: : Lunchie Lunchie at Jojo Cafe : :

Phew! Working on a Sunday is never nice. So, Lam and I went for a nice lunch outside. We ended up at Jojo Cafe at 3rd mile. It's an air-conditioned Chinese restaurant with home-cook cookings.



This is a common sight in Chinese restaurants. The utensils are soaked in hot water to sterilize them and to prove to their customers that everything is clean. Anyway, Lam and I order some side dishes to be eaten with white rice.



The 1st dish that came out is the Deep Fried Chicken which is a specialty at Jojo's. It comes with a sweet chilli sauce.



The next dish is the Mixed-Vegetable, Lo-Han style. The veggies mostly consists of different types of mushrooms : Golden Mushrooms, Button Mushrooms, Straw Mushrooms, Portabellos. It's cook with some sweet corn, Chinese broccoli @ Kailan, and some tanghoon @ glass noodles along with some oyster sauce.



Final dish was the Assam Fish Meat. A nonya dish that is both sour and spicy at the same time. It was cooked with some mackerel and believe me, it tasted like the ones in Penang. Yummy. :)

The bill for 2 people was RM43 (USD11.30). Definitely value for money. Unfortunately a bit far out for the tourists.

: : Oregano, Travilion : :

It was a great day yesterday when I went out to meet Yolanda, Ari and cutey-pie Rhyanna a.k.a. Nana. We went hunting around looking for a baju kurung for Ari for Hari Raya and eventually found it in Wisma Saberkas (one of the shopping complexes in Kuching). Then, it was off to Travilion to eat dinner and we settled in at Oregano. It's an Italian alfresco restaurant but we sat inside since it look like a huge rainstorm was coming. In the end, it was just a simple pitter patter.



It was fresh lime, water, coke and house wine. I had the house wine although I couldn't remember to take a snapshot of the menu to get the names. It was Chardonnay by Rothbury I think.



This is a shot of the kitchen. It's an open kitchen concept so all the wonderous smells came out. On the right hand side, out of the picture, is the bar. Taken by placing the cameraphone on the table. Shots are not too bad but I couldn't focus.



Yolanda ordered the Seafood Marinara i.e. seafood with tomato sauce. And there's a quote : 1 mussel, 1 squid, 2 prawns and a few pieces of fish. She had it with linguine. Very tasty though.



This one was mine : Creamy Seafood with Linguine. Still, it was delicious and it's rare to find a nice creamy pasta dish in Kuching. Not many places know how to make great pasta dishes using cream. Although, I think the dish was slightly smaller than the Marinara so I ended up having dessert afterwards.



Ari had the Chicken Breast which came with great tasting mash potato. Strange that I'm speaking about mash potato? Hee hee... it was very tasty though. Probably the milk inside it. The Chicken was lightly grilled.



Dessert was great. I haven't had great Tiramisu since Auntie M's BBQ a couple of years back. And, they had sherry in it. Yummy! The tiramisu was chilled in a freezer I think as part of the cake was icy when I bit into it. Definitely will be back for coffee at night. It's superb. Try it sometime.

Oh, and the dinner bill came up to RM144.40 (USD38). That's not too bad for 4 people (Johnnie had a creamy seafood linguine as well).



Oregano Restaurant
Tel : 016 888 6003 (PohLo Chai)
Private Sublot 18, Lots 209 & 210, Section 54
Travilion,
KTLD Kuching,
Sarawak.

Note that this is the owner's handphone as looks like the phonelines are not installed yet. Only for reservations.

Shots taken using the Sony Ericsson W800i so sorry if the pictures are a bit blur. Was taking it using the timer shot which is a great way to take pics on the phone when in night mode. Getting better at taking photos using it though. Note that the pictures above are edited but only the food pics had major edits. The others, not so much.

: : Tantalizing BBQs : :

Well, while Dad was recovering from his operation, my cousin Yen pop back into Kuching for a brief holiday. He also brought along 2 of his friends from Singapore for a trip here as well. He was working very hard to get his meal just right.





As with any meal, the cutleries and placemats were laid out. Doesn't look like a simple BBQ eh? Well, the food was great. Never turn down dinner at the Tans. Never.





We had a selection of two wines. Red and white.



The salad definitely didn't look like an everyday salad. The cherry tomatoes were interesting though. They were brought in by Yen from Singapore. It was a very refreshing salad, that's for sure.



This was a backup dish : some sliced Italian sausages with dragonfruit. Yummy! Somehow, pork always taste better with some fruit.



Yen baked this huge dish of Paela rice with prawns inside it. Yum. Interesting taste. And believe me, this little kitchen helper was trying very very hard not to pinch a nibble here and there.







I think this is the Middle Eastern Chicken. It was slightly spicy but not much. Also there was a touch of tumeric in there.



And this is the Moroccan Barbequed Lamb. And believe me when I said that it was utterly tasty, sweet and succulent.



Now this was a great and simple way to liven up bread. Grilled them lightly over the grill after all the meats have been BBQ-ed and you'll get some slight BBQ flavour into the bread. Easy to do.



Divine Dessert. Home-made chocolate cake with icing. Sigh. It literally melted in your mouth. Auntie M is a great cook in the kitchen. Like I said earlier, never turn down dinners at the Tans. Never.



Oh, we also ended the dinner with this great desert wine. Brought by one of the dinner guests. It was amazing. It was one of those ice-wines i.e. grapes were harvested just before the winter really came. It was definitely chilly and sweet. Very very sweet.

And so ended a great dinner one fine day in August.

: : Poof! : :

Well, I was due for a major change. And sometimes, it's just best to keep it utterly simple.

Also trying to see how to make my way very XHTML friendly and perhaps, mobile phone friendly.

Those of you who are using 3G or the wireless broadband connections, do let me know how it works out --> Feedback is via the Comments link at the bottom. The filesizes for the pictures are less than 50kb per picture (USUALLY). I've limit the number of postings to 2 per page. Except the weekly archives which can be a little bit nasty so unless you have unlimited WAP/Net browing on your handphone/PDA, PLEASE DO NOT CLICK ON THE ARCHIVES LINK.

Getting rid of that pesky Tagboard. There's too many spam stuff coming through.

The links : to be updated later. My head hurts just swimming through all the template stuff and the stat counter, etc.

: : Huge SMS billboard : :

Shall we shock from English folks? :) No profanity, rascist or vulgar words, please.

There's a public board that will display any SMS on it. Max 144 boards. Phone number is +44 7929 461727.

However, play nice folks.

And why don't we get such interesting concepts in Malaysia? :(

: : Girl-girl's Birthday : :



And she is a fan of Eeyore the donkey. So, I went out hunting for Eeyore theme presents and got her 2 mugs and a coin purse from World of Cartoons. Post mortem from her boyfriend : Wena, she screamed when she saw the stuff! Even kept the wrapping paper. And that includes the Eeyore bag that had the presents.

Note that I told the guests that they have to act surprise and wish her Happy Birthday very loud for her sake as well as her boyfriend. He's been planning this do since Monday and wanted it to a huge surprise for her. And it sure was.

Sad to say that the pictures of people didn't come out as well as the food. My little itty bitty little spotlight just doesn't quite give out nice pictures when it should have.

ANYWAY, I'm digressing. Party was at the Junk Restaurant where we all have a nice and too filling dinner (what else is new? ;p). There was salad, wine and the main meal. Oh! and the birthday cake at the end too.



The bruschetta was so-so. Very filling though. Not too bad but nothing great.



And getting a full square meal, we definitely need the salad. This is one of The Junk's signature dishes : Caesar's Salad. Definitely taste a lot better than the pathetic ones in KL shops (sorry but I really think they need a lot of work in KL). It tastes like how a salad should taste : crispy and fresh and not limp.



The soup of the day was interesting though. It was a Thai-style pumpking soup although it look and does taste very similar to Sarawak laksa. That could have been because of the coconut milk though. Still, it came with some prawns and gave the pumpkin soup a bit of a seafood taste.



What can I say? I like carbonara and ended up orderingly this for the 3rd time. Fettucine Carbonara. Very seldom does one find it cooked well in Kuching. This is one of the two restaurants that I've taken it and enjoyed myself immensely. Then again, my calories would be screaming.



Isn't this interesting? Lemongrass Prawn Pasta. The prawn was lightly grilled until it was extremely fragrant. In the mean time, the pasta was cooked with some tomato sauces as well as chillis. Hmmm....and the prawns were huge!



The birthday girl-girl was asked to ditch any thoughts of dieting tonight as it was her birthday. And she definitely didn't when she ordered the Lamb Shank. The bone was big enough to do Fred Flintstone proud. Another favourite at The Junk.



The words Organic Chicken is deceiving. The chicken didn't come small. It was the size of a spring chicken that was definitely much much too big. Definitely delicious though. But definitely a meal for 2 people.



Now this is the last meal that nearly didn't make it. The problem with eating at The Junk is that it can get so chaotic if there are too many people around that the orders are mixed up. Well, the steak was definitely worth it.

And there you have it. Dinner at The Junk Restaurant. One of the first Fusion restaurants around.



The cake. And Girl-girl was careful enough to cut slices away from the picture of Eeyore. Doesn't he look so cute though? Well, it was cheesecake ordered from Uncle Cat bakery in Stutong Commercial Complex along Jalan Setia, near Tabuan Jaya.

Girl-girl definitely went back with happy memories and Boy-boy was more than happy with the way things turned out in the end.

: : Wong Jin Ren ~ Plea for Help : :





Apologies for being so slow and backward about this. Haven't been reading the newspapers for awhile. I just got this in the email today. Wong Jin Ren suffered severe burns about a month back and his hospital bills are astronomical. Not sure how much it is as various papers give different figures e.g. RM25,000 (USD6,578) per week, or about RM70,000 (USD18,421) in total. However, the figure is definitely climbing and the parents are seeking help from the public.

Warning : Here is a picture of how he look like on Oct 5. It was attached in the forwarded email and is more gruesome than the pictures you see in the newspaper links below.

Here are some newspaper articles :
Miracle baby's gift to mum
He’s a brave soul, Shahrizat says of child who suffered 90 per cent burns
給媽媽的生日禮物 男童堅強坐起吃粥

There are many ways to make the donation. I'm only posting one as that's the safest. Cheques to be addressed to the Malay Mail to the details below :

The Cashier, Finance Department/ Charity Unit,
New Straits Times Press (M) Bhd,
Balai Berita, 31, Jalan Riong 59100 Kuala Lumpur.

: : Contact Details for Kuching Restaurants : :

I'm putting together a list of restaurants in Kuching. Anyone one have any recommendations? If yes, drop me an email at myremi [at] gmail.com or drop a note in the comments section.

Updates : Ahem. I said via email or in the comments section. Not in the chatbox. And please provide address and contact details. Else, how can it be helpful to other people?

: : Springcleaning Attempt : :

Going to be posting again. Yes yes, I heard the plea that was on the Tagboard.com although being the last hope of all overseas students is too big a burden to shoulder. Sorry chaps. You just have to take whatever postings I'm putting up.

And yet again, I'm going to be cleaning up this entire website. It still looks too much of a mess. Links needs updating - there are so many new food blogs in Malaysia and Asia.

Unlawful picture linking - bandwidth stealing is also an issue. I get referral links from emails and forum postings. This is not a Creative Commons site anymore. Pictures are not to be distributed but for viewing.

And probably a few other tips and tricks that I can do to spice up this website a bit. I think I know what to do next. Just need time. A lot of time. :(

: : Free Pasta ~ A little taste : :

Salesgal : Auntie auntie come come! Try some pasta! With Prego sauce! Very good one.

Granny : Eh! How you know we like one?

Salesgal : Aiya! I see you buy Campbell soup. If you can eat that, for sure can eat pasta one. Not many people eat pasta.



Granny : Smell good lah. What you put inside?



Salesgal : Some chicken. Pasta is behind me one.



Granny : Nice. Next time, I make for you.

Wena : Errrm...ok.

(Actually her Chinese cooking is a lot better than her Western cooking but I didn't have the heart to tell her.)

Sidenote : Trying out Flickr.com for the first time. Need to move some of the bandwidth to somewhere else. And no, the photos are not a Creative Common license.

And yes, I'm seriously impressed by the picture quality from a Sony Ericsson W800i. It's just short of amazing.

: : Food, Wine & Music : :

Ok, not exactly a posh meal but it was a great way to unwind and just hang out with some colleagues. Also, I got to try out my new camera handphone, the Sony Ericsson W800i. The original size is 1632 x 1224 pixels, resized and edited to 400 pixel width. I'm impressed with the picture quality although an image stabilizer would have helped. Some pictures could not be used because it was too blur.

Oh, the restaurant was Koreana Restaurant in front of Hilton Hotel. The best korean restaurant in Kuching so far. Great for a private function with Karaoke sets for those who want to be happy and merry.



An innocent little teapot? Although, the little shot glass isn't as innocent. We all had some Korean shoju after a tough day at work.

Korean Colleague #1 : Korean tradition is 1st glass, MUST finish all.

Wena : Must ah?

Korean Colleague #2 : Aaahhhh sh*t, Yes yes.

Note : Korean colleague #2 usually says sh*t as shhhhyyyy i.e. as long as it's not actually spoken, he's not cursing. Hee hee



And surprisingly, the major ingredient was cucumber pieces in the shoju. Somehow, it got rid of the bitter aftertaste completely. Reminds me of how Pimms is served with cucumber sticks. Yum.



Korean Colleague #2 : You know, ah. Korean scientist do research on SARS (disease). North Korea and South Korea no infection. Why? Because we all eat kimchi!

Kimchi, the fermented and spicy pickled salad similar to the German sauekraut. Never did find out whether he was serious or not.



However, just to be safe, he ordered Kimchi Soup too!!



And, with any Korean meal, we had grilled beef and bacon ala hotplate. It even has a small outlet for drip oil.



With loads of chilli flavour veggies all around. That never changes. The Koreans have cast iron stomachs.

And we all got back home before midnite!