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Throughout the years I have had many friends tell me about the wonders of the Japanese food buffet. They often speak of the fairytale of bottomless plates of sushi, the magically replenishing platters of sashimi and of the warriors who tried and failed at conquering the mythical towers of teppanyaki. Okay that was overly dramatic but have you ever had friends tell you about how wonderful so-and-so Japanese buffet was but you have never tried it before? Well I have been through that situation a few times and today I had a chance to do something about it.

ST gave me a surprise dinner at Shogun Japanese buffet located in One Utama's new wing. She had booked us a table early in the week. Which turned out to be a very wise decision otherwise we would have to join a very long queue of hungry masses. It's incredible to see people lining up to fork out RM48.00++ per person for dinner. How long was the queue? Imagine someone setting up a booth and started giving out free bags/t-shirts/etc (which incidentally was a scene I witnessed at the MATTA fair recently. A lady at the Taiwan booth started giving out free cloth bags and two other guys had to keep shouting for people to line up... not that anyone bothered to listen).

Saisaki is a name I often hear associated to all the tales of the great Japanese buffets I mentioned earlier and I hear Shogun operates under the same owner thus I had high expectations for the food here... but then reality kicked in and I remembered why I've been despising buffets for a few years now. Basically it's two things; 1. You never get quality food at buffets, 2. Your kiasu-ness (translation: never wanting to lose out) will always cause you to overeat. Nothing's changed... Shogun is quantity over quality and I ate so much that I felt like throwing up a few times after dinner :)

But but... don't get me wrong I did enjoy my time here. It's just that the food really isn't what most people say it is. Nothing extraordinary at all. There was only one food item that made me go back for a second round and of all things that was the mixed fruit punch! Yes the fruit punch was good... very good because they used lemon (or maybe lime) juice in the punch.






There's also a few varieties of soup. We had both Tom Yam and Shark's Fin (yes, really... though we couldn't find any fin in the soup) which was both lacking in taste. Shogun also offers a lot of other stuff that you can't really call Japanese including sweet and sour fish and some varieties of Korean food (kimchi and bulgolgi). Their dessert selection is merely adequate but then again no one is here for their desserts. I did enjoy their ice cream and they had quite a few choices of drinks (green tea, lemonade, soursop, etc...).


Well it was exactly like I expected... their food was generally acceptable and it's been many years since I've eaten so much. Enjoyable night but I think I'm going to stay away from buffets for another few years.

Warning: bad memory accompanies this post!

I really have to apologise in advance but I have forgotten quite a few details of the meal me and ST had at Swensens in SS2. Please make do with the descriptions since I can't remember what the meals are named.

As far as I remember Swensens has been around in Malaysian malls and they were famous for their ice-cream. Some years back they realised that merely selling ice cream isn't going to get them far in the premium ice cream market. When you're competing with the likes of Baskin Robbins and Haagen-Dazs you better innovate and innovate they did. They started selling all kinds of western food along with their ice cream and they became more of a restaurant than an ice cream parlour. They have a branch in Sungei Wang which is quite popular.

Now I've never thought much about Swensens ice cream but when the craving for ice cream kicks in and the nearest established ice cream place you happen to be is Swensens you tend not to think twice about it. We were along the LDP so we made our way to Swensens in SS2 for some delicous icy goodness.

They had a Spring promotion going on where they offered a few choices of set meals. The one we had was with a big beef burger patty as the main course. If I'm not mistaken every set meal comes with a soft drink, a soup of the day and a scoop of strawberry ice cream.





ST actually wanted to have some chocolate ice cream but they were completely out of chocolate that night. What a bummer. However the beef burger was surprisingly good. I really didn't expect to find good burgers at Swensens.

Something happened to my car yesterday night and I can't figure out what went wrong with it. I had a mechanic check it today and even he doesn't have a clue. The problem is having me a little worried... I mean what if I'm driving half way and one of the wheel falls off? That would be disastrous and more importantly really expensive to fix!

First of all I drive a Proton Iswara that's a little less than half my age. I'm 25 so you do the maths. Now what happened was I was driving home yesterday night when the car started shaking. To be more specific I should say that I could feel the steering wheel wobbling violently. First thing I suspected was a flat tyre so I stopped in the emergency lane, got down and took a look. As far as my naked eye could see nothing was wrong.

It's not just a wobbly steering wheel though, there's also a rythmic thumping sound that's coming from the front right wheel (of course the sound can only be heard when the car is in motion). It was about 11pm and I was tired so I decided to drive back home and pray that the wheels would stay attached till I'm home. The wobbling got worse... it was difficult to drive in a straight line and then suddenly...

something even stranger happened...

The problem just went away! It was smooth driving all the way back and my car is home with all 5 tyres intact (including the spare). The sound was gone, the steering was back to being less wobbly and I could drive straight and make turns without any difficulty. That's damn scary and as I mentioned earlier I got a mechanic to look at it today. He couldn't find anything wrong with my car.

The mechanic told me that usually there are 2 reasons for a shaky/wobbly car. The first being a spark plug malfunction whereby your engine vibrates violently because the combustion in your engine has gone haywire. I'm pretty sure that's not the problem I'm experiencing because my wobbling only occurs when the car is in motion and you can feel it through the steering.

The other thing he mentioned was the drive shaft which makes more sense to me. But then problems with the drive shaft don't happen on and off. Like the mechanic said... if it's broken then it's broken... it won't be okay one minute and kay-o the other. The mechanic has looked through the car and I guess I should trust him. He's not my regular mechanic though.

Personally I'm thinking it may be something to do with the ball bearings. Anyone have any similar experience? I'm having doubts about the safety of my car now but if I don't drive I don't have my freedom!

I've always wanted to try out San Francisco Steakhouse but it's not a cheap place to eat at and there haven't been that many occasions to celebrate. Well that's just an excuse now that they are offering set lunches for RM13.90. Each set lunch comes with a main course and 2 choices out of the following 3; Soup of the Day, Salad of the Day and Dessert of the Day. The set lunch menu varies with each day of the week with 2 selections of main courses per day. Drinks however are not included and they are killer expensive. It might be wise to order sky juice if you're on a budget :)

Me and ST made our way to the San Francisco Steakhouse outlet in Damansara Intan which was a little empty on Saturday afternoon and ordered both choices of set lunch for that day. The menu for the day was Penne Arabbiata (Penne Pasta with Tomatoes, Mushrooms and Turkey Ham) and Boneless Lamb with Plum Sauce (Roasted Lamb with Roasted Vegetables and Plum Sauce). Since neither of us were big fans of salads we opted for the soup and the dessert.

This is the last blog post regarding the BMW Sauber F1 Event in Malaysia which was held in a makeshift structure near the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. We were there from the beginning of the event at 8pm till about 10.30pm or so which means we did not stay to the end.

The stage event began with a video depicting BMW's racing history and a then the Managing Director of BMW Malaysia, Wolfgang Schlimme took the cat walk to kick off the event. He's not a bad speaker but as one who runs one of the most succesful car companies in Malaysia you don't expect him to be. I managed to shake hands with him a little later just for the hell of it. I was actually thinking of asking him for a job but I didn't have the guts to do it.


Next up the emcee introduced the BMW Sauber team. These guys are all veterans of racing with everyone of them having an amazing portfolio. Unfortunately I'm not too familiar with them so I can't remember their names.


And then the fashion show began. Before the show began we met an uncle near the bar who told us to expect CBU (it's a car term, look it up) girls and G-Strings... lol.




After the fashion show I excused myself to the port-a-jons and as I was dispensing my mineral water I heard a powerful voice on the sound system. It was a lady called Jocelyn Brown. She may not be well known but she has a voice which I bet you have heard before. Does anyone remember a song with the vocals "I Got The Power!"? Yup, that was her and I do believe she's a legend in her own right.


We saw one of the models at the bar and managed to get her to take some pics with us. She was actually a little reluctant but still obliged. I never got her name but I'm taking good care of the picture in case she becomes famous one day.

"Free flow alcohol!", dangerous words to say if you are picking up the tab. Thankfully BMW is freaking rich and they can afford to do something like this. Quite frankly it was amazing. Maybe I'm a "jakun" when it comes to drinking but I tried a great deal of drinks tonight that I have never ever tried before. I was careful not to overdo it though because I was driving and I am a safe and responsible driver (plus hangovers really really suck).

We came to the event with an empty stomach which was a little mistake early on in the event because an empty stomach with alcohol make for some really drunk guys. Because I'm a safe and responsible person I took care not to drink too much :) There were some really great finger foods that came a little later in the event. I especially enjoyed the mini burgers with massive beef patties.





Related:
BMW Sauber F1 Event in Malaysia - The Cars
BMW Sauber F1 Event in Malaysia - The Stage Events

The BMW Sauber (did you notice the word Petronas is missing? Not my fault... BMW didn't use it when it named the event) F1 Event in Malaysia was held at a makeshift structure located on the open air car park outside of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. It was an exclusive invites only event but I was lucky enough that an old friend of mine who managed to snag some invites "kena FFK" so he called me to go instead. We had only enough invites for 2 persons but we went anyway... after all there was free food and free flow of alcohol!

I took quite a few pictures so I'm going to split the event into a few blog posts. First up are the cars that they had parked at the event. BMW displayed many notable cars but I'm not a big BMW fan so I can't name the more exotic ones. The common ones are easier to name but then many people can name them anyway. If you could help name the cars that I couldn't then that would be great!

Restoran Sri Murni in SS2 needs no introduction. It is the most crowded establishment in the whole of SS2 and it is one of the most unique mamak places around. First of all this place is run by a Chinese guy. Secondly they have a great variety of roti that you will not find anywhere else. Thirdly they have some great "special" drinks that I really enjoy. Forth they have an ass kicking Claypot Lou Shi Fun.


Sri Murni is famous for it's confusing array of roti varieties but the most popular must be the Roti Hawaii which is kind of like murtabak but with lots of chicken, sausages and egg as filling plus a generous dose of mayonnaise squeezed on top of the roti in the shape of a spider web. If there's one problem with the Roti Hawaii is that it does not go well with curry. It would be nice if they had diagrams of all their different roti with a little explanation on what goes inside. Would make ordering them a little easier. On the subject of roti you could also try out their naan which are served with curry and condensed milk.


Their "Special" drinks are fruit juices (there's also a Ribena Special) with lots of Nata de Coco, longan, watermelon and some other fruits. The fruit juices are usually quite thick... in fact the word fruit puree comes to mind. These drinks are fruity goodness with lots of chewy bits to keep you occupied.


Of all places to find good Claypot Lou Shi Fun one would hardly expect to find it in a mamak but Sri Murni's lou shi fun is one of the best around. Mix the egg before it cooks and you get a thick and flavourful bowl of noodles. If you can eat spicy food then make sure you eat it with the sambal provided.

Trivia: The brother of the owner operates a mamak near the old Lim Kok Wing building which we like to call "William's" after the name of the owner. He serves some mean pasta and great naan.

Last Saturday me and ST were in Low Yat Plaza and we had a chance to try out the cheap ramen at Sapporo Noodle House again. I have previously blogged about this establishment and I liked it then (click on the link at the end of this article to read).

Sapporo Noodle House is located in the same building where Federal Bowl used to be. We actually wanted to try out the adjoining Japanese restaurant which offered pretty reasonably priced set lunches but even at 12pm they were not ready for business. Oh well, maybe next time.

This time around we ordered 2 noodle dishes and one pan fried salmon.


The Ma Po Tau Foo Ramen was probably the least Japanese of Japanese food I have ever eaten which is not to say a bad thing. I liked the smooth tau foo cubes and the ramen noodles though I would have preferred the broth to be a little more spicy. I tasted hints of capsicum in the noodles and indeed there were slices of capsicum in the broth. If it was me cooking I would have added some cili padi cause I like em hot!


The Ramen with Pork was very similar to the Beef Ramen we had the last time we were here only with slightly fatty pork instead of beef. The soup base had a very strong pork taste and the pork meat provided with the ramen was good. ST didn't like the fat on the pork though so I ended up eating them all ;p


The salmon was nothing to shout about. They simply fried the salmon and poured some teriyaki sauce over it. It was a simple dish and most people couldn't go wrong making it.

Read my previous blog on Sapporo Noodle House.

Yes sir, famous is the word. Yu Ai must be the most famous seafood noodle establishment in the Klang Valley. As far as I'm aware their original outlet is in Segambut and they have a branch in SS2 on the same row as Nasi Kandar Kayu.

What they serve is noodles (or meehoon or kuey teow) in either clear soup, curry or tomyam with lots and lots of seafood. There are prawns, fish, lala, sotong and so on. The amount of seafood they put into each bowl of noodles is quite a lot and you'll probably be quite surprised at it the first time you try them out.

Well as for me I've eaten at their restaurants on more than a few occasions and wish to introduce another word to describe their noodles; overrated. I was impressed with their noodles the first time I ate at their Segambut branch some years back but the second time I ate there I noticed that their seafood isn't all that fresh (especially obvious with the prawns) and there's really nothing special about their soup base. The few times that I've been back there my impression of it has not changed for the better.

boo_licious from masak-masak recently wrote about a traditional chinese soup stall in Puchong and it sounded really interesting (please do check out her post on the subject, she's a much better writer than I ever will be plus it's much better than me repeating what she already wrote).

Basically what they serve is some variety of soups that are double boiled inside one of the three humongous pots they have at their shop. I'm not adventerous with my soups so I had the safe choice of "Old Cucumber and Pork Ribs Soup (Lo Wong Kua Pai Kuat Tong)". Each pot of soup will set you back RM10 to RM15 and it will be enough for 2 persons at least.

I wanna be the first to spread this rumour so here it is... according to a comment left on wAntAn productions just a little while ago:

"Im a salesman of perodua from sabah, kota kinabalu. this month on march we will be launching a new look kelisa. its called kelisa IMAGO. its a replacement for kelisa special edition. It will be in jade green colour. suitable for ladies driver. nothing much has been changed. the price will be increased RM300. Hope i can sell one or more.. "

Could it be the car that Paul Tan blogged about some time ago?

But he mentioned that nothing much has been changed. Perhaps just a facelift then?

How about something like this?

Shihlin Taiwan Street Snacks is a small shop that's located near the entrance to the TGV Cinema in One Utama's old wing. The whole shop can probably sit only about 10 people so take away is your best bet and the thing is their food is very well suited to 'tapau' after all they are a snack place.

I've always been intruiged by their Oyster Mee Sua and finally got the chance to try it out last Sunday. The Oyster Mee Sua comes in a small bowl so don't expect to it to fill your stomach. The Mee Sua is preboiled with the (yummy) thick soup. When they serve it to you they simply scoop it out of the pot and garnish it with chicken slices, some vegetable and a few oysters. There's also a helping of sambal belacan perhaps to cater for local tastes.

I can't really make it out but I suspect the soup is made with lots of oyster sauce because it certainly looks like it is. The Mee Sua is soft but still retains its texture despite the fact that it must have been in the pot for some time. Perhaps this is a feature of Mee Sua. I wouldn't know since I don't eat it very often. I'm looking forward to having another bowl soon :)


Besides the noodles they also serve a very huge looking fried chicken fillet and some tempura vegetables. I must say the chicken looks pretty impressive and I'm tempted to try them out next time. So far every food item they sell goes for RM4.80.

Just came across this hillarious song called the Bittorrent Song which is a song about Bittorrent's many virtues and drugs and naked lunch! The guy on the keyboard and singing actually ain't bad at all. Enjoy...

This post is just to mark a milestone for myself. Today is the day I started my fourth job. I left my third job at the end of the last month and took a few days to do some stuff like pay my taxes and get a lot of sleep ;p

How's the new job? Oh gosh... I'm not used to the environment which is strict, strict and strict. I hope I will warm up to it eventually. I plan to commit at least a year to this job. There are things to learn still and really I'm just happy I have a good paying job... and taking the LRT is a hell of a lot better than driving to work.

I've just finished watching the latest Transformers series titled Transformers: Galaxy Force. Part of the story involves Transformers transplanting themselves on Earth and taking varied guises. There are two particularly odd Transformers who appear in the series on and off. One of them is a signal light and the other is a pay phone. Both of them are stationed in the middle of the desert. You NEVER see them transform until the final episode where the signal light Transformer does and it's frickin hillarious. Man if they had a toy of this I would buy one.

Presenting, Signal Lancer:

If there's ever a direction that's easy to give then this place is it! Marco's Pizza is located directly opposite the Kelana Jaya LRT station on the same row of shops as Restoran Talipon. Went there for lunch with ST today as I'm in between jobs and had some free time to waste.

When I first arrived I was expecting a small operation but as I looked around I began to realize that this place was huge! 3 shop lots huge! It took us a little while but we spotted an oven in the center of the restaurant where you can see your pizza being made. It's too bad we didn't see it when we came in otherwise we would surely take a seat over there.

Marco's Pizza offers 2 kinds of sets for the lunch time crowd. Set A which consists of a starter, a main course and a soft drink and Set B which consists of a 6" Pizza of the day and a soft drink. The price for Set A is variable depending on the main course while Set B goes for RM7.99.

Today's Set A was Potato Salad with Cajun Chicken (RM15.00) while today's Set B was a pizza with pepperoni and olives (I didn't catch the name). We had both sets plus a soup of the day which was tomato soup.

The waiter kept pestering us by telling us it was only an additional RM3.00 to change the soft drink to Orange Juice. Problem is RM3.00 isn't as cheap as he made it sound. How much do oranges cost anyway?





Marco's Pizza is simply the most average Italian restaurant I have ever been to. Everything we ate today just tastes so bland. As I was paying at the cashier I asked for their business card. The person manning the counter handed the card to me and advised me to make reservations if I plan to come on Friday, Saturday or Sunday night. As he said that I thought to myself... "You sure ah? This place got so many people come wan ah?". I found it very difficult to believe. By the way their lunch crowd wasn't even near half full.

Marco's Pizza,
No 81-85,
Jalan SS25/2,
Taman Bukit Emas,
47301 Petaling Jaya,
Selangor, Malaysia.

Tel: 603-7803 5000

First thing's first. This movie is not based on the Shinobi videogames from Sega so don't expect a video game movie. If anything this movie is one of the greatest live action animes since Cutie Honey well except it's not based on an anime but rather the source of the story is from a famous novel called Kouga Ninpon Cho by Yamada Futaro. The novel is so popular there is also an anime adaptation called Basilisk, which I managed to watch halfway before I got bored of it.

The movie is set in Japan's Tokugawa Era under the reign of Tokugawa Ieyasu. The Kouga ninja clan and the Iga ninja clan are mortal enemies who have been held at a truce by the original Hattori Hanzou (which, if I'm not mistaken is a title given to what amounts to a Minister of Ninja who controls the ninjas to do the Tokugawa's bidding).

Our heroes are the clan's respective successors. Kouga Gennosuke is the heir to the Kouga ninja clan while Oboro is the heir to the Iga ninja clan. While their clans have always had an uneasy truce somehow the two youths found each other in love.

Things take a turn for the worse when the current Hattori Hanzou revokes the truce. The movie gives several reasons for the revocation of the truce where one would have been sufficient. Our heroes now find themselves on opposing sides pit in a duel to the death. Will love prevail or will tragedy ensue?

Probably the best thing in the movie are the ninja fights. Each ninja has unique powers and the movie showcases their powers in incredible CGI enhanced fight scenes. Unfortunately some of the ninjas are not given much focus which is a real shame because they are interesting in their own right. The best power belongs to our two leads and when you see them using it you will fear them. Oboro's power is especially frightful.


This movie is very similar to the Stormriders movie from a few years ago. It's a movie filled with a lot of CGI eye-candy and lots of battles which also means it's not a movie for everyone. Some people will detest the CGI but I love it. The art direction is also pretty good and there are several scenes that look like they came directly from some anime.


All in all good fun for slight over one and a half hours. Actually I think the movie adaptation of the novel actually beats the anime adaptation which is quite an amazing feat. If you're a fan of ninjas or animes in general you won't want to miss this movie.

There's this building in Cyberjaya next to the bus terminal called Street Mall but I'd hesitate to call it much of a mall. There are a few places to eat there and some of them are not bad. One of the most popular lunch time restaurants in Street Mall must be Penang House. I'm not sure why they call themselves Penang House but they serve all varieties of Chinese food and Nasi Lemak. The great thing is that they're halal and you can usually find more than a few tables occupied by Muslims.

Open up their menu and you see Prawn Mee and Curry Mee being featured. They aren't great but they are good enough. Personally I like their Spring Onion and Beef Kuey Teow. My friends heartily recommend the Nasi Lemak. I've also tried some of their other noodles and I think their Fish Head Noodles are quite good. The important thing to remember when eating in Street Mall is NOT CHEAP (unless you eat at the mamak) ;p Expect to pay about RM10 for a main dish and a drink in any of the restaurants here (except for the mamak).




Other recommended eateries at Street Mall are Hassan (mamak, try the rice everything else sucks), Kenanga (extremely expensive Malay mixed rice but oh so good), Che Siti (Malay rice like Nasi Kerabu, Nasi Dagang, etc...), Austin Chase Coffee (some really nice sandwiches) and the Italian pizza place at the back (can't remember the name, very pricey but good food all around).

I previously blogged about Wei Dao Hao Bak Kut Teh in Dengkil and KampungboyCitygal left a comment extolling the virtues of Ah Di BKT. The big question here is have we been frequenting the not-so-good BKT all this while? Let's find out.

Like every restaurant worth eating at in Dengkil, Ah Di BKT is located along the main Dengkil road right next to a restaurant called Dengkil Seafood Restaurant. It's quite easy to spot because Ah Di BKT is located in a wooden shack. You won't find any signboard outside with a name though. It's the usual BKT place which serves more than just BKT.




The problem with this place is that it's hot hot hot! I mean it's just a wooden shack. There's a roof over your heads but not enough fans and BKT is hot (not spicy) stuff too. It would be great if they had air-con but that would be wishful thinking.

So how does this place compare with Wei Dao Hao? I believe that they are more of less the same. I wouldn't choose one place over the other. Why don't you guys try it out and leave your thoughts?