Best char siew @ Toast & Roast, SS2, Petaling Jaya

Heavenly, melt-in-your-mouth, delicious...

These are words commonly used to describe the char siew (BBQ pork) from Toast & Roast in SS2, PJ. We are completely smitten with the char siew here, hence whenever the craving for char siew hits, only the best at Toast & Roast will do.

I always complain to Hubby that SS2 is too far a drive, but once we get here, and sink our teeths into the char siew, I wonder why we didn't come sooner. Since trying the char siew here in January 2011, we are happy to report that it has remained a firm favorite with our family.

Porky delights

Check out the beautiful layers of lean meat and melting fat!

Nice caramelised exterior..

The Premium Char Siew is half fat-half lean and ! toasted to perfection using charcoal, hence it is slightly charred on the exterior with a gorgeous caramelised finish. We ordered a medium portion (RM16) to share and it was devoured in no time. In my opinion, the char siew here is thick and chunky and has the perfect fat-meat ratio - that's why biting into each piece of char siew is like having a piece of heaven. I love eating mine, dipped slightly in the thick, sweet sauce provided.

"We must resist from ordering another," we tell ourselves, but very often, we find ourselves losing our willpower to the sight of the beauties hanging at the front of the restaurant. When it is this good, one plate is never enough! So we ended up ordering another small portion of char siew (RM8)...

For us the perfect accompaniment to the char siew here is a bowl of Hakka Noodles (RM6). The springy noodles are topped with minced pork and crunchy fish skin for some added texture. We also like the crispy deep fried wantans (RM3).

Hakka Noodles Original

Crispy deep fried wantans (RM3)

Refreshing roselle sour plum (RM2.70)

Menu

Chop chop chop!

Verdict:The char siew here is definitely the best in my books.

You can read about my previous experience at Toast & Roast here.

Join Toast & Roast'sFacebook page here.

Opening times: 9am to 4.30pm. Closed on Tuesdays.

Location: Toast & Roast, No. 20, Jalan SS2/72, Petaling Jaya, 47300 Selangor.

Tel: 016-682 2249 (Angie)

GPS Coordinates: 3.127629, 101.627237

Healthy Breakfast Foods for Kids

Preparing healthy breakfast foods for your kids is easy. Letting them finish the food that you have prepared is another story. However, there are ways on how you can have your children eat the healthy foods that you made while enjoying them. It all takes a little creativity and a few servings of patience too.

Here are some of our recommended foods:

Pancakes for Picky Eaters

Let your kids measure 4oz wholemeal flour, pint milk and 2 eggs for the batter, and fill with a choice of fillings including low fat cheese, lean ham and corn, roasted peppers and chicken, tuna mayonnaise, grilled mushrooms. You can also do sweets such as honey, pureed fruit, fresh berries, thinly sliced apple or mashed banana with cinnamon. Getting your kids involved in measuring and eve cooking their meal makes them interested and obliges them to finish their food.

Breakfast Smiley Face

This is simple, yet healthy and quick to prepare. In a plate, arrange 2 grilled button mushrooms for the eyes, 1 grilled cherry tomato for the nose and a line of scrambled eggs or baked beans for the mouth. Make sure that the face is smiling.

Funky Chunky Fruit Kebabs

Healthy breakfast foods at their best using grapes, berries, little pieces of melon, pineapple chunks and other bite sized pieces on sticks and let your child dip them into yogurt or fromage frais.

photo credit: flickr.com/eye of einstein

Cheesy Monsters

Cut or mould this dough into monster shapes and bake at 425F for 8 minutes. Shred 2 oz low fat cheese, add pinch mustard powder, 2 oz reduced fat butter, 1 egg yolk, 3oz wholemeal flour and 1 tsp baking powder. Serve these healthy breakfast foods with a little s! crambled egg.

Berry Mess

Mix 4 oz low fat fromage frais, 1 oz crushed low fat cookies, 4 ox mixed berries and 1 tsp honey or maple syrup and serve in a little glass or bowl.

Smooth Dude Smoothie

Blend together cup non-fat Greek style yogurt with a little ice, half banana and/or 4oz strawberries, cup skimmed milk for a refreshing healthy breakfast smoothie.

Pirates Breakfast

When preparing eggs over easy, cut your egg into a skull shaped figure and arrange two rashers of grilled bacon as crossbones underneath. Children love eating food in the shapes of themes they love.

Youre So Nuts Muesli

Make a bulk quantity of healthy breakfast foods and keep in an airtight container. A good combination for children is 1lb porridge oats, 1 lb dried fruit and mixed nuts, lb whole-wheat cereal flakes and a cup of mixed seeds. For a change from milk serve with grated apple and apple juice, or natural yogurt, or a little honey, or a little bit of everything. Warmed milk is also good on a cold day.

Bran Muffins

Store bought muffins are usually loaded with calories so make your healthy breakfast foods for your children using 8oz wholemeal flour, 1 tsp baking powder, pinch salt, 2 egg whites, 2 oz sweetener powder, 2 oz bran cereal, cup vegetable oil. Soften the bran cereal in the milk then mix everything and divide into 12 muffin cases. Add some blueberries and bake at 400F for 20 minutes.

Banana Bread

Get fruit into your children at breakfast time with this healthy breakfast foods recipe. Mash three ripe bananas and mix together with 1/3 cup reduced fat melted butter, cup sweetener powder, 1 beaten egg, 1 tsp vanilla extract, pinch salt and 1 cups wholemeal flour and 1 tsp baking powder. Bake in a greased loaf tin for 1 hour. This is our healthier banana bread version, but I still like the original version though.

>>Download the Free! eCookbo ok here<<

Related posts:

12 Foods for a Healthy Heart

32 Reasons Why You Need to Eat Breakfast

7 Healthy Recipes for Diabetics

Glycemic Index Diet: A Healthy Way to Lose Weight

Longsilog: Something Heavy for Breakfast

Mooncake Festival at Lai Po Heen Mandarin Oriental 2012

Celebrated on the 15th of the Chinese August Month calendar, the Chinese community usually celebrating the mooncake festival. Mooncake is a round in shape normally and sweet in taste comprising a thin layer of baked or chilled pastry filled with lotus or red bean paste, melon seeds and salted egg yolks.

One of my favorite place to get my fix of mooncake is Lai Po Heen of Mandarin Oriental Hotel Kuala Lumpur.

A golden dining hall gives a luxurious Chinese Imperial feel of ancient palace look.

The restaurant is perfect for business discussions and dining at the same time enjoying the mooncake celebrations with the customers. The customer will surely impressed with the ambiance and the taste of the food crafted by their house Chinese Master Chef Ricky Thein which famous for his avant garde Chinese Fusion dishes.

Mooncakes are good to be eaten before or after meals.

Traditional baked mooncakes

Chilled pastry mooncakes

Other variety of chilled pastry mooncakes

The rich in taste and nice colors create a harmony in a box. Chinese cuisines emphasizea lot on the look, taste, smell and quality which all this criteria are matched in every mooncake crafted. Each are hand crafted and not machine made.

Chicken ham with almond mooncake

Just look at that! Every bite are having loads of fillings and thin pastry skins which giving the person who eat it smile with happiness.

Lotus paste with double yolk

Mooncakes made from chocolates

Green : Pandan Flavour Mooncake
Yellow : Durian Mooncake
Purple : Blueberries and grated coconut Mooncake

Aside from the great mooncakes, a range of good food to accompany them also vital in bringing out the rich taste.

Double-boiled abalone soup with seasonal dried deluxe seafood and baby cabbage

Big abalone and scallop use to boil the soup which each drop are very rich. Priced at RM188 each bowl surely worth every cents of it.

Jasmine tealeaf smoked chicken RM38

Smoked chicken under tea leave then paired with Ginger and spring onion dip. The dip paste smelt inviting and paired beautifully with the smoky-wood flavour and smooth texture of the chicken thigh.

Special seafood fried rice RM36

Frankly speaking, this is the BEST BOWL of fried rice I ever tasted. Itwas fluffy and thorou! ghly tos sed in the wok, allowing the wok hei and seasoning to permeate the grains. Every grain of the rice are coated with eggs and the seafoods are succulent too.

The crispy egg noodles with assorted seafood and vegetables (RM48) had more seafood than noodles. Just look at the big crab claw, succulent prawn and the juicy scallops. The gravy alone are so tasty and sweet.

The night do not ends here. When you are sitting on a table full of foodies, you will expect to taste a full range of the dessert menu.

The Classic Banana Split Recreated the Chinese Way

Chilled Mango Puree

Chilled Almond Bean Curd

Coconut Pudding and Pea-shaped Green Tea Dumpling

Hot Gingko Nut and Snow Fungus

Black Sesame Panna Cotta

Lemongrass Jelly

Double Boiled Sweetened Ginger Tea with Black Sesame Glutinous Rice Dumpling

Chinese Inpired Chocolate CoconutDome

Double Boiled Five Treasures

Lai Po Heen Chinese Restaurant
Mandarin Oriental Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 03- 2179 8885
Email:mokul-fb@mohg.com
Facebook:MandarinOrientalKualaLumpur

My Opinion On Foods

Seek out new food

Food is the most wonderful creation. It gives you energy, fills you up, and above all else, makes you feel happy. A full stomach is a happy stomach, they say. Hence why more of us should seek out new foods, tastes and dishes.

Experience new flavours

Even the most experienced food lovers havent tasted every flavour in the world. The get distracted from their mission by foxy bingo games, and daily commitments. There will always be a new flavour from an obscure corner of the world to try, that will likely blow your taste buds away. Because every country, every culture, and every home has their own recipes and special ingredients.

Find out what you like

Many people have the bad habit of saying they wont like something, purely because they dont like the look of it, or theyve eaten something similar before and disliked it. You shouldnt let opportunities to eat great food go that easily. Trying new foods all the time, gives you a better idea of what you do and do not like.

Get out of your comfort zone

We all end up in food slumps, continuously eating the same foods over and over again. Its easier and at least you know youll enjoy your meal. Every so often you need to reach out of your comfort zone though, and seek out new tastes. Otherwise your taste buds get bored.

Try everything once

It doesnt matter how many similar foods youve tried, just because it looks like that really hot chicken dish you hated one time, doesnt mean it tastes anything of the sort. Give it a go at least once. It only takes a small bite. And if you hate it, you can note it down as a no. If you do like it however, you have a new recipe to love.

Japanese Stewed Pork Leg With Soybeans

Pork leg with soy beans stew--so so yummy.

My MIL's Shanghainese pork leg and soy beans stew is a dish we look forward to find on her dining table when we eat dinner at her house on Saturdays but after tonight, MIL's pork leg stew looks like it might loose its crown to the stew cooked by my son Wey. To add insult to injury, it was the first time Wey had ever cooked the dish, and first time he ever handled a pork leg, which disgusted him a bit.

This is a great dish for one-pot dinners when you are too lazy to cook a banquet. Just add a soup and stir-fried veggies and nobody should complain. I don't cook pork leg often but once in a six-month while I do, especially when I see my face getting drawn and thin. Pork leg has lots of collagen and gelatine so go easy on that expensive jar of SK II and eat pork leg instead. Wishful but you never know.

This recipe is adapted from an old Japanese cookbook and all the ingredients are the same as my MIL's except sake is used in place of Shaoxin wine and Wey added a bunch of scallions and a tablespoon of dark soy sauce. The stew was so good that I suggested that they take most of it to my in laws and have dinner there, which of course Hub gladly did so.If the skin and ligament are not stewed soft enough, the gravy or sauce will not have that slight stickiness which is desirable (the stickiness) and makes the dish tastier. If the skin and ligament are cooked too soft, there won't be a bite although my son Wey prefers them this way. The best texture is when there's still a slight bite in the skin and the ligaments come off without you having turn your face to one side andto use your finger! s to pul l them off. What I do is cook the pork to a stage where the skin is still a little bit springy, turn of the heat and let the sauce and flavor seeps into the meat and then after an hour or so, timed about half hour before dinner is served, re-heat the stew.


Japanese Pork Leg With Soy Beans
1 medium-sized pork leg, about 1.7 kg bones on
350 gm dried soy beans, washed well & drained
6 T light soy sauce (I used Lee Kum Kee's)
1 T dark soy sauce
3 T sake
2 T veg oil
2 large stalks of spring onions or leeks, washed & tied in a bunch each
1 knob of fresh ginger (about 20 gm), washed n smashed lightly

1. Have the butcher clean, shave and cut the pork leg into large fist-sized pieces. Put the pork leg into a bowl and scald with enough boiling water to cover. Stir, then drain the water away. This step will clean the leg of any dirt or hairs and also gives a clearer gravy instead of a cloudy gravy later.
2. Marinade the pork leg with 3 tablespoons of the light soy sauce and the sake for about 1/2 hour.
3. Heat a heavy-based pot (such as AMC's) until smoking and throw in the ginger and spring onions. Fry until the onions are wilted. Add the pork leg (keep the marinade liquid) and stir fry until the skin is tightened and seared.
4. Add the soy beans to the pork leg, stir to mix well. Add the remaining 3 tablespoons of light soy sauce and dark soy sauce and enough water to just cover the pork leg and soy beans. When the stew boils, turn the heat down to low and simmer, covered, for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, depending on how you like the texture of the skin and ligament. There's no need to add anymore water but if you are cooking longer than 1 1/2 hours, you may have to add 1/2 cup of water. Taste and season with more soy sa! uce if n ecessary. Serve hot with rice. This dish gets better the next day.

What Mosaic Are You? Photo Campaign - Mandarin Oriental KL & Leica Camera

How would you fancy winning this?

ALeica V-Lux 3 Camera

Or stays at Mandarin Oriental KL?

What is it?
Mandarin Oriental, Kuala Lumpur celebrates the first year anniversary of Mosaic, theirall-day dining restaurant with a photo campaign entitled What MOSAIC are you?, in collaboration with Leica Store Malaysia. The theme for the photo campaign is "Food for Celebration" - diners and the public are invited to submit creatively captured photo of food and/or celebrative moments with friends and loved ones.

Throughout the campaign, a printed MOSAIC collage will be displayed at the hotel lobby adjacent to the restaurant to create awareness and encourage participation.Diners at Mosaic will be extended a complimentary Leica camera experience courtesy of LeicaStore Malaysia. During the session, Leicas professional photographers will be on site to sharethe tips and tricks for the ultimate Leica experience. Sessions are available on every Thursdaysand Sundays throughout the campaign duration from 12pm to 2.30pm.

How long will the contest run for?

The contest will run from 10 September to 10 October 2012. Prizes include a Leica V Lux 3 camer! a, accom modation stays in MandarinOriental, Kuala Lumpur and much more.

What can I win?

In this month-long campaign, you can win prizes worth up to RM 15,000.

How to enter?

1. You are allowed to submit up to a maximum of three (3) images up to 10 October 2012.

2. You have to e-mail your submissions to mokulsocialmedia@mohg.com with your full name and title of their photo(s).

3. Photos will thenbe shortlisted by Mandarin Oriental, Kuala Lumpur and Leica Camera. Selected entries will beposted onto the hotels Facebook fanpage (www.facebook.com/MandarinOrientalKualaLumpur)in an album A Mosaic of Food for Celebration.
4.At the end of the campaign, the Top 10 winners will be announced in Facebook as well asnotified via email.

5. Following the end of the campaign, a collage consistingof all selected photos will be tabulated and posted as the hotels Facebook fanpage cover photo.


I would definitely be putting in a few entries to boost my chances of winning the Leica V-Lux! ;) Wish me luck!