Chalet, Equatorial, The Chef's Table

There's something about the Equatorial KL. It is probably the last of the golden oldies, so to speak, with perhaps the Federal being the other one, but Equatorial is the "grander" one so to speak. Say Equatorial, and Blue Moon, L'Etoile, Golden Phoenix, and of course, the Chalet spring to mind. Who doesn't remember slow dancing to the golden oldies music of Blue Moon? I am sure the youth of today, that means 99% of the food blogging community, wouldn't remember. Thamby would.

The Makan Fairy Godmother, our dear Hooi Khaw, invited me a few weekends back to dine at the Chef's Table, in the Chalet. I've always had fond memories of the Chalet, our family used to go there for special occasions, and always enjoyed the song and dance that is thrown in as part of the entertainment. But years have gone by, with the advent of all the various hotel discount cards, and the newer spankier hotels, the Chalet was shelved into the recesses of our minds. So I was delighted at the opportunity to revisit this old haunt. Rumour has it that the hotel will undergo a massive refurbishment soon, so the Chalet as we know it, may have it s days numbered. All the more reason to quickly visit.


Photobucket
Even the cutlery screams "CLASSIC", those heavy types that contain so much metal, if you melt one, you can make a proton.

Photobucket
Personalized butter with chef's table inscribed.

Photobucket
They also let us sample the normal herbed butter that the chalet serves. Which was yummy.

Photobucket
Smoked Beef With Rock Melon.... Chef Hafizzul has certainly done justice to the beef and managed to make it almost resemble Proscuitto With rock melon. Except the beef did not have the streaks of fat their pig cousins have. Oh, obviously, Chalet is pork free.

Photobucket
Creamy Saffron soup, Spanish Black Mussels with Chorizo, leek and potatoes, and crunchy garlic croutonsA lovely smooth soup, rich, bursting with flavour. The spanish mussels were small but juicy and sweet, not like some gigantic ones that taste like a goodyear tyre. Paired with the buns and that glorious butter, I would have actually been satisfied to end the meal here.

Photobucket
Slow-braised Angus Beef Cheek and Pacific Oysters cepes, herbs and Cabernet Sauvignon sauce. The plump oysters enhanced with the lovely jus from the beef cheek, a lovely marriage of surf and turf, which wa! s the ch ef's objective.

Photobucket
A lovely passionfruit sorbet to clean the palate.

Photobucket
Few places still serve dinner with these silver lids, with the waiters lifting them in unison and going bon appetit.

Photobucket

Grilled Barramundi & Calamari with Cannellini Bean Puree, Clams & Parsley Veloute. Actually all of us guests ordered the OTHER mains, which was Pan Roasted Duck and Foie Gras, so Carol (our hostess and Director of Marketing Communications) had to order the fish for us to have a look.


Photobucket
The foie gras (look at the generous portion! They assured us that that IS the normal sized portion at the Chalet) is to die for. Melt in the mouth, seared to perfection, it really is the epitome of decadence. The duck was also very good, complemented by various caramelized fruit, like cherries and apple. This was not your ordina! ry quack ing duck from the nearby Chinese roast duck farm, but flown all the way from France and is of the Muscovy family. I love the gamey but yet tender flavour of the duck. Ah, just thinking about it sends shivers down my spine.

Photobucket
Our glamourous hostess, Carol Chin, was very hospitable, as was the handsome Chef Hafizzul Hashim.

Now one of the highlights of dining in Chalet is the making of the Sabayon for dessert. Ever since time immemorial, the waitering crew will perform a little dance, usually accompanied by the 4 piece band that serenades the diners.

Photobucket
That gorgeous copper bowl must have many stories to tell....after all, the place has been around for 37 years. Ooh, I must have been in standard 3.

Photobucket
Molten Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Ice cream & Strawberry Compote. To be honest, after all the previous dishes, this was rather pedestrian. It was good, but anticlimactic, if you know what I mean. Actually, the Sabayon with Ice cream and fruits which was made specially for us, was the dessert highlight.

Photobucket
The Chalet does serve a fine selection of beef steaks.

Photobucket

Photobucket
Gotta love the quaint receptacles in which the sabayon is served. Despite the sabayon having passed through so many hands, it was a case of too many cooks did not spoil the broth, but somehow, must have channelled at that positive energy. I loved the taste of it, though arguably, the ingredients are simple enough. Yolks, various spirits, (boozey ones).

Photobucket
Awww, and like establishments of yore, chivalry is not dead, and each lady diner gets a single rose. The accompanying box are not diamonds, but certainly close enough, and definitely more tasty. Chocolates.

Photobucket


Photobucket
Iced Pralines. Ah, I remember the Grill at Parkroyal used to serve this...a reminder of my courting days.

The Chalet is also participating in this year's MIGF. Do checkout the website here for menu details.

Check out fellow diner Pure Glutton's post here.

For reservations, call 03-21617777

Thanks so much, Carol for hosting us, Chef Hafizzul for the lovely dinner, and to our dear Hooi Khaw for the invitation.

Note: Apologies, my flash was on the blink, and the dark lighting didn't help,

Suitable for Framing (First in a Series)

David_hagerman_hanoi_market_vendor

Noodle vendor, Hanoi, August 2011

David_hagerman_hanoi_morning_glory

Scene from a wet market, Hanoi, August 2011

It's that time of year again. At least that's what the Christmas carols ringing through the shopping mall told us yesterday.

For the next ten or so weeks Dave will select some of his favorite images from Asia, Turkey and America -- two or three that can stand alone or would work well together -- to post under this new series we're calling Suitable for Framing. Posts will go up every Tuesday.

The idea is: if you're in the market for a gift, seasonal or otherwise, we hope you'll consider a David Hagerman original. To purchase any of the images in the series go here. If you're not buying, just enjoy the show.

(It goes without saying, but any photographs that you see on this site, or on David's not-always food-focused photography blog, on his professional website, or in any of his Photoshelter galleries are also available for purchase. Got a special request? Looking for a specific type of photograph? Questions? Contact Dave directly: drhagerman@gmail.com).

For those new to EatingAsia, some background on the photog! rapher:< /p>

David Hagerman is an editorial and commercial photographer specializing in food, travel, portraiture and street photography. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Saveur, Food & Wine, Travel+Leisure Southeast Asia, Wall Street Journal and other publications.When not on assignment or otherwise working Dave offers private photography workshops in Penang and elsewhere.


Pan Mee Opposite Shaw Parade, Off Jalan Pudu

Our previous visit to Keong Kee Herbal Soup was great and we enjoyed the home-style dishes. But after that we had this constant nagging feeling that we should go back for the other more exotic herbal soups we missed.
So this time I was adamant that we werent leaving without trying at least one of them. Besides, I also had a go at the Pan Mee which came highly recommended by some of you. To cut to the chase, the Pan Mee is nice and this is actually coming from me, someone who does not even like Pan Mee!

pan-mee

Personally, the main reason I do not fancy Pan Mee is because of its rubbery texture that makes me feel like I am chewing on pieces of flavorless flour. So luckily for me the Pan Mee noodle here does not taste like that.
Even though the noodles is machine-rolled, it is slightly thinner than usual hence having a better elasticity and taste that suits my palate better. And of course you can choose to have your Pan Mee in a more traditional manner which is the torn/pinched style. Just let the aunty know!

pork-mushroom-pan-mee

As soon as the noodle arrived I was pleased to see the generous amount of ingredients given, considering most hawkers are getting stingy nowadays. The main stuff are minced meat, chopped mushrooms and fried anchovies which you could see are fresh with a crunch just by their looks.
The clear soup tastes mostly MSG-free and authentic like it was really boiled with pork bones. B! ut what really makes this Pan Mee delicious is the appetizing mushroom fragrance that you wont get from any Pan Mee. And that really makes the noodle stand out from the rest. For only RM4.30, this is a steal in KL.


cooking-pan-mee

Pan Mee is usually cooked to order so there is no exception here.

chilli-sauce

To spice things up, savor the noodles with their self-made chilli sauce. It will make a whole world of difference.

squirrel-soup

Now back to Keong Kee, the soup I had was the Squirrel Herbal Soup, called Dai Mei Shu in Cantonese and literally translated to Big Tail Rat. If you are wondering, the soup tastes quite similar to the herbal chicken, just that the Chinese herbs used are less and the bitterness is clearly stronger.
This is also my first time eating squirrel and I find the meat texture to be quite gritty with a mild gamey taste. Since it is basically a small animal you can expect to find lots of bones too. Even though I wont use the word delicious to describe this, it didnt taste too bad and I finished everything nonetheless.

ginger-chicke!  n

Ginger Chicken was another new dish we tried and it was OK, albeit oily. We still adore the wild boar curry and Mui Choy Kao Yuk the most.

girl-and-cat

While waiting for our food to arrive I spotted a little girl seemingly talking to a stray cat.. it was quite a cute scene.

shaw-parade

pan-mee-stall

Keong Kee Herbal Soup and the recommended Pan Mee stall are just opposite Shaw Parade as shown above. It is almost impossible to miss them with such a huge landmark nearby.

Minced Meat and Mushroom Pan Mee (Opposite Shaw Parade)
Jalan Changkat Thambi Dollah,
Off Jalan Pudu, 55100 Kuala Lumpur
GPS Coordinates: N3 08.425 E101 42.745

Blog Widget by LinkWithin

Wordless Tuesday

I wish there was more i can say about Makan Kitchen @ Doubletree hilton, Intermark
I was never a fan of buffets, and only visit here by chance for a friend's birthday
To be fair, we were given a fair selection of 3 main cultures of Malaysia,
by that i meant Malay, Indian, and Chinese food.
But the taste just didnt hit well with my tastebud
overall a dissapointment.

The Tea Maker Twinings of London 10th Generation Stephen Twining South East Asia Tour 2011


Get Your Jelly On! Day 3 - Steam Your Head Off (Marble Cake)

IMG_5032

Who moved my jelly?


Tis' Monday. That bluest day in the week and I reckon one should "Steam Your Head Off" from all the stress that builds up in this one day. My Monday feels extra worst today since I now feel like I'm juggling 3 jobs - work, blogging and now jellifying my life away. It's so bad that I reckon I was having jelly nightmares last night. Don't worry, I won't go into the wobbly details.


IMG_5024


Moving slightly away from my jelly comfort zone, I decided to put the Royal Selangor Nick Munro pewter mould through the "steam" test.


Was it steam-worthy? Looks like it has proven its worth in pewter as it withstood the rapid boiling heat of 100 degrees Celsius or less for 25 minutes. Glad to see its just not a pretty mould but a darn useful one too, which can multi-task.


IMG_5039


Using the same theory like baking cakes, I decided to butter the moulds and dust them with flour. It worked like a dream as the cakes popped up easily. I did feel the recipe still needs some tweaking though. The batter consistency was a little too hard and less watery than preferred. While the cake tasted great eaten steaming hot - the V! alrhona dark chocolate is excellent with the vanilla butter cake, I would have preferred a moister crumb that can keep better for the next day.


Reminder: Support the cause by buying a Royal Selangor Nick Munro pewter mould as all proceeds go to breast cancer welfare association. Also, do remember to submit your suggestions to booliciouskl@gmail.com or leave a comment for the mould to win the Olympus camera VG 110. For more pictures, see the Flickr set for all the whole Royal Selangor Jellyriffic challenge. To view, all the jellies, see this link to the Royal Selangor website.


Marble Butter Cake (For 2 moulds)


150g butter
100g caster sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
150g plain flour, sieved
1 1/4 teaspoons double action baking powder, sieved
5 tablespoons melted dark chocolate (preferably Valrhona)


Grease the moulds with butter. Dust with flour. In an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla extract; beat until smooth and light. Fold in the sieved ingredients together. Remove 5 tablespoons of batter and combine with the chocolate in a seperate bowl. Pour a little batter into the top of the mould. Drop a little chocolate batter and swirl with a toothpick. Repeat with the batter and the chocolate batter. Leave about 1cm gap from the top to allow the cake to rise. Cover the top with foil to prevent any water from dripping inside. Place moulds in a mug. Steam over medium low heat for 25 minutes, or until the cake springs back when touched in the middle. Remove from the steamer. Cool for 10 minutes. Loosen the cake f! rom the mould with a knife. Place cake on a plate and serve immediately. Best eaten steaming hot.


Note: There will be a little excess batter so place it in a muffin cup to steam.


Green Butter


In Europe last year, my hub embarrassed me by requesting for butter everytime we had bread. The waiters in Rome would either give him that look or mutter something we didn't understand. For this Chinaman, dinner rolls and bread are to be eaten with butter. When we finally got to London, he was thrilled to be served butter with bread without having to request for it and I was too, because good bread with butter is one of the most enjoyable things to eat, especially when you are watching your diet.

Sweet basil grow so fast in our tropical sun that I often give them away to restaurants. This most distinctly Italian herb needs to be trimmed frequently or it goes to seed and die. I was getting a loaf of baguette last Sunday when the light bulb in my cerebrum (I'm sitting down with Wey for his upcoming exams) lit up: pesto with butter instead of olive oil and the Royal Selangor Pewter (RSP) jelly moulds would be perfect for that. And that's how today's green butter recipe came about. For another yummy pesto recipe, check here for green eggs.

And so how did we like green butter? Spread on freshly toasted baguette and eaten with a simple beef stew tonight, we think green butter is divine!


Green Butter
3 Tbsp of home-made pesto (recipe here)
100 gm softened b! ut firm salted butter (use the best butter)

1. Whisk the butter with an electric hand mixer until light and fluffy.

2. Drop 3 tablespoons of pesto and fold to mix well.

3. Scoop into the RSP jelly moulds, packing the pesto in firmly. Cover with wrap and chill until firm.

Sky Garden (Kuta)

Sky Garden is probably one of the best clubs in Bali at the moment (September 2011). I'm sure tons of people hate it because it is very commercial and mainstream, but the fact is, it is always full and happening. Actually, for many tourists, Bali nightlife equals spending the whole night in Sky Garden.

The official name of Sky Garden is "61 Legian", a huge entertainment complex with 7 different areas a! nd Sky G arden is just one of them (the rooftop on top of the building). The other ones are:
ESC Urban Food Station: A food court opened until 5am
Blarney Stone: An Irish Pub with sports, live music, premium beer and pub food
Club Cyclone: The room with House Music
Brandy's Club: The room with RnB music
Heineken Beer Garden: Self-explanatory
VIP Gold Pass Lounge: For the wannabe VIP

Two new areas should open soon:
The VIP Sky High Club: For the VVIP
George's Sports: Open 24/7 with sports, beer and food
The design of the whole ensemble is remarkable, exactly how I like a club to be: It is easy to get lost, or meet people as you walk from one room to the next, entering each time in a different atmosphere. The crowd is dominated by Australians in their 20s, followed by Indonesians (among which some working girls). It gets crazy on most nights, and you should not be surprised to see a few people being escorted out because they are too drunk to stand on their feet.

Another good thing about Sky Garden is that the entrance is free, so if you are not sure whether you will like it or not, you can always check inside first. If you order drinks though, it will be more expensive than the average for Kuta (Rp50k for a beer if I remember correctly).

You should check their facebook here for special events, including sexy dancers, bartender shows, and guest DJs.
61 Legian "Sky Garden"
Jalan Legian No. 61
Phone number: 0361 755423
Website: http://61legian.com/

The Love Shack (Kuta, Bali)

The Love Shack is a small pub on Jalan Legian, Kuta, not crowded when I visited, but if you are on a tight budget, you may be interested in their cheap prices.
The Love Shack
Jalan Raya Legian 186
Kuta, Bali, Indonesia

Phone number: +62 361 9237390
Email: baliloveshack@yahoo.com
Facebook: The Love Shack

W Sports Bar (Kuta, Bali)

W is a a popular sports bar and restaurant, interesting because it is opened 24 hours, 7/7. I stopped there at 4am on a Friday and it was still decently crowded and lively, perfect for a snack before heading home. The crowd is older than the average for Kuta, with many guys in their 40s/50s, and there was a few girls too (but maybe because it was late).

They have 3 wide screen and 4 TVs on two levels, plus a pool table.
W Sports Bar and Restaurant
Jl. Legian No. 99 Kuta - Bali 80361 Indonesia
Phone number: +62 361 751 805
Email: info@wsportsbar.com
Website: http://www.wsportsbar.com

Apples and Vines - Hush Heath Vineyard

Pouring Balfour Brut Rose

They chose to make a pink sparkling wine simply "because it makes me smile". With a marketing head on they - that's Richard Balfour-Lynn and his wife - were after a distinct point of difference too. From the heart of England's great fruit growing region of Kent, the Balfour family with winemaker Owen Elias and the guidance of Stephen Skelton MW, have "mediocre champagne" firmly in their sight.

They have only produced five vintages of the flagship Balfour Brut Ros, one of which, the 2007 all went to British Airways. Production will be capped at 100,000 bottles from their 400 acre estate; the vines nestling between verdant apple orchards and wild woodland.

As Richard explained they set out to produce the Balfour Brut Ros sparkling with a "really pale apricot colour" "we like the idea of a very pale, very dry, wine. I like the idea of accommodating different vintages, the variations... "and thus not producing a brand year after year. A difficult job, the latter, I imagine given the vagaries of the English weather. And this point was highlighted with a discussion of the differing years - 2011, for example, was classed as a "classic English weather" (although the early October heat-wave was yet to come) but the flowering period was "terrible".

A stroll through the Chardonnay and Pinot Noir vines demonstrated this. Many bunches had uneven ripening of grapes - like in the photo - some still small, hard and green, others ready to burst with juice all on the same bunch. Not easy to accommodate during picking if those bunches with 'any green' are rejected.

Uneven ripening on the Pinot Noir grapes, Hush Heath Vineyard

The impression one leaves with is of dedication and a very dedicated focus on the whole production. Millions have been invested in one of the cleanest, most sparkling winery I've encountered. As Richard continued every aspect has been analysed and debated. From the drainage, the plant coverage, the selection of vines... "you cannot make great wine without great grapes".

Interestingly Richard stated that he does not want to be part of the English wine scene but aims to compete with the top champagne houses. "But we are not champagne. It is from Kent with its own distinct flavour and taste. A longer growing season gives better aromatics and higher acidity. The acidity is the key and spectacularly English".

The Hush Heath Estate is not open to the public. Their Balfour Brut Ros [Adegga / Snooth] has limited off-trade distribution (a little goes to Waitrose, Selfridges, Harvey Nicolls etc) with 90% of production going to the on-trade (Hotel du Vin, Bistro du Vins and Pub du Vin outlets, St. Pancras and Paddington Champagne Bars and so on).

The estate also produces a refreshing apple juice - one that also demonstrates vintage variations - and, newly launched, a still Chardonnay and a still Ros. The Balfour Brut Ros is "not a sitting down for dinner drink" but with its high acidty does mean it goes very well with food "I like it with kidneys", finished Owen...