Toilet post#8

Someone tell me please.

Did I just miss d golden opportunity to experience d most intelligent washroom in the whole of Malaysia (could it be even Asia)?

I'm talking about this futuristic public convenience featured prominently in The Star newspapers early this year.

Couple of weeks ago while shopping at the vicinity of Lot 10, Sungei Wang and BB Plaza, found the pride of our nation like this:-Err..had this ever been in operation? Can't seem to find the date it's launched nor d ribbon cutting (maybe toilet seat popping?) ceremony news online.

If it was opened before, oh boy, public toilet-ers in our city sure are a rough and careless lot!

Pity the self-repair function was not included.

Restaurant Guizhou Garden, Pudu

4 of us. Dinner time. Raining dogs, cats and whatever animals easily found on Kuala Lumpur city soil. Bad traffic jam, of course. You get the idea.

We were unable to decide what to have around Pudu area. The easiest choice would be Teochew porridge but 2 of us were not keen on rice and I wanted to try other restaurants there. So, after walking along the row of shops, we found ourselves staring into a spanking clean bright air-conditioned patronless restaurant wondering whether to risk it. You know what they say about quiet empty restaurants but then again we noticed other shops were like that at that time. Maybe the heavy downpour was keeping most diners away. Upon spotting us, the Manager (mm.. a position like a Head Waiter/Captain) quickly came to open the door and ushered us in. Menus were presented, tea was poured and the manager started rattling on about their specialties/choices of food/recommendations.

We decided on a hotpot with 2 choices of soup ie. herbal and malat("spicy hot"). Yes, we were going for a sweaty affair.

Oh, a couple of spoonful of soup (your own preference of which) is to be added to the small bowl of condiments. It's dip.

On that night, a sliced tong-shan fish (ikan keli?) was given free. As for other ingredients, we chose beef balls, pork balls, straw mushrooms, golden mushrooms, chinese cabbage, lamb meat slices, chicken meat slices, lotus root, homemade tauhu.On top of that, we tried 2 of their specialty dishes.

Fried Brake (that's how it's named in the menu!) Vegetables with Cured Meat @RM18.The green vege is green onion. The rest was Brake Vege which tasted like err.. twigs. Reminded me of a Mr Bean episode where he served his guests with freshly broken twigs dipped in Bovril (I think). Definitely not a dish to order again. For us, that is. The only thing I can recall about the cured meat, which was sliced and not obvious in the picture as the colouring was similar to the Brake Vege, is it's very salty.

Special Blood Bean Curd Miao with celery @ RM15 Blood Bean Curd Miao is the black pieces in the picture. Tasted similar to 'heong cheong', Chinese Hakka stuffed intestine. Salty, flavourful, and you get to choose the vegetable to be cooked with. The manager recommended celery. Good call. 2 bowls of steamed white rice was ordered due to this dish!

Desserts? Looks like candy?They were moist pink towels offered after the meal.

Good environment, good service. Did I mention the waitresses were in customs? After they've cleared the table, we sat there chit-chatting for almost 3 hours. They didn't mind since only a sprinkle of diners came in. Anyway, having people at tables do look so much more inviting to potential patrons outside, right? When we left at almost 10pm, we saw the restaurant next door which serves similar food was full! Hmm.. we missed the jackpot? O well, at least we did enjoy the meal.

This was our bill:- and this is how you locate the place.

Restoran Makanan Laut Soon Fatt (Soon Fatt Seafood Restaurant)

This is one of Phitoy's favourite dinner venue for Chinese 'Tai-chow' (literally means big cook?). This place is definitely no stranger to those staying around Sri Petaling and Sri Endah housing garden. How good is it? Below is the familiar scene at dinner time e-v-e-r-y-d-a-y except Tues when it's closed. (Please note that the restaurant only occupies the ground floor. A Korean BBQ restaurant runs the floor above.) :-

A few friends have been asking for map/address but being one who has problems differentiating right from left when directing, thought why not do a post instead. Dear impatient hungry friends, do skip the pictures and scroll below for the address/telephone number and location map! For the others, let me show a few favourite dishes served there.

These pictures were taken quite sometime ago as the date on the bill will show. Anyhow, to this day, these few dishes have never disappointed us nor new patrons. Almost every table will have an order of at least one of these:-

Pineapple pork ribs (sweet and savoury)'Par-chiu' Tilapia (hot and sour) 'Seong-thong' (err.. high soup?) spinach (flavourful with anchovies and garlic based soup)

Nevertheless, the chefs here always do come up with new dishes. The waitresses there are very helpful in recommending the specials for the day. As the crowd is quite 'scary', glad to note that the service is usually fast and furious in finding a clean table and taking orders.

To get there just call for directions or better still, just see this location map. This restaurant is diagonally opposite the Sri Petaling Hotel, so once you find the Hotel, just look across. Hard to miss with the bright lights and heavy crowd, even on rainy nights!

Price? See the bill? Oh, just notice that there's no breakdown of price for each dish but in total, reasonable price, right?

Taro Ramen, Sungei Wang Shopping Complex

One day after working hours, 3 of us headed over to Sungei Wang to get a few *coughcoughDVDscoughcough*. For dinner, I suggested Madam Wong's Cafe which was recommended by Babe In The City KL, one of my favourite food blogger who did a review of that place in Sept'06. Was mentally deciding whether to taste the Marmite Chicken or Supreme Pork Rib Rice when suddenly upon arrival at the shopfront, 1 of my friends exclaimed "Aiyo, this place is it? Came before-lar with so & so. So-so (meaning edible standard) only-lar". Upset but with tummy making angry noises, I did not protest much but made a quiet promise ie. I will return without you! So, we went nextdoor.We were quite early, I guess, as the tables were still empty and the waitresses/waiters were chatting away at a corner. Nevertheless, once seated the service was fast and attentive. In between I noticed they were whispering about my taking pictures of the food. My actions were very obvious especially when my companions kept reminding each other not too softly not to touch the food until satisfactory portraits were taken! TQ guys. Actually, quite shy-oh.
Lucky for that friend, we found the food there good. The 3 of us had Green Tea (refillable/bottomless. Guess that's why it's RM1.50 per glass) with the following individual bowls of ramen (I can't remember the names - forgot to take pictures of the menu). Pictures from top to bottom:- Beef Ramen. Mine. Tender beef slices. Good. Miso Ramen. Well, I'm not a fan of Miso soup, so I prefer the Beef Ramen without a doubt. Spicy Ramen. This I believe was featured very prominently in the menu (highly recommended?). We agreed that was the best of the lot (of those we ordered, that is). Kids stay away as it was hot (spicy)! That red colour soup was not for show.These were additional orders (for the record, we did struggle a bit with the udon as all the noodles servings were quite generous). Edamame (credit to Honey Star for reminding me of the name) and Yaki Udon. I only managed to bite into 2 pieces of the beans as my companions were fast workers. The udon tasted bland to me but maybe it's because I was already quite full after my bowl of Beef Ramen. But all of us agreed that it was a tad too oily.

The bill and address:-

Other branches' location:-

Excuse me, just to check. Are my pictures too dark or is it just my monitor?