I was really out of idea on what to cook on weekend. Plus I don’t feel like cooking for hours in the kitchen. There was some leftover of the canned peas from what Dear Son ate the night before. I already blended dried chili with onion and garlic 2 weeks before and kept the paste in the fridge. And there was some evaporated milk left from nasi hujan panas cooked earlier.

I fried the chicken pieces first. The oil from the frying process was used to saute the blended chili, onion, garlic and ginger.

I didn’t use too much blended chili this time and it turned out to be ayam masak tomato versi kurang pedas. After the blended paste has been thoroughly cooked or pecah minyak (the paste bubble and the oil separates from the paste), I put in Maggi tomato sauce and chili sauce. I added some plain water and the IDEAL evaporated milk about 5 tablespoon just to give the creamy taste to the gravy.

The canned peas, sliced Holland onion and fresh tomato can be added later a few minutes before you are ready to serve in order to maintain the crunchy and fresh look. Oh, don’t forget to add in salt to taste.

This was the first adult dish that my toddler son agrees to eat, thank God I decided to make it less spicy.

Ayam Masak Tomato (Chicken in Tomato Sauce) originally appeared on CintaRasa on April 16, 2012.

I ordered their set meal A which has breadsticks, 2 drinks, potato wedges and 9″ original crust pizza for RM29.90.

Their breadsticks were served with special garlic dipping sauce while potato wedges came with Papa John’s special Pizza Sauce. The jalapeno was for the pizza (I guess).

For dear son, I ordered Little Papa Set A – beef balls bolognaise with orange juice.

These were potato wedges – baked till golden brown and best served with their special Pizza Sauce.

Their fresh dough were shaped into breadsticks and oven-baked to golden brown.

I also tried their cream of mushroom soup. (RM5.90)

If you choose their set meal, there are limited pizza choice. The one that I chose was Fisherman’s Catch – chunky crabsticks, tuna, green pepper and onion.

Dear Son ate the beef balls bolognaise after much persuasion. He is one picky eater..huhu!

Overall I would have to say that I didn’t find anything special about their food at Papa John’s Pizza.

Papa John’s Pizza originally appeared on CintaRasa on March 20, 2012.

We went to Capricciosa Sunway Pyramid in August 2011 for break fast and birthday celebration for Niece #3.

The outlet is quite small and packed by the time we reached there for break fast.

As you walked in, you can see the cook making pizza.

We took the super value set for 4 that they offered for break fast. It came complete with appetizer, salad and soup, pizza, selection of fresh pasta or/and spaghetti, dessert and drinks.

This is their rice croquette. It is a deep fried rice ball stuffed with mozzarella cheese and served in Capricciosa’s homemade meat sauce.

Next is soup and salad. The salad has tuna and calamari which have been marinated with Capricciosa’s house dressing.

This is the pizza we chose. The Capricciosa pizza has beef bacon, beef pepperoni, mushrooms and bell peppers.

For the 3 spaghetti or hand made fresh pasta selection, we decided to try this freshly made Fettuccine with salmon in tomato cream sauce. My son loved salmon so I felt that we made a good choice.

This is pappardelle with mushroom in spicy ragu sauce. All their hand made fresh pasta are cooked al dente which I personally don’t like. I prefer my pasta to be cooked to a softer consistency. Maybe next time I can make a request to ask them to boil my pasta a little longer..heh!

I think niece chose this pappardelle with porcini and eringi mushroom in cream sauce.

We were given bottomless sirap bandung as part of the deal. Oh, I didn’t have the picture of the dessert. Frittelle is actually a dessert with 2 scoops of vanilla ice cream with honey cinnamon glaze, fresh strawberry and pastry puffs.

I hope this year they will come out with nice, super value set menu for break fast.

Here are the details for the outlet:

Capricciosa Sunway Pyramid
(Opposite Sunway Lagoon main entrance)
Lot OB3.LG2.2, Oasis Boulevard
Sunway Pramid Shopping Mall

Tel: 603-7492 0513
Fax: 603-7492 0512
Business Hour : 10am – 10pm

Ristorante Italiano Capricciosa Pasta & Pizza – Sunway Pyramid originally appeared on CintaRasa on January 31, 2012.

I recently learned new type of pisang (banana) available for cooking. I knew pisang emas as we usually use it for jemput-jemput or cekodok. Now I learn that there are pisang abu for goreng pisang and pisang tanduk for pengat.

Picture of pisang tanduk taken from the Internet:

I already knew the basic of making pengat. You will need santan (coconut milk), sugar, in my case I also used gula melaka (palm sugar), a pinch of salt, daun pandan (screwpine leaves) and whatever the main fruit you want to make your pengat from.

This time I thought I want to add in biji sagu (sago) in my pengat. The first time I made pengat pisang with sagu, I didn’t soak the sago and it took me so long to stir constantly until the sago pearls turned transparent. The second time I learned my lesson and I soaked them beforehand..hehe!

So, how do you like your pengat? With sago pearls or without?

Pengat Pisang originally appeared on CintaRasa on January 14, 2012.

Last October we decided to take Niece #3 out for dinner and we thought Subang Parade will be a good idea, not too crowded and they have Dave’s Deli. Little did I know that the outlet located on the same floor of MPH has been moved to the lower floor.

The newly refurbished outlet is certainly much bigger than the one located by the escalator. You can even choose to dine outside.

At first glance at the menu on the board, I was shocked to read that there’s no more beef rissole. But after looking around at the blackboard by the cashier counter, I noticed there it was written “back by popular demand”..oh, they do have beef rissole in the menu at RM16..thank God! The only thing that keep me coming back to dine at Dave’s Deli is their beef rissole..huhu!

They no longer have roasted potato. The gravy I got that day was quite generous..sometimes it really depend on who cooks for you.

Niece decided to try their lasagna. Most of the main dish come with salad and mashed potato. Overall it was a nice experience dining there at their newly refurbished outlet.

Dave’s Deli Subang Parade 2011 originally appeared on CintaRasa on December 19, 2011.

People say they got really insaf after seeing the bill after dining at Restoran Insaf..haha!

The whole set of beryani ayam like in the above picture will cost you RM13. You will get a plate of rice, with a choice of ayam goreng or ayam beryani, a small plate of acar timun and dalca. A normal glass of iced tea costs RM3.

But I wouldn’t mind paying such money because their beryani ayam was so good that every time I have to go to KL, mainly to Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman to buy stuffs for my craft business, I will make it a point to have my late lunch or dinner there.

You should try their beryani ayam, seriously!

Restoran Insaf, KL – Beryani Ayam originally appeared on CintaRasa on November 22, 2011.

First of all you need to know the type of banana which will taste good if you fry them in batter. Pisang tanduk is one of them. For some it might look like plantain but it is not.

I prefer all my goreng pisang to be masak ranum. The above picture of pisang tanduk is not ripe enough. I have to let it ripen outside for 2 days before I fried them the second time.

The other type of banana which is great for goreng pisang is pisang abu. The single banana looks kind of funny, rather than oval and long, it looks like rectangle..haha!

This is how it looks like once I have peeled the skin and cut each pisang abu into 3 slices.

For the batter, I used a measurement of 2 table spoon of tepung beras (rice flour) to 1 table spoon of instant tepung goreng pisang. I’ve tried the one bought under Jusco brand. I added in bijan (sesame seeds) and a pinch of salt in the batter as well. Mix all with water until you have reach a good batter consistency.

Dip the sliced bananas inside the batter and deep fry in hot oil.

Once it has turned light golden brown, you can remove from the oil and drain on absorbent kitchen towel.

I usually eat my goreng pisang with sambal kicap. How about you? What’s your preference?

How To Make Goreng Pisang originally appeared on CintaRasa on November 2, 2011.

A few weeks ago I asked Hubby to buy some ribs from pasar borong, Since I was busy it was left in the freezer for a week plus before I could boil them.

The main intention is to turn those ribs stock into mee kuah but since I saw there were too many ribs in the pot, I decided to make some sup tulang for dinner. After all I have bought celery sticks earlier at Jusco and was hoping to use it in soup making (as suggested many time by Mat Gebu’s blog..haha!)

I rummaged through my pantry and realized that I don’t have any ready made spice to use in the intended sup tulang. I googled and found out that you can make your own sup tulang spice by toasting without oil some ketumbar (coriander seeds), jintan manis (fennel seed) and jintan putih (cumin seed). After that you pound those toasted seeds. I added in black pepper as well.

The rest is like the normal sup procedure. I added carrot and potato but you have to wait a bit longer to soften those vegetables.

Oh, if you want your sup tulang to be more spicy, you can smash some cili padi and add in the sup.

Sup Tulang originally appeared on CintaRasa on October 24, 2011.

I cooked this ayam masak tomato a few days ago as per request by hubby. Usually I will cook this dish to accompany my self-invented nasi daging..haha! Anyway, I think some people call this dish ayam masak merah.

I was not aware that I have not bought tomato puree the other day when we did our groceries. Luckily I have enough fresh tomato in the fridge. So I chopped them up and blended them. If you use tomato puree in can, the color of the dish will be more red as compared to mine..heh!

It is quite easy to cook this dish. I fried the blended onion, garlic and ginger. Then I added in 2-3 table spoon of blended dried chili to make it spicy. The chicken pieces are usually fried beforehand. Some people prefer their fried chicken to be 3/4 cooked as not to make it too tough and chewy in the gravy. Then you put in the tomato puree and some amount of water. Add in sugar and salt to taste. Sliced of Holland onion and tomato can be added a few minute before you turn off the stove.

This time I added in green peas in can just to try whether it makes any difference to the taste. I think I will omit that next time I’m cooking ayam masak tomato because I don’t really like the taste of green peas..heh!

Have fun cooking!!

Ayam Masak Tomato originally appeared on CintaRasa on October 3, 2011.

When I was told that Pullman Lakeside has this Middle Eastern delights, I was hoping that I could compare the food to Saba’s Restaurant in Cyberjaya. However even till the end I couldn’t see any of the food as portrayed on their Ramadhan buffet pamphlet..huhu!

Since it was a group booking, we were seated under a tent nearest to the place where they roasted the satay. However it was a hassle to get my share of satay, as they put the satay, roasted lamb and whatnot on a stage.

Beside the stall of satay and roasted lamb was another stall for kebab…that too was on that tiny stage. It was a relief that the stage didn’t collapse with so many people taking their share of food.

They also have otak-otak and lamb satay but I didn’t get to take the otak-otak. It’s either my eyes were not sharp enough after the heat dining outside under the tent or maybe those queuing up in front of me took too many..heh!

Check out the big Aladdin lamp. I was not sure what they have around that lamp area. I was glad that our group was not seated inside the buffet area as it was not well ventilated and people were packed taking their food..at least we have fans under the tent.

These two rows of chauffing dishes were loaded with Malay cooking like gulai telur ikan tembakul, ayam bakar masak lemak, butter crab, puyuh berlada, roasted chicken, mixed vege, masak lemak pucuk paku and a few more dishes that I can’t recall.

And then there were 8 more stalls with food like mee goreng mamak, kuey teow and bihun goreng, cooked right there for those who didn’t prefer to eat rice.

I was looking for tidbits to give to my son when I found this stall that has goreng keledek and keropok lekor.

At least these keledek goreng will do till I managed to queue up to take satay..huhu!

Hubby tried to bribe our son with those hard breadsticks, tough luck..haha!

I missed tasting their murtabak since by the time the crowd has subsided, there was none to be taken at the stall.

I didn’t see this seafood bakar stall during my first round. Not sure if anyone else at the table took the ikan bakar so I can’t really tell whether they were tasty or not.

Oh, this is the stall for popia basah and rojak buah. I was there two times, but the bowl was always empty. Not sure whether you have to ask the chef to prepare rojak buah on the spot or what..sigh!

Since I noticed that the roasted lamb was almost finished, I quickly queue up at the stage. This was the first time that I didn’t get served by the chef in charge of roasted lamb and rice stall, have to fumble with the small ladle to take my share.

As I was walking at the 8 stalls again, I saw people coming out from the other side of the building with plates of desserts. So here is the picture of what I managed to take for my family.

I tried their mee kari since I was not really full and satisfied eating the Malay dishes with rice. Personally I have tasted better mee kari.

I tried their dim sum since other stalls were too packed with people queuing for food.

Honestly if I were to pay for my meal, I will feel cheated and it was not worth it. But that is my personal opinion, maybe I am too picky when it comes to food and my expectation when dining at premier 5-star hotel is too high.

However it could be a nice hotel to stay in. Those in service at the buffet were polite and courteous even when they were swarmed with hungry customers.

Lastly, thanks to the company for paying the Ramadhan buffet. It gives me the chance to make a fresh Ramadhan buffet review at a new place this year.

Pullman Putrajaya Lakeside Ramadhan Buffet 2011 originally appeared on CintaRasa on August 17, 2011.