thus, the really HEAVY image food post!

yum yum yum! (dedicating this post to cook-block victim motr and birthday girl melc!) food post, with loads of courtesy from kilmenyanne (whom with much regret to have me borrow her camera phone everytime i makan in her proximity). XD (but i have to say motr and his kenneth, not kilmenyanne's kenneth, is from a different level of camwhores from me. scary.)

mid valley's uppermost floor food court "food street" has a desert stall that made this 'honeydew sago ice' (sorry, i forgot the actual name) since i did not want ice kacang (ew, kidney beans - pity kilmenyanne if she had to watch me had that). the sample photo was colourful, but when i got my order *gasp* it was not only not colourful, it was filled with santan milk. *__* coconut! nooo! but at least there wasnt any desiccated coconut.

all i was thinking was GTO, when onizuka was punished to clean the swimming pool and scooped a generous serving of 'sago lolo' down some other boy's pants.

decent (enjoyed the fine residue coconut in the santan milk, the same way i enjoy guava residue in guava juice) but poor presentation. 6/10

on 29may, big apple donuts and coffee opened a new outlet in lowyat plaza and the first 168 in queue with a cut-out coupon (from The Star) will redeem free half dozen donuts! i dragged kilmenyanne up early (since we had no morning class) and queued from 10am. we were only 79th and 80th in line! i was right, its great to get free stuff at places where parents/kids dont throng.

the queue behind me began to form with average of two three person joining the line every minute. one or two staff was photographing the procession (but probably disappointed the ticket number hasnt been filled up). just before 11am, there were two brilliantly red lions dancing to welcome the opening of the store. the queue began to move (and fast) before the lion dance end.

finally, the queue had to come to an end. we (the spotty-faced food critics) got to the queue and received two boxes of half dozen donuts.. saw a very determined (either starved or kiasu) aunty took home six or eight boxes to herself - that's three or four dozen! we left for college with a dozen big apple donuts, and stuffed ourselves silly that i had brought home half.

not being biased but i prefer j.co donuts to big apple's (but i enjoyed the cream puff ones). 7/10

pretzel time! auntie anne's pretzel was having free pretzel day on 19june throughout all their outlets in malaysia, except for penang queensbay mall which was on 20june, redemption from 11am until 2pm for original- and cinnamon-flavoured pretzels only. due to some travelling time allowance we did not get to the klcc outlet by 10am, but like i told them, dont worry coz the queue cannot possibly be longer than 79 or 80 in line before us. i queued up with kilmenyanne and psycho at 11am and the queue was just charming dahling. all the way in front.

the queue was already moving the moment we got in line and i was not too surprised that the queue was short since it was a weekday when many are working, not shopping at klcc. we three ordered the cinnamon pretzel and went to sit at Dome to eat our pretzels. as usual, they slapped generous amount of sugar on the pretzel, that once we were done with eating, there was a large tbspful of cinnamon sugar left at the bottom of the wrapper. only i licked up mine. ohh~~diabetes.

after that, i suggested we leave for BTS (berjaya time square) auntie anne's outlet for another round of pretzel since we still had time before 2pm, but we just sat at Dome for free, too (coz starbucks will kick freeloaders for keeping their chairs warm). also coz i thought since BTS was such a common place, their outlet qould generate a longer fussier queue. then psycho was headed to 1Utama for a movie, so kilmenyanne suggested he get another round of free pretzel at AA's outlet there, but he decided against it. (did the epic freeloader fail to guest18? pass on the crown, psycho.) instead, i went back to klcc AA to get my second pretzel.

auntie anne's pretzel is unbeatable (but i miss churros a lot - will review it when i know where to get some again). want moar~ 9/10

scones! just kidding, i was only being random. no scones available, sorry. this time, i'll review food at the clubhouse cafeteria at college. it used to be run by a malay/chinese caterer (whose cooks takes forever to get to your order), but now it has becomed your average mamak hangout since it is now run by an indian caterer. (am not being racists). what i usually order with a bunch of hooligan members are: limau ais, teh o ais, teh o limau ais, maggie goreng/sup, mee goreng biasa/mamak, nasi briyani, all sort of ayam and kambing side dishes. XD

i dont want to say i enjoy this place (not because to prove "campus food sux" but) because they feed everyone too much sugar and salt and MSG and oil. the drinks we order are still sweet even when kurang manis and the food is generously greasy. (like i said, your average mamak hangout.) no matter, we still eat there 5-6 times a day or just sit there talk about one another's interesting or uninteresting sex life while drinking teh o ais and teh o limau ais (only i order limau ais - sometimes the hooligans spike my drink with tea, if left to my own we usually water down our drinks).

its the atmosphere that we stay in (not away from) the cafe all day and warm the seats and ask for "teh o ais une" over and over again. (teh o limau ais is slighty bitter if you prod the limau too much with your straw.) i recommend you add a hard-boiled quail egg as side dish; more cholesterol than chicken egg. 6/10

there's a new place in town! not. it was only last weekend that i was reading a review about Amuleto by crystal jade at mid valley boulevard, but like all other review, i dont read the words and looked at the photos only.

what made me want to drop by for a visit was the interior. tres chic. according to The Star review (as much that i had read), it was a fusion of spanish and asian food. some may say it is a risky attempt. kilmenyanne's just said it has been open for two months. imagine my surprise when i got there...

as you can see, i straight away jumped to the photos instead of telling you what was my surprise. but no, it wasnt that they served complimentary drinks! perhaps because it was almost 3pm on a weekday and not many businessman would take their clients to a chic-themed boutique restaurant for their third lunch of the day, but that's no reason to have only three customers at one point of the evening! yes, i meant the three of us, kilmenyanne, visha and i. (oops, i have split opinion now that im not biased to promote this place.)

we had iced cappucino, amuleto punch (me!), coke (visha's idea), cheesy baked rice with seafood, and rosti with mushroom gravy. the cappucino was not at great as the price, says kilmenyanne (someone who does not enjoy starbucks) 5/10. sorry, i paraphrased that line. as for amuleto punch, i enjoyed picking out my fruit slices, but it does not compare to halo cafe's mocktails, 6/10. cheesy baked rice was filling and cheesy (that even now my mouth is salivating) but the seafood was not as great as far as fresh can go, 8/10. my rosti had a tasty mushroom gravy, but you have to like soggy potatoes to eat the center of the rosti that was exposed most to the gravy, 8/10. (biased rating for cheese and potatoes.)

so you see, i went there again on last friday with motr and his kenneth for lunch. *palmface* was it them or was it amuleto's fault? there was a lot not to like about amuleto that day. (i dont have photos for this second review as the boys kept it to themselves.) kenneth ordered tomato juice. @_@ and then he ordered spagetti-something that had loads of tomato. motr ordered.. gah, memory loss - cant remember but he had a choice to have it with rice or spagetti. i ordered cordon bleu - and THAT was IT.

now, motr has a food blog, so he may be critical but i'll agree with him this time. CORDON BLEU 2/10 (markah kesian for presentation). it failed because the worst bit was THERE WAS NO SIGHT OF CHEESE. i told him i dont mind my cordon bleu serving was small but when i cut it in half to watch the cheese flow onto the plate...its just plain disappointing. as for both his and kenneth's order, they rated 8/10 but changed his mind to 7/10. i dont understand how amuleto can be so generous with cheese on the cheesy baked rice, but totally failed cordon bleu. (i think the chef sucked out the excess cheese coz i noticed a tiny hole at one end of the cordon bleu.) whyyy? i liked that place.. (no average rating for this - they vary too much.)

next and finally, i shall review the food at college's student restaurant this semester. (culinary and hospitality students in charge.) i was there with kilmenyanne and visha to try the lasagne but it was not on current week's menu (currently western). so we ordered appetizers, desserts and drinks; and waited for a while, drinking free-flow iced sky juice. (visha said she saw our assigned waiteress spilled so much cappucino on the tray that she returned to the kitchen, thus delayed, without informing us.)

according to the two girls who ordered cappuccino each, it was too bitter but after they added sugar, (and i unfortunately tasted it) too sweet! these girls are sending me to diabetes ward too soon. (they also suspected it was not ground but instant powder coffee.) then came kilmenyanne's mushroom soup which was o-m-g. can you imagine cooking 'socks soup' where you boil dirty socks and stir until thick? mind you, the (mushroom) soup was tasty but we think it was over-flavoured! it does taste like they dumped a big packet of black mushrooms (instead of button mushrooms!) into boiling water and cooked so long that the soup tastes of nothing but mushroom (coz i thought it tasted like 'chinese mushroom soup'). they couldnt even fake the colour (the photo is accurate.)

the chicken pie was also too flavourful. the crust was not all safe-crumbly but salty crust-chunk. and they used frozen vege - which was forgivable but they were dry and uncooked bits! the whole thing tastes like chicken (crust and fillings) but thats not the point of a chicken pie, and visha did not want to finish it. (i bet the chef got a telling from the face of the waitress who reported to the manager.)

then came my apple pie with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. it has a presentation if not for the shivering waitress who made the ice-cream topple off the slice sponge cake (which acts as a sponge when the ice cream melts). *chomp* over-flavoured! the whole thing tastes like apple, sweet and sour (from raisins). honestly, the student chef do not know how to control how much flavour that should be in a dish. in the end, the ice-cream spread all over my plate as it was not melting directly on top of the sponge slice (which was too small a slice yet was not invisible - it is supposed to be invisible or at least not a sore eye).

finally, the long-awaited tiramisu cake. umm, no comment. we did order a second helping four minutes before they were scheduled to close. heres the second slice.
we believe cakes have been rumoured to be made by the lecturers themselves, but i cannot say it tastes like real tiramisu. its just cocoa powder, cream, ice cream layer(?!), cream again and coffee bottom crust. its weird. nothing wrong, the flavour was moderately spread on both tasting, but odd.

because it was a 'learning process' for them students, i'll comment on the service as well. our waitress, lets call her Alis, was too polite (thanking us every step of the way), forgetful and not alert. Alis took too long to write down our orders; forgot to take away the menu after taking our orders; when she did clear away the fourth person plates et all she left behind the drinking glass; shivered too much as she served our orders and as she cleared our plates. (ouch.) we simply give them 5/10 (passing mark, coz we dint die of food flavour poisoning).

oh and, one last stop was at wendy's in ioi mall. kilmenyanne and i went there yesterday and we vowed to never return. at first she wanted to try wendy's because it was really good at philippines when she first ate at wendy's, but did not think it would be so boring to have it in malaysia. (just a selection of chicken, beef, and fish.) i ordered chicken-something burger with cheese (its not the premium chicken i remember; the chicken was elasticly chewy, the edges was slightly overdone and hard instead of crunchy, and the cheese was ridiculous) while she got the 1/4 quarter pound burger (which she commented was just edible, "all sauce, not much flavour on the beef" and omg-even-the-vege-drowned-in-the-sauce).

thus, not worthy of a photo because it could easily be mistaken as any other fast food burger, since they werent very creative. other choices was like "baked potato with ----- and cheese," "baked potato with cheese and cheese," "baked potato with sour cream and -----," "baked potato with sour cream," and "chilli" (omg, they resort to sell "chilli" and it contains beef).

maybe it was just this outlet, but it was a horrible atmosphere: it was a weekend (human galore), wendy's has kiddy meals that come with a free toy (children clutter), but no playground (mobile sirens running about), the place was almost fully carpeted (its the only restaurant i see is carpeted and is not a fancy chinese restaurant - i mean, food+children+carpet?). the whole place was scary, to think that at burger king the ratio was thin-thin-thin-fat people ratio, here was thin-thin-fat-fat ratio. the whole experience just felt like i visited a mass production factory. (we much prefer carl's jr. thank you very much.) 2/10

okay, time to go back to your own food blog, motr. i speed up my post to early of the week instead of end of the week, coz im not sure i can handle three assignments and one bottle of smirnoff vodka together in a week.