Oiso, The Sphere, Bangsar South

Thank God it’s Friday so we can have an extra special lunch to review for you! S, N, Master Yoda and our newest team member, Baja Hitam, agreed for something a bit different than our usual fare and decided on embarking the journey to Bangsar South. It is a pretty decent up and coming place with growing choices of restaurants and cafes to cater for the ever so increasing number of white collar crowd from the surrounding new high rise office towers. Parking was surprisingly easy at the Sphere, or it may be just that we got lucky. Busy working people translates into hungry people, so the place was packed and we had to push our way through the throng of equally ravenous lunch crowd. Not to mention there was a supermarket conveniently located at the lower ground floor, giving way to opportunistic grocery shopping for the brave- hearted. 

We decided to try our luck at Oiso, a Korean restaurant. The fact that we had to queue for a table was something new for us. Usually, we tend to shy way from spending unnecessary energy expenditure for food, i.e. queueing. We waited for may be 5 minutes, or 8 minutes tops. Nobody was counting as they had the decency to provide us with a cooling drink while we waited. As we weren’t well versed in Korean cuisine, we honestly did not know what they served us. Looked like barley, or it could also be rice. Who knows? But it was clever ploy to keep the customers and for that Master Yoda gave the service a 7 out of 10 which N and S concurred with.

We really wanted to sit indoors as it was quite hot al fresco. Alas, hunger won and we agreed to sit outdoors. Though shaded and equipped with fans, we could not escape the fact that this is Malaysian humid afternoon weather we are talking about. And for that the ambience was rated 3 by Baja Hiram and 5 by Master Yoda. N & S scored somewhere in between. 

The service was quite fast in obtaining our order and delivering our food and drinks, now coined as ‘order to table’ by Baja Hitam. You know, like ‘door to needle’ time in treating patients with heart attacks. My, my… we have quite a reviewer here. Though some mishap did occur with our order due to miscommunication. The attending waiter did not enter our order for kimchi pancake but it turned out for the best anyway as we sincerely could not even attempt to eat another dish after finishing our own lunch sets. S scored the service as 7/10 while Baja Hitam scored it lower at 4/10 as he was a fan of kimchi pancakes, even though we doubted he could have finished it. All of us ordered the lunch sets which came with 3 refillable side dishes.

Baja Hitam opted for the less famous noodle soup with beef set. See, it is so not typical Korean that it did not even have a Korean name. He did not think drinks were necessary as he was having soup and soup is basically flavoured water after all. You wonder what is inside Baja Hitam’s head sometimes. He scored his food as 7/10, managing to finish his noodles and beef but raising the white flag on the absurdly large amount of soup. His lunch set cost around RM 16.50 post taxes which is typical of restaurant food price in most shopping malls nowadays.

Being a Korean food virgin, Master Yoda had nothing to compare her beef bibimbap to. So she scored her food a 6/10. The iced plum juice helped to quench her thirst in the hot and humid ambience. We hope this eating experience did not in any way detract Master Yoda in reviewing other Korean food in the future. The beef bibimbap was RM 16.90 and the drink was RM 5.90, costing RM 25.30 overall after taxes (6% GST and 5% service charge).

S also had the beef bibimbap, along with iced honey citron tea. The bibimbap was tasty once mixed with the sauce. She did wish there was a little bit more of the crunchy rice crust at the bottom of the bowl though. The sides were so- so. The fried salty anchovies were not as crunchy as hoped but tasted nice nevertheless while the kimchi was edible. As long as the kimchi does not sting her throat, hey that’s fine with her. The last side dish was some pickled radish. She gave it a miss because she was not a big fan of radish in general. The honey citron tea was heavenly in the hot weather. The candied marmalade bits added a bittersweet twist to the otherwise typical drink. The price of her food and drink was the same as Master Yoda’s.

N had the kimchi stew with rice and iced organic barley tea. He felt that the food was nothing special compared to other Korean food he has tasted. Hence he rated his food as 6/10. His lunch set was RM 15.90 and coupled with the RM 1.90 drink, his lunch came to RM 19.70 including taxes.

Overall, a good lunch outing with friends at a relatively different place than the usual spots. We left with our tummies full and ready to bring our A game back to work. Who are we kidding? I bet most of us wish that we had siestas over here like the clever Spaniards in our post- lunch stupor.

As they say in Korea, annyeonghi kaseyo!

Honest Foodies Review Team

Aroma, Persatuan Alumni Universiti Malaya, near UM Damansara Gate

Run by Eden Catering, this is the poshest place some of us can go to in these difficult times. The restaurant is located in the clubhouse, with waiters in their black and white attire and expansive air- conditioned dining area. The best part is that there is a student’s lunch special, which cost just below RM 10. The bad part is it is always char key tiaw every time we ask. Our best bet is their lunch set menu which rotates on a weekly basis on a 7 week cycle. You will also get an iced lemon tea with a dessert with the set ranging from RM 10- RM 15. 

This week, after much debating (“Where do you want to go?” “ I don’t know, you decide lah” “ I don’t mind” “ I don’t mind either” “Urghhhh…”) N and S decided to try the nasi bukhara lunch set at Aroma, PAUM.

S has been eyeing the set for months but was never lucky enough to come when it was the weekly special. So, this time, she keyed in the lunch menu sets into her smartphone. Smart gal.

The food itself tastes alright. You have a crispy poppadom on top of your rice. The rice, though not seasoned with spices enough was adequate to satisfy our hunger. The tandoori chicken was not too overwhelmingly seasoned, though S certainly hoped for while the dhal with potatoes and vegetables completed our food group. Health conscious N gave his a 6- 7/10 as he expected fresh vegetables and wilted vegetables in a dhal curry did not count as a vegetable serving for him. S scored the food higher with 8/10 because she especially liked the tandoori chicken. Not the best tandoori chicken she has ever had, but certainly the best one with the easiest access to around her workplace.

Next came the dessert. It was a bubur cha cha with tender sweet banana. Or is it a pengat pisang mixed with pulut cha cha? Either way, the chewy cha cha and sago with sweet banana gave us the kick needed to continue our work after a draining morning (oh, we were just being melodramatic by the way). The sweet creamy coconut milk certainly helped this dessert’s case. FYI, N hates anything milky or dairy affiliated. But since coconut is not dairy, we repeat NOT DAIRY, N liked his dessert just fine.

Overall, we would recommend anyone within the vicinity of this place to come here for the lunch menu. We each forked out RM 13.40 for our lunch and hey, that is not too bad. Just don’t order their pies. La Bonito once ordered one and it took them like a million light years to serve her with it because they said it was made from scratch. Maybe because they gave us the impression that it was going to be worth the wait or something, but the collective disappointment on behalf of La Bonito when the pie arrived spoke volumes. We thought they looked eerily similar to the ones you see in Secret Recipe- franchise- like shops.

2 things we have learned from this review:

1. We tend to post less pictures when we are hungry, most probably because we only remembered  our task half way through wolfing down our meal

2. Coconut milk is not dairy

Okay, until the next review,

Honest Foodies Review Team

Marufuku Udon at Jaya One, Petaling Jaya

We decided to go here based on the recommendation of a fellow food reviewer, with the promise of good affordable home made udon noodles. The atmosphere was not bad, though a bit crowded during lunch hour. We managed to get a table inside the restaurant fairly quickly and thankfully the indoor seating was air conditioned. They do serve other food besides udon but the name of the shop does end with Udon after all so we decided to try their udon selection. 

First off, we gave the atmosphere a 5/10 with the down side of being very crowded, which most definitely was not their fault. But if we said everything was okay then this would be a very short post right?

 The waiter managed to give our menus immediately upon sitting down, which was a plus point. After pondering a while, we managed to order our food though with some difficulty in getting the waiter’s attention. The service was okay, not super fast like McDonald’s fast but 7/10 okay.

N had the Soboro with iced lime green tea. The Soboro was described in the menu as minced chicken with tare sauce and onsen egg. Tare, our fellow food enthusiasts, is basically a general Japanese dipping or basting sauce that you can use during grilling as well as with sushi, nabemono and gyoza. At least that is what Wikipedia said. And it was quite cheap too, at RM 9 and  another RM 1 for the green tea. N rated his food as 8-9/10…he declared his love for the onsen egg repeatedly. Being a connoisseur of poached eggs, his declaration of the soft silky egg white with a perfectly firm egg yolk must have meant a lot to egg lovers of the world, though none to the rest of us. R, who joined us in this edition of food escapade had the same food as N. As usual, he ate his food in the usual thoughtful manner which can be confused with a poker face. Either way, we assume that his love for the onsen egg is comparatively less than Neoh’s for he rated his dish as 6-7/10.

J and S both had Tempura Seafood Udon with iced green tea because hey, what is life without some fried food? Boring. So, just to make it clear. J absolutely loved it . Like 9.5/10 love. Why not 10, you ask? You can if you want to, nobody cares actually. The udon soup was topped with crispy fried tempura prawn, squid, tofu and, shiitake mushroom and to put the proverbial icing on the cake…a soft squishy egg is placed in the middle of this scrumptious bowl. Priced at RM 12 with another RM 1 for the green tea, this is an absolute deal that you should not miss. The contents looked deceptively small but the tempura thingies can make you feel full. If they do not then the soup most probably will.

Having eaten our fast lunch, we left the restaurant in high spirits. Only then R told us in that “oh by the way” nonchalant tone that though the food is pork free, they do put sake in their soup bases. He did not have the heart to tell us earlier since we had almost finished our food by the time he arrived. Thanks, we guess. Hmmm, that is one sinister restaurant.

Here’s hoping for a future teetotalism review,

Honest Foodies Review Team 

Streat Thai, Jaya One PJ

The food here is mediocre but we have a more interesting story to tell besides the food. You see, S, N and J decided to go for lunch and since we were all lazy out of towners who have low tolerance for KL traffic jam, we decided to wait for the bus to bring us to our next food- tastic adventure. But lo and behold…3 magical creatures decided to take pity on us and brought us along in Didi’s car to Jaya One for lunch.

So, this is Didi, Mr. Z and La Bonito (collectively known as Didi & Friends. Don’t look at us weird that way, we just found out what they were like 10 seconds ago)

Didi is a proficient driver who gets jittery when she has to drive her big car. She prefers smaller cars but since she has to bring us whole lot, she just had to face her fear for the 2.8 km (or 8 minutes) that it took us to reach our destination. Now, parking was a bit trickier. Didi does not like to attempt to reverse park when there is limited space. Folklore had it that she once refused to reverse park her car even when there were 3 adjacent available parking spaces next to her. Hey, that’s just hearsay. Or you can ask Mr. Z and La Bonito because that’s what they told us.

So, Mr.Z kindly offered to reverse park Didi’s car. The parking was at a solitary parking space with a feet each from the walls by the way. Imagine our total surprise when said car actually came equipped with a reverse camera. A reverse camera, Didi! With the car safely parked, we made our merry way to Streat Thai. Since we had such a thorough introduction,we will try to make our food review as concise as possible.

The service was quite good, though our waiter was a tad pretentious with his fake American accent and taking order via his smartphone app. Puhleaseee… we saw the waitress at the next table writing down orders for the whole table on her trusted notepad in half the time it took you to get one single order. The fake American accent thing is probably us being prejudiced (maybe all Thais speak like MTV Asia VJs...but hey, was he even Thai?) but trying to be hipster like with our order? Ugh….so that’s 5 to 6 out of 10 for service.

They stayed true to their theme of Thai street food with wooden facade and furniture.Since it was during a busy lunch hour , it was a quite hot as there was no indoor seating and our experience was further brought down another notch to 5-6 out of 10 as they did not segregate the smokers from non- smokers. Granted, it was an open space street food concept but we would still prefer to save our lungs. 

The price, though not street market level, was still affordable. However, one could hear the mumblings of some reviewers who said they could eat better Thai food in MyElephant with cheaper price. #2jobs.

J had the Pineapple Fried Rice with Chicken. Let’s say this is the worst food he has ever tasted in his whole life. He even gave negative marks. Since this is a fake food review blog, so we let him give -5 out of 10. See, the food was not even worth a 0! Why, do you ask…let’s call it a false advertisement leading to false hope and disappointment. He fully expected a piece of chicken but when he just got the pineapple fried rice, he politely asked the server where was his chicken. So he was told that it was actually minced chicken mixed with the fried rice. Try as he might, J could not find the minced chicken (maybe it was too small?like nanotech small?) so he was left to his imagination on how the chicken would have tasted like with his fried rice. So -5 it was to be. Oh, to top it off, he ordered the hot Thai milk tea but got a cold one instead.

Mr. Z had the Pad Krapow Beef with Rice & Fried Egg with cold Thai Milk Tea. He kept comparing it to MyElephant and how it was inferior compared to his favourite Thai place so he rated his food a 5/10. At least it was not 0. Didi also had the same dish and she liked it with a 6/10 rating (or more if we let her. It was her first review, after all)

La Bonito had the Pad Krapow Squid with Rice & Fried Egg and Iced Lychee Tea. She felt the food was of good portion though the tender squid was slightly underseasoned. Look at the squiggly egg, how lovely. She gave the food 7/10, mostly for the perfectly fried egg.

N had the Thai Green Curry Noodles with Red Ruby. Why have a drink like everyone else when you can go straight for dessert right? He quite liked his noodles, rating it a 7/10 or something. Everyone was eyeing his dessert, honestly.

S had the clear Seafood Tom Yum soup and had to pay extra for the white rice. She also had the cold Thai Milk tea which tasted exactly like the one in Boat Noodle, except you cannot bring the mason jar glass home.The tom yum tasted ok, nothing great about it. The one in MyElephant was tastier and packed more punch. Okay, this is officially a sad thing since we have mentioned this ethereal restaurant 3 times in this review which was for another restaurant. Sorry. Oh, she rated it a 6/10.

So, generally this place performed pretty averagely and had more room for improvement. Oh, another thing. We had to pay the bill which amounted to RM 186.20 (for 10 adults and 1 kid) at the counter, which kind of defeated the purpose of paying a 10% service charge, right?

With our tummies full, we safely went back to our workplace chauffeured by the ever so funny Didi. She just managed to miss the turning to exit the building this time, nothing spectacular. 

Till the next review,

Honest Foodies Review Team

Seeds & Wheats Cafe, Section 13 Petaling Jaya

Discovered by our Francis Light, Egg, who is now confined to eating at the same food court every day due to work commitment, we decided to have our lunch at Seeds & Wheats Cafe. The initial party of 4 was later reduced to 3 as R ditched us due to ‘family stuff’. We are starting to suspect that he may have another food review circle that he is attending besides ours.

Similar to Yellow Apron, this restaurant is located in an office building that must have been a former factory or warehouse in its former life. Parking was tricky as we could not park within the building’s premises. Luckily, we managed to snag a parking somewhere and and settled ourselves in the tiny quaint restaurant. It feels tinier during lunch hour as it was crammed with people. Probably equipped with roughly 12 tables, we had to share ours with another patron. The limited food options in the menu was perfect for our perennial indecisiveness. Customers had to queue up at the counter to order and pay for the food first and wait for the order to be delivered to their table later once it is ready.

Some random chalk drawing that non- artsy fartsy people like us could never interpret. N said it was dynamite connected to a long fuse cable. Maybe he has been watching too many Die Hard movies.

 So here are our order numbers, written on wooden blocks. Nice touch.

What you see is what you get: The selection of food and gourmet coffee are all written on the chalkboard. No fancy schmancy menu here.

We had to wait for a while for our food, and we saw quite a number of people at other tables still waiting for their food too. The cashier was courteous and fast, but the service was not. S rated it a 3/10 as she was hangry. J was a bit diplomatic, giving it a 5/10 while N was surprisingly calm and collected with a 7/10 rating. He said he had to wait the same time for his food during our Yellow Apron lunch service. 

Ambience? Good, comfortable though cramped. 8/10. The pastry selection looked tantalising but we do not want a carb overload now, do we? People might think we were lazy or something.

S & N both had the salted egg chicken rice which was white rice served with fried chicken cutlets cooked in creamy salted egg sauce. We really liked it… like 8-9/10 like. It was filling and served its purpose to get us through the rest of the workday. There was crunchy poppadom with a slice of omelette on top of the rice. The lightly seasoned omelette tasted nice and managed to cut through the creaminess of the salted egg sauce. The meal was affordably priced at RM 9.90 each and we were fine with the free refillable plain water.

J was tempted by the grilled chicken chop. You see, he wanted to see whether there was any difference with the similarly priced grilled chicken chop that he eats at the food court in our workplace. Once served on the table, the grilled chicken chop here appeared way more appetising than its food court cousin. It was served with a side of fries, a scoop of mashed potatoes and a serving of fresh crisp salad. The gravy was properly seasoned with black pepper and salt and was not cooked in a pot of oil, unlike the one in the food court. He rated it a 9/10. As he liked it so much we actually posted 2 pictures of the dish! With no added cost from the plain drinking water, his meal cost him RM 17.90.

Second shot of the grilled chicken chop, since it was so good according to J

Overall, a satisfying lunch experience although a bit slow in their service due to the lunch crowd. Might benefit from more space. Well, maybe it is a reflection of today’s economy whereby the average middle class family can barely afford a shoebox unit apartment (it is an apartment unit less than 500 sq ft, for all you non- real estate enthusiasts out there) who may need to restrict themselves to having 1.5 children or less. Okay, now we are depressed. 

Interested? Go to : Lot 41,No 10,Block C,Jln Bersatu 13/4,Seksyen 13,46300 Petaling Jaya (it is located at the gound floor 

of Axis Business Park Building)

Until the next review,

Honest Foodies Review Team.

Yellow Apron, Section 13 Petaling Jaya

From the good ol’ people who brought you The Humble Pie Co, comes Yellow Apron. If you do not know it is run by the same people, fear not. They use Humble Pie's napkins. Waste not, want not we guess. Located in the busy office district in Section 13 PJ, this restaurant serves a twist to normal lunch fares usually expected by the hardworking white collar establishment.

We decided to try this restaurant once we have passed this place one too many times. And after reading a real online food review. A real one.  

Parking was relatively easy here, and free. From the outside, you would not have thought that a high- end restaurant existed in the office building called Heritage Centre, surrounded by converted factories and offices.

 The ambience is quite nice as the restaurant was spacious and adopted a minimalistic approach in its interior design, leaving ample space in between the tables. That way, you do not have to hear what your neighbours are talking about. Or that would probably be a bad thing if that chatty neighbour was bad- mouthing somebody you know. Oooooh, juicy. Anyway, when we entered the premise, the workers were busy cutting fresh flowers to be arranged in small glasses as part of the quaint decoration. The flowers were well thought off and for us was the highlight of the restaurant. Which was kind of sad when you think about it. We gave the ambience an 8/10. R wanted to give it 10/10 though because even the toilets had fresh flowers as part of the decoration.

The menu

Hmmm... we do need to learn a lot about filters

R & N both had the chicken burger. It was not your average burger. It was a fusion burger with deep fried chicken thigh meat lathered in very hot and spicy sambal belacan and slaw with a huge side of either potato wedges or chips. R rated it as 6/10 while N loved it more at 8/10. If you looked at how R ate it you would understand why. He started off really cool and proper but towards the end of the burger he was sweating like we were in Sub- Saharan Africa. N ate his burger with poise and managed to describe eloquently how his chicken thigh meat was still tender and juicy despite the crisp outside layer. The burgers were rather small though but compensated by the huge portion of potatoes, which sorely lacked seasoning. N also, being an opponent of anything dairy, detested the cream cheese dip.

S initially wanted to try the assam laksa but was told that it was not available. Dejected, she opted for the dancing prawns in yee mee instead. Well, the prawns did not look like they were dancing. More like swimming. Or drowning. Either way the yee mee tasted nice but not in the RM 20- worth- it nice. S swore she could have something similar for 10 bucks or less. So she rated it a 6/10.

All of the food came with a cup of coffee or a small glass of lemonade, tasting so- so. We told you we were honest.

Wish we had better things to review about this restaurant. Seriously, we really wanted to. But at the end of the day food speaks for itself despite man's best effort in accessorising the whole eating experience with chic interiors and fancy names. And sad to say, we have had better food for the price we paid here, which rounded up to RM 73.

Here is the address if you would like to prove us wrong: 

3, Jalan 13/6, Petaling Jaya, Selangor.

Alas, till the next review

Honest Foodies Review Team

Boat Noodle, Jaya One

We spent our extended Friday lunch hour (everyday feels like extended lunch hour to some of us) trying out Noodle Boat restaurant in Jaya One. As we arrived just before the onslaught of hungry office workers, we managed to snag a long table for our party of 8 and leisurely started ordering while the queue for tables started to grow. 

We ordered 24 bowls of rice noodles and 4 bowls of egg noodles, limited to 4 choices of Pathumthani chicken or beef and Ayutthaya chicken or beef. We have no idea which is which but one has clear soup while the other was murky. Either way, most of us could not really taste the difference because as previously mentioned, we graduated from Food Review University of Nowhere. Except for N, because he is a dedicated Masterchef follower.

We also ordered the Thai Popeye’s Tempura, as we can still say we have eaten our vegetables. Except they taste way better crispy and deep- fried.

Since we have a large group today, we have compiled the highlights of our lunch date. Some shy members of the team declined to give their reviews, most likely due to the fact that they were too hungry to care (note La Bonito et al)

One can choose something other than boat noodles based on the menu but hey, the shop is called Boat Noodle for a reason

Master Yoda, whose resemblance with the real one ends at their height (or lack of), rated the food at 6/10. She felt the noodles tasted ok, but not super ‘I- have- died’ fantastic delicious. However, she liked her coconut shake drink but being the Asian Master Yoda that she is, loved the nice  and more importantly reusable plastic tumbler/ bottle that came from the iced tea and coffee more. If there was a review of bottles or tumblers for drinks, she will probably score this place an 11 out of 10. 

Said Thai iced coffee. And the Thai iced tea was nice too.

N felt the food was a bit too salty, rating it 6/10 while Olaf (we really do not know where we pick up these freelance reviewers) scored the food 7/10 as she has recently acquired a knack for salty food. And as she is the foremost expert in Thai food having just returned from Bangkok the week before, she declared that she preferred the Pathumthani soup base which tasted crispier like Chiang Mai, unlike Ayutthaya, which was too rich like Bangkok. Wait, what?

Aerial view of the boat noodles. We ordered 28 noodles in total.

S liked the noodles fine, scoring them 6/10 but her favourite was the Thai iced tea…which was so rich it is probably more milk than tea. The Thai iced coffee tasted nice and light too, quenching the thirst of those who were made to walk back to the workplace (i.e. all of us)

The price of the food itself was reasonable, hence being scored 6 to 7 across the board. A regular bowl of rice noodle cost RM 1.90 with the iced tea or coffee priced at RM 6.90. And since some frugal reviewer managed to calculate the price of the spinach tempura (it was 80 sen per person, in case anyone is wondering), the meal cost RM 17 per person with an average of 4 bowls of noodles ( 6% GST and 5% service tax included). Wow, that was complicated.

Service was a major drama for us. They bungled our order majorly. No one cried or shouted or anything like that, but it came close. You would have thought that a franchise which is trying to sell the novel and unique experience of ordering a lot of small bowls of noodles instead of one big one would have figured out a way on how to efficiently execute a large number of orders. So,we gave the service 3/10 for messing up our orders.

The atmosphere was good, as the place is air conditioned but the growing long and frustrated queue made it uncomfortable for us to enjoy our food in a leisurely manner. In fact, while some of us got up from the table to pay at the cashier with the rest still sitting and finishing their drinks, a few hangry (hungry + cranky) ladies already sat at our table and shooting daggers our way. So, ambience rating ranged from 4-5 only.

Overall, it was a nice place to have lunch with good company and good food. Our golden advice is to come during off- peak hours when you can get a place to sit easily and do not feel bullied by queuing patrons. Dude, no food is worth killing someone over.

Address : UG 100-P2.037, Block J, The School, No., 72, Jalan Universiti, Jaya One, 46200 Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia

Opens daily from 10 am to 10 pm, last order by 9.30 pm

Until the next review,

Honest Foodies Review Team

myELEPHANT Thai restaurant, Section 17 PJ

We are taking the bold step of reviewing our usual go- to eating place, myElephant, in Section 17. Some might agree that we do not have to review this restaurant because regardless of the outcome we will still eat here, hence making this a redundant entry. But in the true spirit of fake journalism and fake professional review blogging, we will still document this experience. 

By the way, we are trying to cut down on words in our review based on a reader’s verbal comment that it is too wordy and she wanted more pictures. Ok, we’ll sure try to condense our food-ventures into 300 words or less. Or she could just follow us on our non- existent Instagram account. We’d prefer the latter.

For this restaurant’s review, we have enlisted the help of our freelance foodies reviewers, namely Mr.Z, Egg and La Bonito. If they do their jobs well we might make them permanent members of review team. Don’t forget to post your feedback at the end of this post ya! By the way, J opted to sit this review out as he was having writer’s block.

We had mixed feelings regarding the ambience, with scores ranging from 6 to 8. R said it was too crowded, while others who scored the place higher liked it for the air- conditioning with no weird perfume-y smell (please refer to our previous entry). The interior was clean with those industrial designs young people seem to favour nowadays. Like R mentioned, the place was packed with tables crammed into such a small place. Their refusal to increase the number of tables for their lunch service shows their confidence in their patrons’ loyalty because hey, only people who really like their food would be dumb enough to queue outside in the hot blazing sun to wait for an an available table, right? Another downer is the forever lack of parking space. It is located in a crowded residential flat area which is next to a school. The influx of the hipster cafes setting up shop there is certainly not helping with the parking situation.

We were more uniformed with the service rating, with mostly 7s and 8s out of 10. The servers were quick and efficient in taking our orders and delivering our food despite the packed lunch crowds.

Here is the lunch set menu to help with non- Siamese speaking customers to order. Or you could just point to the food that you want. All lunch sets come with pandan basil drink. Which is basil- less nowadays. We know because as we keep pointing out, we come here a lot. That being said, we do not know how do their normal menu looks like because we prefer our food cheap.

The pandan drink, now basil seed- less. Disappointing, especially in this blazing hot afternoon sun.

This is what Mr.Z had, the Gai Phad Grapow. It is not a gay fat anything. It is  brown rice served with roughly chopped chicken pan fried with holy basil. How does a normal sinful basil transforms into a holy one will not be explained in this review. The sunny side up egg adds a nice taste to the food. Mr.Z rated his food as 8/10. Since he could not express how good the food tasted because he was so overwhelmed enjoying it, we will have to try to explain it on his behalf. The brown rice was nicely cooked and gave a nice texture that is refreshing compared to the more common white rice. The chicken was seasoned well and tasted nice, especially combined with the fried egg. A refreshing piece of watermelon completed Mr. Z’s experience. However, he still feels the restaurant was going cheap on him by serving the drink basil- less. 

La Bonito and Egg both had the Markeer Yao, pictured above, which was brown rice served with pan- fried eggplant with minced chicken and mango salad. Being a crowd favourite, we were shocked by their independent ratings of 6/10. Since neither suffers from self inflicted peer pressure, they were adamant in their review as they felt the portion was getting smaller and saltier. Subsequent reviews confirmed their findings. La Bonito added that the drink was watered down. Seriously, you serve us pandan drink that you probably just took from somebody’s home garden without the basil seeds and that also needs to be watered down? Man, times are bad.

R, N and S all had the Gai Yaeng, consisting of brown rice served with 2 pieces of BBQ chicken wings and mango salad. They unanimously rated the food 8/10, with the star being the well- marinated chicken wings which was succulent and juicy. The rice, though not as fragrant as its white counterpart, was well suited to the slightly spicy yet sweet tender chicken. The mango salad was crisp and had balanced flavours of sweet, sour, salty and spicy. The cleansing watermelon topped off their dining experience.

Overall, the affordable price offered by myElephant is an absolute plus point for us, despite their skimping efforts. Who knows, we might change our opinion if the now basil- less pandan drink turns into tap water or 2 chicken wings are reduced to 1. 

Here is the restaurant’s address : Block C-G4, Happy Mansion, Jalan 17/13, Section 17, 46400 Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia. (Really, Happy Mansion? Being optimistic, were we?)

Opening Hours : Monday to Sunday; Lunch (12:00pm - 2:00pm) and Dinner (6:00pm - 10:00pm)

PS: This entry went just above 900 words. Deal with it- Honest Foodies Review Team

Khyber Pass and Rojak Subang in PJ New Town

Hey, hey... today you are in for a treat as we have a double review for you! Call it a New Year special. Or buy one free one. Or gluttony. 

 First, R brought us to PJ New Town to try and find Nasi Vanggey PJ branch. But apparently it is not there anymore. Oh, the sadness of it all.

 Anyway, as parking was so super precious around there we parked at the first available parking spot we could find. And that parking place just happened to be near KFC. But do you think we would waste your time on a review of KFC food in here? Hello, we are uber sophisticated okay (N: but S just had McDonald's prosperity burger 2 days ago! S: shut up, N.).

 Anyway, we walked along the street and decided to switch from the usual Malaysian or Western fare to some exotic looking restaurant. How exotic? Pakistani exotic. This place is called Khyber Pass. For all you geography nuts there, Khyber pass is the mountainous range connecting Afghanistan and Pakistan. See... we do remember somebody's request for learning points in this totally non- educational blog. Honestly, would you google 'food review blogs' if you wanted to find learning points? Some people make very weird comments in this blog.

This is the interior of the restaurant. Very early 90's vibe. But on the plus side, there were barely any customers there (is that a good thing by the way?) and with the air- conditioning on full blast, R gave the ambience an 7/10. N went with 5/10 because he has more refined taste in interior design while S gave it a 6/10 because there was some strong perfume-y smell when she first entered that she had an acute bronchospasm attack. Luckily she brought her inhaler along. Here is another learning point: always bring your rescue inhaler everywhere you go in case you enter a strongly perfumed establishment. My, my... aren't we on an educational roll here.

All of us ordered the executive lunch sets because it is cheap at almost RM 10. N chose naan bread while S & R had briyani rice as the carbs. Sampler sizes of mutton curry, chicken curry, potato curry and vegetable curry were served alongside the carbs. Okay, so they probably were not all curries but our limited food knowledge on Pakistani/ Indian food is decidedly poor. They were exceptionally well- seasoned with strong spices which kind of burn your stomach, but in a nice way. Not like the diarrhoea stomach- burning type.

This is how the briyani looked like. We were each given a glass of carbonated drink as part of the lunch set and all of us chose Coke. The general consensus for the food is 8/10. Honestly, our main writer forgot the individual scores rated by the team so she decided to to go with the average. Service was good and efficient, scoring 7/10. 

Having claimed to be feeling full due to the spiciness of the dish, we left the restaurant in good spirits, having just forked out RM 10 per person. Then we saw it.....

What better way to cool the inferno raging in our stomachs than chendol? The shop was conveniently located opposite of Khyber Pass, along the same block as KFC. Clever marketing ploy right to place a cooling chendol shop opposite a spice- laden Pakistani restaurant? The shop is called Rojak Subang. We are pretty sure it is a branch of a shop originally started in Subang (you think?). S had the chendol jagung which cost RM 3 while N & R both had the plain chendol which cost RM 2 each. N gave it a 5/10 as he was disappointed that they did not use gula melaka. As S & R both originate from non- chendol states ( you know who you are, Borneans), any chendol they eat automatically taste good so they gave theirs 7/10. Plus, they did manage to extinguish the heat in our tummies. So, job well done chendols. 

The rojak there looked appetising though... Next time team, next time.

Khyber Pass address: No 36, Jalan 52/ 18 New Town, Bandar Baru Petaling Jaya, 46200 Petaling Jaya, Selangor 

Rojak Subang address: No 47, Jalan 52/18, 46200 Petaling Jaya, Selangor

Until the next review,

Honest Foodies Review Team

Tony Roma’s Lunch Sets, Midvalley: thrifty people edition.

Today N & S decided to jazz things up a bit. They took the bus from centre of excellence workplace to Midvalley Megamall. The bus ride cost RM 2 for a return journey. Honestly, they were ditched by R and J was too interested with his work to join N & S. 

We went to Tony Roma’s because we know we will get our money’s worth for their lunch set menu. From RM 17.91, you can get appetising soup, tasty main dish with bottomless drinks. Surprisingly, they have quite a generous variety of lunch sets which cost RM 17.91. You know those places right? The ones that advertise in their big bad banner proclaiming to have very cheap lunch set menu and once you have sat down and looked at the menu properly you realise there is only ONLY measly meal which was relatively cheap at RM 18… the rest were RM 30 and above. Clever marketing ploy? Depends on if you want return customers or not.

Once we were seated and ordered our lunch sets, we were served with a small loaf of baguette (or rolls… hey, nobody reading this is expecting us to be technical right?) with herb butter. The warm bread was soft and really nice and tasted better with a thick spread of herb butter. Ok, who are we kidding… we did not lather the bread with a thick spread of butter. We basically cut the butter into huge chunks and ate it with the bread.

S chose the grilled quarter chicken meal which came with a whopping dollop of mashed potatoes topped with grated cheddar cheese and a side of mutant broccoli. Seriously, they were huge. Like Godzilla huge. She also chose the clear chicken soup as part of the lunch set and had Lipton’s Iced Lemon Tea. Bottomless just to be clear okay. She rated the lunch set at 9/10 as she felt it was the worth the money. The clear chicken soup tasted okay, like it was not euggghhhh or something. Well seasoned (or our Mums would probably say too salty). The quarter chicken was filling ( she received the breast and wing part) with normal- tasting gravy which was elevated when dipped with the restaurant’s signature sauces. She was promised fire grilled vegetables from the menu but got the broccoli instead. The brocolli were lightly sautéed in butter. She had those first (you know, saving the best for last?) and was quite full by the time she finished the last of them. She could not force herself to finish the mashed potatoes even though it was delicious. The texture of the mashed potatoes was the best… it was not too smooth and silky like the ones you usually get. You can still taste some of the skin and some small potato pieces. And the iced lemon tea topped off the whole dining experience. You know what they say about drinks…the best drinks are bottomless ones. 

The generous grilled quarter chicken with mutant broccolis and mashed potatoes topped with grated cheedar cheese

N chose the Fire Grilled Harvest Valley Chicken which was a generous piece of chicken breast with rice and fire- roasted broccoli (seriously, you guys ran out of vegetables other than broccoli at 1 pm?) topped with a citrus apple relish. He also had the clear chicken soup as a starter and had Light Pepsi, which he topped up like 3 times (nobody was counting after the 3rd one by the way). Just because it is light does not make it okay to guzzle like it is plain water, buddy. S felt like her friend has the bladder capacity of an elephant. Anyway, sorry to digress. He rated this particular meal at 6/10 because the he felt the rice was too dry. We are Asians hence that automatically make us the leading expert on rice. Deal with it, non- Asian restaurant chain. The citrus apple relish was quite refreshing and tangy like a salsa. He probably felt the same way as S on the mutant broccoli so we do not have to repeat ourselves here.

The Fire Grilled Harvest Valley Chicken with roasted broccoli and rice topped with citrus apple relish

The clear chicken soup. Okay, so this looks unappetising because we forgot to take the picture when the bowl was still full

Our overall experience? A 8/10. Or 9/10, it’s close. The service was quick, efficient and courteous. Once they cleared our table, they opened the single packs of wet tissue for us. And it was pre- warmed… oh heavenly. We also received a Mentos chewable candy each. You feel loved, right? The ambience was 7- 8/10. It was clean, not musty smelling and dimly lit (which we think was what they were going for instead of trying to be cheap on electricity bill). Our total bill came up to RM 39.40. RM 20 per person for a place like this is worth it, don’t you think?

So, if you can find another place like this for us to review do leave a comment below.

Regards,

Honest Foodes Review Team (well, N & S for today)