD 400,000). The entire condominium could fit into the living room of our suite in Royal Plaza Hotel, where we stayed and Mong Kok East MTR train station was just underground of the hotel. 

 

Above was one of our orders of crispy dried noodles topped with scrambled egg white and garnished with fish eggs. The serving looks appetizing for me. The noodles were crisp and crunchy to the palate. 

 

We also had deep fried wanton paired with Thai chilly sauce and black sauce in a yin yang shaped sauce container. 

 

Chinese food is never complete without an order of pork ribs braised in special sauce. It was simply heavenly having such fine dining food. 

After travelling to Golden Bauhinia Square, Aberdeen Fishing Village, Repulse Bay, our next stop was the optional tour of Ocean Park where we dined at The Neptune Seafood Restaurant. I loved the ambience here and it gives me a feeling of swimming in the ocean with the huge manta rays, baby sharks, schools of colorful ocean fishes, etc swimming gracefully in this 2 storey-high aquarium.

 

This was our dining table and we got an excellent view of the mega aquarium or oceanarium while waiting for our servings. Loved the deep blue glasses of water.

This was my selection of fish with potatoes for the MAS cabin food that was served to the passengers. The white gravy was certainly tantalizing and sumptuous. You have another choice of chicken with rice but I am a fish lover, hence I chose this meal. There's a bun with butter, butter sponge cake with chocolate cream, salad, water and juices. Geens like cuboid carrots and long beans were paired with the poached fish. This meal was mouth-watering and yummy!

Dinner at Max Gourmet, Gurney Plaza

 

Yesterday I was at Gurney Plaza to catch the Transformers 3 : Dark of the Moon, 3D movie and dined at Max Gourmet on the 7th floor of  the lifestyle shopping mall. Above was my order of steamed garoupa with  hor fun or flat rice noodles. The hor fun was tangy with flavorful thin liquid gravy and slices of garoupa which is an expensive fish. I love this dish and will always order the same meal whenever I patronize Max Gourmet.

 

As opposed to dining al fresco, I usually dine indoors with air-conditioning turned on to lend a cool atmosphere for comfort. This was my friend's order of herbal ginseng chicken drumstick ramen or Japanese noodles. The soup was delicious with hints of ginseng sprinkled with red wolf berries for better eye sight plus other aromatic herbs. 

 

After our hearty meals, we had our drink and dessert. On the left was Mango Platinum Ice Blended while on the right was Ginseng and Water Chestnut that I ordered. Mango Platinum Ice Blended has real sweet cut mangoes with bits of raisins, peanuts, some syrup and topped with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream. The ginseng with water chestnut was boiled until the flavor seeped to the water giving a tasty drink to finish off the meal. 

 

On the third floor of Gurney Plaza is the ever popular Kim Gary Hong Kong Restaurant. This place is usually full of diners, simply because of the delicious food and very affordable pricing. If you are a member, you get a further 10% discount. The meal above was fish fillet cheese baked rice garnished with broccoli for the color and visual appeal. It consists of rice steamed with lotus leaf laid at the bottom for the fragrance, corn, button mushrooms and fish fillet. This has always been my favorite dish since I stepped in this popular restaurant.

 

This is lemon butter fish served at Karen's Kitchen with apple green table cloth and menu. The gravy was simply ambrosia and heavenly. It comes with mashed potato, salad, fish fillet and a generous portion of lemon sauce that complements the fish. 

 

I was also at New World Park, which is a food haunt with swanky restaurants as well as dozens of  hawker stalls where you can dine al fresco and choose your table. I had ice-kacang recently as shown in the photo above. And I requested for extra creamy corn to go with the shaved ice with rose syrup, milk, black herbal jelly, and not forgetting a scoop of vanilla ice-cream.

 

This was our free roasted half chicken after collecting 9 chops on the Chicken Rice Shop loyalty card. For 6 chops, you get a quarter chicken and for 3 chops, you get a drum stick. I also frequent Chicken Rice Shop for the many varieties of food like 'pie tee' or known as top hat. The roasted chicken was succulent, tender and juicy.

Dinner at Simple Life Vegetarian Restaurant

 

I was in Kuala Lumpur last week and dined at a vegetarian outlet in Sunway Pyramid known as Simple Life Restaurant. Above is my order of Sweet and Sour Crispy Abalone Mushroom set which consists of a bowl of organic brown unpolished rice, fried spring roll, a small portion of different vegetables and a bowl of old cucumber soup. There is a slice of water melon and the main dish - sweet and sour crispy abalone mushroom.

Here is a close up shot of the sweet and sour crispy abalone mushroom with cashew nuts, tomatoes, cucumber, yellow bell peppers and of course the abalone mushrooms served in a wok-like bowl.

 

My friend's order of organic multi-grain porridge paired with various vegetables and hard-boiled egg sliced into two which is topped with a star aniseed for visual appeal.

 

Beautiful lights hang precariously over the tables and exude a soothing mood to the ambience.

 

I took the liberty to ask a waiter to pose for this shot and notice the wordings on his t-shirt - "I love my papa & mama" - which I thought was appropriate for father's day and mother's day celebration here. Simple Life Restaurant was patronized by many diners because of the quality of food, service, ambience and affordable pricing. If you like to try this spanky new restaurant, the details are below:

Simple Life Restaurant

LG2-126A, Blue Atrium, Sunway Pyramid Shopping Mall

No. 3, Jalan PJS 11/15, Bandar Sunway, 46150 PJ, Selangor

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.

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Teaching my kids how to wakeboard

Guest post written by Greg White

There has been so many times that I've going wakeboarding that I honestly lost count years ago. Well, now it's actually about time that I can teach my kids how to do it. I picked it up in college and I can't believe that I've been doing it for so long. My wife is a little hesitant about it but I think that this is going to be a really nice way for me to bond some more with my kids.

My wife is of course coming along to drive the boat and make sure that everyone stays safe. I was online looking up some kid-sized wakeboards to buy for them and while I was doing that I saw the site WIRELESSINTERNET.net. I read through it and after that I decided to switch over our home internet service to it.

I think that this is going to be a really big success. Then maybe we can even convince my wife to learn how to wakeboard too! Although I really doubt that's ever going to happen. One can dream though.