MyCoffee Eats: Dinner @ Out of Africa

Out of Africa? I thought I was “in”.

Hehe, bad joke aside, it was quite an experience dining at Out of Africa. Who would have thought a place like this exists in Kelab Syabas? Ambience is kind of rustic yet serene and relaxing at the same time. Menu is rather extensive with some of the most imaginative names I have come across (meat lovers will definitely love this place) and servings are really waistline-challenging.
Pumpkin Soup in mini cauldron and Chicken Liver Pate
My friend and I shared a Chicken Liver Pate and Pumpkin Soup as starters. The latter is served in a mini cauldron with really tasty garlic toasts. Pumpkin soup was definitely good, warm yet tantalizing and perfect for a rainy evening. The liver pate came in a generous chunk with toasts and some sweet chutney. Rich and creamy, I was surprised (and slightly appalled) that we nearly finished the entire block.


Bobotie Set
For main, we ordered something that sounds like Bobotie. Described as a common dish in Africa, it is supposed to be a very mild dry beef curry. The sight of it was not really appealing and unfortunately, so was the taste. It was too dry and the accompanying rice, crackers (papadam), and slices of bananas (yes, very strange indeed) did nothing to elevate the problem. The only thing I liked were the sambal-like condiment and the side salad.


Warm Whisky Sticky Toffee Pudding with Ice-cream
A meal is not finished without dessert so we ordered a Warm Whisky Sticky Toffee Pudding to share. Definitely very sweet but it was still yummy when eaten together with the accompanying ice-cream. In my opinion, one can hardly go wrong with the classic combination of warm & cold dessert. Then again, I would definitely not mind if they were more generous with the whisky though.

For something different and exotic, Out of Africa is definitely worth a try!

Out of Africa Restaurant and Kudu Bar
Inside Kelab Syabas, PJ State
Tel: 03-7955 3432

Still Here...(Strawberry Chocolate Gateau)

There has been a brief lapse in posting but rest assured I am still here. The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of activities, including a trip to Bangkok. Sadly, my baking had taken a backseat as a result. With Christmas coming, I have better brush up my bakings again soon.

Strawberry Chocolate Gateau
I baked this cake sometime back. It's actually a Devil's Food Cake spread with the easiest Chocolate Fudge frosting I have ever made (no cream used, only condensed milk) and decorated with fresh strawberries. The frosting was surprisingly good. Sweet as expected, but not sickening so. I believe using good semi-sweet chocolate chips in the frosting makes a difference!

But I should have waited for the frosting to cool a bit before dipping the strawberries in it. As you can see in the picture, the frosting was too thin to coat the strawberries properly.

**edited to include recipe
Extremely Easy Chocolate Glaze
1 cup good quality semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 can condensed milk
1t vanilla essence
1T Nescafe Gold (optional)
Method:
1) Heat condensed milk in saucepan over medium heat until warm state. Add in chocolate chips. Stir constantly to combine until chocolate chips are melted and the mixture is smooth. Add coffee powder and stir until it dissolves.
2) Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Cool slightly until desired spreading consistency before glazing over cakes.

I wanted to make something... (Sweet Corn Konyaku Jellies)

It has been a long time since I made anything. And I really wanted to make something. But I was slightly short of time though so I made the simplest of things - sweet corn konyaku jelly. Simple but satisfaction guaranteed! :-)

Based on this recipe.

Weekend of Indulgence: Iketeru, Hilton KL

One more post on my stay at Hilton KL, or to be more specific about my mini kaiseki course at Iketeru Japanese Restaurant.

By this time, I couldn't really recall back each individual dishes that were included in the kaiseki course., but I have pictures! *wink*


1st appetizer. The one in the middle sure looks like some cheese cake, right? It was actually some kind of egg or tofu sponge.


2nd Appetizer


Dumpling in clear broth


A selection of sashimi


Also ordered a portion of Dragon Roll


I can't remember what this was but I really liked this dish. Check out the cute buttony mushrooms.


Grilled fatty salmon. Ultra-delicious with melt-in-your mouth fatty meat.


Another main course. Not bad as well.


Rice dish. Just in case one isn't full by this time.


Finale: Desserts consisting of Goma Ice-cream, Mochi and delicioius rock melon.

Iketeru
Hilton Kuala Lumpur

Weekend of Indulgence @ Hilton KL

Here's a peek into my room. Not a big room but I love the concept. Don't get alarmed with the open-area bath/vanity room. There is a glass sliding door for those who are not inclined to shower in full view of others; unless of course if you are staying alone...


I love the bath! And also the "rain" shower. Pure bliss....

Of course it does help that the room has a big plasma screen as well.

Weekend of Indulgence: Hi-Tea @ Cosmo Lounge, Hilton KL

Haven't done much baking lately. I missed baking but for a long time now, weekends were filled with activities. Just imagine, 12 birthdays over a period of 5-6 weeks not to mention a couple of weddings here and there plus visiting friends from offshore, these were more than enough to take its toll on me. But there had been lots of eating though...hehe.

A few weeks ago, I once again spent a weekend of indulgence at my favourite hotel in KL at the moment - Hilton Kuala Lumpur. This time, was hoping to be upgraded to their Executive Floor but the furthest I got was their Honors Floor..*grin*

Anyhow, the entire afternoon was spent having hi-tea at the Cosmo Lounge. The hi-tea spread was rather small (both in selection and serving - you will see later), but was rather interesting. Everything came in bite-size servings, this was the first time I actually saw only 2 small cuts of "chee cheong fun" served on a sauce plate, and this was later reduced to just one small piece. *LOL* But the small serving worked in a sense that I got a chance to taste almost EVERYTHING at least once. Enough yakking, let's take a look at some of their spread.

Savouries

Asian appetizers. First time I saw chee cheong fun served in such miniscule serving. The grilled unagi was the best. Sadly, only 3 plates were replenished each time. Still it didn't stop me from having countless plates of this.


The prawn in cold mango consomme was yummy!


Savoury pastries.


More western-styled appetizers and various sandwiches. Not bad...Not the tuna nor egg sandwiches though. Fillings were surprisingly measly.


This was another favourite of mine, creamy mushroom in the smallest ever brioche that I came across. Small enough to pop the entire thing into your mouth at one go.

Highlight of every hi-teas - the DESSERTS!

Started with something light...


Freshly prepared crepes with choices of fillings and condiments...Delicious!



At this point, any pretense to hold back was lost. Major pig-out time!


This looks cute, doesn't it?


Another 2 of my favourites, Chocolate Truffle and Lime Creme Brulee. Truly yummilicious!


This looked ugly, I know. They called this Chocolate Fritters. Not very nice though since it was quite cold. Might be nice if served warm or when just fried.
Also included was a chocolate fountain with various condiments - fruits, marshmallows, baked goods. No need to go into details here. After all, one can never go wrong with a chocolate fountain.


What a nice way to spend the afternoon. Surrounded by a relaxing environment with live piano music, lots of yummy goodies and plenty of conversations, it's undoubtedly one of my favourite pastimes for a lazy weekend afternoon. My only gripe was the hi-tea only comes with one miserable round of coffee/tea. Duh, how stingy!

Cosmo Lounge
Hilton Kuala Lumpur

Bakerzin, a Sweet Tooth's Heaven...

By now, I would say that Bakerzin has become a name synonymous with "sweets" and "desserts". A for a sweet tooth person like me, it is almost like a 2nd home - not quite, but close. (hehheh).

Why do I like them so much? Because I reckon that they go for quality instead of quantity. Have a peak at their cake counter and you would see that most of them are rather small in portion but take a bite and you will find that only fine ingredients are used in the cakes. One exception is their Apple Strudel, which is rather monstrous in size and in my opinion the most value-for-money that I came across so far. But that's another story...

I have a few favourites from Bakerzin but today I will just introduce one of them. Named "Sweet Pleasure", it is indeed what its namesake suggests. Here's the official description of this dessert..."Layers of hazelnut praline dacquoise, Jivara milk chocolate ganache with fleur de sel, topped with chocolate mousse." Aptly described, there is nothing else I could add except to give my two thumbs up!!!

Layers of Sweet Pleasure

And myCoffee's daily quintessential: Today's pick - Cafe Late. Loved how it is prepared!

Bakerzin
1 Utama and Bangsar Shopping Village

Bitten by the 'L" Bug (Coffee Liquor Chiffon Cake, Chewy Chunky Choc Cookies, Multigrain Raisin Bread)

Yup, I have been bitten by the "L" bug; "Lazy" bug, that is. Haven't had much motivation to bake recently and partly due to that for the past few weekends, I have been attending birthday celebrations, pre-wedding gatherings, hen parties as well as wedding dinners. "Phew", September and November are such "hot" periods to get hitched.

So for the past couple of weeks, these are the only things that came out from my oven...

Coffee Liquor Chiffon Cake based on this recipe. I tweaked it a bit to use whatever ingredients I happened to have in my pantry. But anyhow, I used 5 whole eggs and as for the coffee liquor, I used Amarula instead of Kahlua. I wasn't overly satisfied with the outcome of the cake. Probably due to my substitution (i.e., quantity of eggs used), the chiffon cake was not as high as I would have like. Also, it was slightly "holey". Taste-wise, it was pretty alright. Coffee with subtle taste of the Amarula, it is more suited for adult tastebuds though.


One of my nephews, Clement had been bugging me to bake him some chocolate chip cookies. What my nephew wants, my nephew gets (ceh...). I used my current favourite chocolate chip cookie recipe. It's chewy instead of crispy. Using chocolate chunks means that you will get melted chocolate puddles when you bite into the cookie. Like this......


After all the coffee, Amarula and chocolate, I must make something healthy, right? So out came this healthy Multigrain Raisin Wholemeal Bread. I bought the pre-mixed multigrain/seeds packet from Aunt Catherine (Best23) and followed the attached recipe. Only thing that I added some molasses sugar and threw in some raisins. Yum....

MyCoffee Eats: Brunch @ Delicious Cafe

Duck & Pomelo Salad at Delicious

Been slacking lately. Both in posting and in baking. There are tons of pictures in my archive that I have yet to post. Slowly sorting them out now.

One of my favourite way to spend the morning on weekends is to have a long brunch at any of my favourite cafes or bistros. One of them is Delicious at Bangsar Village. There is almost no other better way to spend a late weekend morning than to chill out with a close friend over delicious food and coffees at one's favourite cafe/bistro.

I was there recently and saw that they had changed their menu a little. At the same time, I can't help but to notice that their breakfast menu is a lot similar to bills (a famous 'breakfast institution' in Sydney) which I went not too long ago. For example, among the dishes on the menu include ricotta pancakes as well as corn fritters.

Corned Beef Hash @ Delicious

My friend and I opted for something different. She ordered the Corned Beef Hash which was served with 2 sunnysides and some roasted baby tomatoes. I already had breakfast so I chose the Asian-influenced Duck & Pomelo Salad (see pic above) instead. Both were good although we thought that the breakfast dish was rather small portion for the price charged. I like my salad a lot. They were pretty generous with the duck slices. Coupled with lots of crushed peanuts and pomelo bits, it was truly scrumptious, especially if you are a salad lover like me.

Delicous Cafe
Ground Floor, Bangsar Village Shopping Center

MyCoffee Eats: Dinner @ Telawi Street Bistro (TSB)

A friend from Shanghai was in town recently. He said he has not been to Bangsar for ages and was keen to see the changes. So I brought him there and we had dinner at TSB.

I have been to TSB a few times although not recently. I rather like the place because I find their menu to be pretty interesting. Some of my favourites include their BBQ Salmon as well as their truffled mash.

All of us ended up having fish. My friend from Shanghai chose Cod with Nori while Ann chose Crispy Skin Sea Bass. I opted for another version of Cod, I think it was pan-fried.

Cod with Nori Strips

Crispy Skin Sea Bass

Cod, pan-fried? Served with arugula salad.
Both my friends remarked that they like what they had although Ann said she couldn't figure out any 'crispy' part on her fish. As for myself, to be honest, I couldn't remember much about my dish. I reckon it was pretty alright albeit average, not something I would re-order. The flavour was rather subdued and the accompanying salad was just, erm, salad.


Caramelized banana tart

Lemon Tart
Here are the desserts. Ann and I shared the caramelized banana tart (could not recall actual name) while my other friend had the lemon tart. Not bad, but not much 'wow' factor either. If I really need to compare, I would say I prefered the lemon tart.

Telawi Street Bistro
1-3 Jalan Telawi 3
Bangsar Baru.
Tel: 03-2284 3168