He Pin Pan Mee Old Town, PJ

He Pin Coffee shop is tucked way in Old Town PJ and this old coffee shop bungalow is famous for the Pan Mee and Economy Rice. This place is normally packed to the rafters during lunch hour as well as the weekends.. and you get the Malay rice, Chinese Economy rice , Indian mee rebus stalls, all under one roof. Extremely Malaysian International.


The lady boss makes the Pan Mee noodles at a 100 miles an hour..


Squeeze, peel, pull and chuck into hot water.


..and repeat!


The bowl of Pan Mee for RM4 is ridiculously delicious. The pork soups stock is thick and sweet, the anchovies fried to perfection, the floating mince pork and mushrooms.. fresh as hell.
The chili is astronomically spicy. It had me in tears because I chucked 2 saucers of it into my soup, and then ate up Cumi's share by dipping my anchovies in it as well!
Talk about masochistic.

Pain!
So good.

but, PAIN!


The texture of the Pan Mee.. slightly slimy, chewy and al dente.
So good!
Must eat!

The way to this place.. He Pin coffee shop is located near Jalan 51/200.

To find it, take Jalan Penchala in Petaling Jaya and travel right to the end of the road.

Hua Xing Restoran Sungai Way

This restaurant that has been around for the longest time, is still a hot favourite with my family and the in-laws. Their Hokkien cuisine is famous and has never been short of endorsements from celebrities, both young and old alike.
Judging from the glossy, ads that adorn their walls, you can tell that Hua Xing has recently re-laminated their newspaper cuttings and wall photo-menu!


What is this place famous for?
The crispy eggplant with killer garlic chunks. The eggplant is coated with their special frying batter that is slightly sweet yet savory.
Only Hua Xing knows the secret recipe obviously.



Also famous is the Tapioca Noodles - non-halal due to the pork bits that comes with it.
The texture of the noodle is springy and chewy.. 'elastic' (for want of a better description, rubber-band like texture, but edible/digestible.. if you catch my drift.)
The wok-hei is excellent and the lard bits really give the noodles a fantastic aroma.



Another big favourite with our family is the bittergourd Hokkien Mee. The noodles this time was slightly over-cooked but in the past this has been another great fried noodle dish. The flavour of this bittergourd-dark-sauce-lard-noodle is a true classic!
We will never tire of eating here.

Add:
Restoran Hua Xing,
No. 1-12, 1st Floor,
Plaza Seri Setia,
Jalan SS9/2,
Seri Setia, Sungai Way,
Petaling Jaya

Tel: 603 7876 3288

Chef Choi

Cumi & Ciki were recently invited along with Masak-masak, A Whiff of Lemongrass and Fatboybakes, to a food tasting at Chef Choi.

For those who are wondering where Chef Choi is (like moi.. drove past a zillion time but never noticed) , it is located en route Bukit Bintang, just as you past MCA and the temple (entering Bukit Bintang) and before Pelita Nasi Kandar. Chef Choi has been established since 2003 and we were really excited to try their authentic Cantonese cuizine.

Their restaurant is apparently famous for its suckling pig, foie gras, Live Steamed Fish with Special Sauce, Buddha Jump Over The Wall, Japanese Kobe Beef/ Matsukaya Beef, Aromatic Duck with Pancakes and Crispy Prawns with Haw Flakes. We heard rumours of desserts such as Hollowed Out Papaya filled with Almond Milk, White Fungus and Lotus Seed, Sweet Red Bean Paste with 12 years Mandarin Peel and Poached Pear with Red Wine and Amaretto Liqueur and were just revving to go!




First up, the Matsukaya Beef, Prawn roll and the Foie Gras.
Two melt in your mouth items sandwich a crispy, flaky prawn spring roll. Pretty ingenious if you ask me.



Here is the foie gras. Sinfully delicious. I ate mine whole with the slab of bread it sat on. Many of my companions decided to leave the bread - to save room for the rest of the food. I guess they were pretty smart as you will soon see for yourself.


No, ..this in not the latest installment of the horror flick, SAW, but it is in fact FBB wrestling with his bones...
Duck bones to be precise.


The Aromatic Duck appeared, disappeared and re-emerged as these delicate rolls you see in the collage. The bones are fried up so crispy and thin that you can actually eat them like keropok. That's what FBB was doing in the photo.. eating his crispy fried up aromatic duck bones (but with added special effects obviously).

I found the meat rather dry. This was my least favourite of all the dishes.


This suckling pig was amazing! Melt in your mouth fat, but crispy outer skin, and the most tender of piggy meats you can imagine.

Sigh, if the dinner ended here, I would not have complained.
Apparently only RM168 for this baby. Extremely value for money if you ask me!


The jumbo prawns in superior soya sauce were a tad salty for me.

The steamed chicken with the freshly prepared young ginger sauce was to die for! The dish looks pale, boring almost in comparison to the other dishes, but let me just say that there was nothing boring about the taste.
I could just eat this chicken with the ginger sauce and rice and be a happy camper.

Deep fried Soon Hock! I prefer mine steamed but there's always a first time for everything.. Lovely fish. You cannot go wrong with the Soon Hock.



Then begins our Ménage à quatre!

Here starts our love affair with the noodles.
Let me just say that the noodles at Chef Choi are exquisite. How they managed to make noodles/comfort food taste like a 2 or 1 Michelin star dish, is beyond me.

From top left to right - The lobster Yee Mee noodle, the tomato sauce chicken noodle, the Sang Mee tossed in prawn roe(man.. my favourite!) and finally the translucent, chewy soy based noodle. All had distinct taste and textures. All were winners in their own right.
Words cannot describe. Go try it for yourselves!


FBB, once again.. doing what he does best.. preening for the camera:P
(He'll stick his finger in almost any inviting crack..)


Finally, when your stomach is screaming stop! and your head tells you, no more! it's time to push the limits and order desserts.



Creme brulee, mango cream, Almond Milk With Papaya and Choc Cake with lava fudge centre and ice-cream.
What can I tell you. They were all great. My personal favourites were the Almond Milk Papaya (pungent and with loads of kick!) and also the Mango Cream - silky, smooth and rich as sin.

Here ends the wonderful dining experience at Chef Choi.

Anyway, a big thank you to the organizer, the lovely Ms Marian Eu for the invitation,
and also to the charming, Ms Chan for hosting! We sat in awe, riveted by your tales of eating excursions, your dive stories, tales from the depths and what not. Rarely do we have the pleasure of the company of a host who is so well informed on so many current and pertinent topics:)

We will be back!



Add:
Chef Choi,
159, Jalan Ampang,
50450 K.L.
Tel : 03-2163 5866
Fax : 03-2164 6463
E-Mail : general@chefchoi.com

Char Siew Zhai Wantan Mee

We've seen this place packed with people during the lunchtime and we wanted to check out the roasted meats and the wantan noodle in this shop.

We ordered our noodles separate and ordered portions of Roast Duck, Roast Pork and BBQ Pork.

The texture of the wantan noodle was not bad. It had a nice, slightly sweet, dark sauce flavour to it.
The Charsiew (BBQ Pork) was dry, tough even, and the Duck was overly soft and had not much flavour in the meat, though the sauce used to cover it was rather strong tasting. It was as if someone had just cooked the duck for way too long and all the essence had gone out of the flesh.

Of the three, the Siew Yoke(Roast Pork) was the nicest but by no means the best I have tried in PJ or KL. The other interesting thing was the guy with the Mohawk flipping the wantan noodles high into the air, backwards, forwards.. over his crazy mohawk, like some Apache, high on Cactus Peyote!

Char Siew Zhai Wantan Mee is located in Sea Park, opposite the Giant supermarket.