Lam’s Place – from Menggatal, Sabah

lams place

Lam’s Place is the new eating establishment in Chong Lin Park
specializing in ngui chap (beef noodles). It just opened a couple of
days ago – it’s located right beside Waterworld. The place has a banner
that says: From Menggatal, Sabah’s “Ngui Chap” (Beef Noodles etc) & others available now!
I have a juvenile sense of humor so I didn’t really get over the
“menggatal” reference. Menggatal can mean ham sup or horny…a rather
unfortunate name for a town.

lams place interior

This is what the interior looks like. It’s pretty packed,
considering I arrived late. Their opening hours are from 8 AM – 2:30 PM
and 5:30 PM – 8:30 PM. The seating arrangements (a pretentious word for
tables and chairs ;)) consists of perfectly square wooden tables meant
for 4 people.

lams place thingies

They have a variety of condiments on the table and this place
operates by writing down your order into a bill, which is then
tabulated and placed in an ornament on your table. You take it to the
cashier and pay the bill when you’re done.

lams place beef noodles

Here’s my order – Raw beef & beef balls with noodles (RM 5.50).
The wet (soup) version is basically the same thing, but they combine
the noodles in the big bowl of soup instead of in a separate bowl.
Lam’s Place serves beef noodles as its staple (both the wet and dry
version), though you can opt to have rice to substitute the noodles if
you want. I’m not a big fan of soup dishes, so I went for Raw Beef and
Beef Balls noodles (dry).

lams place noodles

This is a closer look at the noodles. The noodles taste absolutely
great! I can’t remember having a more delicious bowl since this beef
noodle stall in Sibu shut down. It was infused with a variety of tangy
and salty flavors.

lams place beef soup

Here’s a photo of the soup, served separately. There are beef balls
floating on the top (don’t think they’re home made), with beef slices
at the bottom, flanked with veggies and bean sprouts. The soup was not
as salty as I like it to be, but the salty noodles more than makes up
for that. The main portion was very generous too, though I would have
liked a larger bowl of noodles.

lams place beef slice

This is the raw beef slice that’s put into the bowl before serving
to slowly cook. I love it – the beef doesn’t get overcooked this way.

I highly recommend this place if you have a hankering for beef
noodles. It’s their specialty and they have great service. I’m not sure
if the service is the type typical of newly opened eateries or they
really do have good service, but that hardly matters considering the
food. They apologized for my order taking so late to arrive (I didn’t
even think it was that long of a wait) and I was asked whether I
enjoyed my meal and how my food was when I paid the bill. I told them
it was good. πŸ™‚

I’ll reply all the comments later, I’ve got to head out now. Cheers!

Sushi Tie

sushi tie

Sushi Tie is another Japanese food establishment in Sibu. My
girlfriend’s brother works there and we decided to head over for dinner
tonight.

sushi tie interior

Sushi Tie is another outlet which embraces the “open kitchen”
concept. The interior is slightly larger that Akira Sushi, but most of
it comprises of sushi bar style seating with only a couple of booths.

sushi tie open kitchen

There isn’t a revolving sushi bar in here…instead, the space is
taken up by chefs preparing your order and you can actually see them go
about it while you wait with your green tea. The view is rather
obstructed from our end – it’s better at the seating booths, but all
those were taken and I didn’t want to impose on their dining experience
by squeezing in and taking a shot. πŸ™‚

sushi tie green tea

We were served green tea while we waited for our orders to arrive.
It was the conventional hot water with green tea sachet type instead of
the proper brewed ones. Not that I could differentiate between the two.
*cough* It’s just something I noticed.

sushi tie chirashi don

I had the Chirashi Don which goes for RM 10.50. It has various
slices of sushi like salmon, tuna, prawn, basically the cold raw cuts
on top of rice. It came with a wonderful side dish which I can’t put my
finger on, but it was good.

sushi tie unagi don

My girlfriend had the Unagi Don. That’s eel on top of rice. It
wasn’t her first choice, she wanted chicken terikayi, but I wanted to
broaden her dining horizons so I kinda ordered for her. :p This one was
very good, the eel came out all oily (in a good way) and tasty.

sushi tie miso

The food was all served with a steaming bowl of miso soup.

sushi tie hokkigai

This is hokkigai sushi. That’s raw whelk. It was surprisingly fresh
and tasty. The offerings of Sushi Tai far surpass Akira Sushi in terms
of fresh produce.

sushi tie maguro sashimi

We shared some maguro sashimi as well. Or rather, I ate most of it,
since my gf doesn’t like these things. It’s good, and cheap, at RM 3.90.

sushi tie slimy

Now this is the obligatory “slimy dish” – chuka itako/hotate/kurage
(baby octopus, scallop wing, jelly fish). I managed to get my gf to eat
one of it, despite her protests.

The bill came out to around RM 40 (without alcohol, they don’t serve
sake or Japanese beer here). I like Sushi Tie, the ambience is much
better compared to Akira Sushi and the preparations seems to be less
“mass produced” and is generally fresher and thus more pleasing to the
palate. I highly recommend the Chirashi Don and Unagi Don, they were
perfect, surprisingly so for Sibu. I give this establishment a big
thumbs up. Plus, you just gotta love this sign:

sushi tie sign

Akira Sushi

akira sushi

Akira Sushi is a newly opened sushi bar at the 4th Floor of Wisma
Sanyan, Sibu. It’s the first one to feature the revolving sushi bar
style dining experience here. I have been meaning to check out this
place so I went there for dinner with my girlfriend.

akira sushi interior

The eating establishment isn’t very large in terms of size, but
that’s not surprising since space at Wisma Sanyan is rather limited and
seems to be allocated and constructed wholesale for retail outlets. The
place was near seating capacity when we were there.

akira sushi bar

We only had sushi – the offerings from the sushi bar, so I cannot
comment on their other cooked menu items. The menu even has the
obligatory numbering system so that even the most intellectually
challenged amongst us can place an order.

akira menu

There is also another sushi specific menu plastered on the wall,
lest people unfamiliar with this style of dining get the price confused.

akira sushi menu

There are a wide range of beverages on offer, including sake, but it’s priced on the high side, so I settled for Asahi instead.

akira asahi
Beer and sushi…mmm…made my stomach feel funny. πŸ˜‰

Here’s what we ate:

akira crab
This is my favourite one…I haven’t seen it in other places, perhaps
it’s this establishment’s signature dish, er…sushi. This sushi has
two deep fried whole real crabs as the topping. My gf would have nothing to do with it though.

akira squid
I love this one as well…it’s squid, I think. My gf would have nothing
to do with this as well either, coz it’s “slimy”. I like slimy stuff.

akira tuna
She ate the more conventional sushi offerings like tuna…

akira unagi
Unagi topped concoction. She chose it and I had one. It’s good. Smoked eel.

akira octopus
This one is octopus, one of my favourites.

akira prawn
Here’s a prawn sushi.

akira ginger
Picked ginger pieces are available from the revolving bar. I was
pleased to see this. I’m used to eating one after each different sushi
to “wash out” the taste of the previous one and have a clean palate for
the next one. Pretentious terms, I know, I know, but seriously, that’s
what it’s good for. πŸ˜‰

akira revolving sushi
Here’s another photo of the revolving sushi bar…

akira girl opposite
and a photo of a girl I accidentally took opposite us. She looks like a happy diner.

akira cashier
Our meal came to RM 35, and that isn’t expensive at all.

My only gripe is that some of the items on offer seem stale and the
sushi chef did not “cycle” out the stale ones, nor did he add new items
to the sushi bar fast enough. Otherwise, it’s a great place to go if
you’re after a sushi bar dining experience, cramped as it may be. πŸ™‚

Casabella Mediterranean Restaurant

casabella restaurant

This is Casabella Mediterranean Restaurant, located at the Ground
Floor of Crown Square. It serves Mediterranean and Asian fusion
cuisine. I went there with a dining companion for dinner. It was at
about half capacity on a weekday, perfect for dinner with conversation.

casabella interior

We took a corner table at the restaurant. The interior has paintings
with a Mediterranean motif and the seating arrangements (a pretentious
term for tables and chairs ;)) are nicely square. The service was
pleasant and accommodating, by Kuching’s standards. It’s a good place
to have dinner.

casabella fruit drink

casabella mango smoothie

We were served drinks first – my dining companion had lime juice
that came with bits of jellied fruits at the bottom while I had a mango
smoothie that was frothy and rich.

casabella turkish mussels

The entree dish which we shared is the Turkish Style Pan Fried Mussels.
It was served with a tomato based sauce and two pieces of garlic bread.
The garlic bread was made the way I liked – crusty on the sides and
soft on the insides, which soaks up the sauce well. There was quite a
generous amount of mussels served with the shell intact and split for
convenience.

casabella egyptian fish

I asked about their specialty and was recommended the Egyptian Fish.
This is deep fried fish with Egyptian spice, served with a special
sauce fries on the side. It tasted pretty good – the fish was nicely
fried on the outside with batter and soft and tender on the inside. I
liked the sauce too – goes well with the fries.

casabella kebab

My dining companion had the Chicken Kebab. It was served in a
kebab skewer with alternating chicken pieces and button mushrooms on
top of a piece of nan bread. The dish also had a whole piece of lettuce
and half a grilled tomato. I had a taste of that – the naan bread was
toasty, yet springy, but the chicken kebab was nothing to write home
about.

Nevertheless, I liked the ambience and food here – recommended if you’re in Kuching.

Japanese Pizza!

ichiban teppanyaki

There is this wonderful Japanese Pizza available at either I-Chi-Ban
Teppanyaki or Economy Tepanyaki (depending on which sign you look at)
at Tabuan Jaya. I had this last night as well, and this eating
establishment scene preceded the teh c peng post chronologically.

chef jap pizza

This is the proprietor preparing my Japanese Pizza. Watch him shape the pizza into, er…a pizza.

japanese pizza

Now this, my friends, is the Japanese Pizza. It looks and tastes
wonderful. Those brown flaky things on top are cuttlefish! There is a
layer of pork floss between the topping and the pancake. Lovely! The
sauce is a mayonnaise – Thousand Island fusion topping, which goes
really well with the ingredients. There are some brown onion skins
which adds to the taste too.

japanese pizza closeup

Here’s a closer look at the pancake. This is the interior, which
shows raw onions, meat and some other stuff. It’s not authentic
Japanese cruisine, obviously, but this goes for RM 4, and the portion
is generous, which is a great bargain!

boon taiwan sausage

Ah Boon had a plate of chicken chop and this Taiwan sausage (shown
above) which I had as well. Ah Ann had some rice with beef and onions
and Miriam had the Japanese Pizza as well.

I will rewind the events of last night to the last post (which is
chronologically the second post after the initial post) in this series
which lead to me throwing up in the middle of the night in a dirty
longkang in Tabuan Jaya.

Lau Siong Pork Leg Rice

lau siong pork rice

This is Lau Siong Pork Leg Rice at Yam Seak Cafe in Padungan. They
serve pork leg rice as their main feature and also has chicken, duck
and curry rice.

lau siong proprioters

This is a photo of the proprietors preparing (chopping up basically)
your order. I was there for lunch just now. My apologies for the
underexposed photo – there was a strong backlight and using flash would
just show the people and wash out the food details at the back.

my pork leg rice

Here’s my order. Lau Siong Pork Leg Rice serves three sauces with
every order. There is the standard black sauce that the pork leg is
cooked in, a curry that’s REALLY good when it’s hot and belacan.

pork leg rice closeup

A closer look at the dish – there’s the sliced up pork leg, some
intestines, and BBQ chicken. It’s alright, but my favorite pork leg
rice is this home cooked stall near the place I stay. Does anyone know
of a better pork leg rice stall in Kuching?

Bread Story

breadstory story

Psst…let me tell you a story. A BreadStory. It’s one of the hottest stories going around.

It’s a story about Hand Parcels…

breadstory hand parcel

Hand Parcel
RM 2.50
Like its name, it’s wholly hand-crafted. Tender juicy chicken stewed
in a special gravy and bundled up with this special wrap. Please untie
parcel with Mouth only!

about Golden Pillows…

breadstory golden pillow

Golden Pillow
RM 2.50
A soft pillow of golden treasures like our very own creation of
sambal shrimps with chicken floss rolled into a delicious pillow.

and about Flossy Hotties.

breadstory flossy hottie

Flossy Hottie
RM 2.60
A new taste of Spicy chicken floss specially prepared for this
exotic Hottie! Special spices with special cream, another BreadStory’s
Signature!

Chinese Barbecue Specialist

chinese barbecue specialist

Chinese Barbecue Specialist. It’s a big name to live up to. This
outlet is located at the end of Jalan Padungan and it’s quite famous
for it’s barbecue offerings. I went there for lunch today. This is what
the stall looks like:

chinse barbeque specialist

Apparently, the “e” has fallen off the sign, showing “Chin Se
Barbecue Specialist”, which puzzled me for a while since the shop sign
is Chinese Barbecue Specialist. This is the flagship of the coffee
shop, don’t go asking for steamed chicken or anything like that – this
outlet offers BBQ meat only.

chinese bbq offerings

As you can see, there are several BBQ stuff on offer. You can order
BBQ chicken rice, but to fully appreciate the wonders of barbecue meat,
you have to try the “mixed plate”. There are other BBQ staples like
char siew rice, pork ribs rice, etc. Basically just about anything you
see in the picture above is available in whatever combination you can
think of.

chinese bbq chopping

Your choice (in this case “mixed plate”) is prepared by the proprietor…and it’s delivered to your table:

chinese bbq mixed

There’s the fork and spoon with a napkin, sorry, i mean tissue,
broth, apologies, i mean soup (this joke is getting old, isn’t it? ;)),
sauces and a plate of mixed bbq stuff rice.

chinese bbq closeup

Here’s a closer look at the plate. There’s barbecue chicken (the
white stuff), crispy pork (the brown crispy stuff) and char siew (pork
cuts of an unknown origin). This is all lying on a bed of chicken rice.
It tastes really good, despite the simple appearance.

chinese bbq sauce

These are the two sauces – the BBQ sauce and the chilli sauce. You
want the barbecue sauce (the brown one). This is the secret to a good
BBQ meat meal…the sauce makes the dish (or something). Just liberally
apply the barbecue sauce and you’ll definately enjoy your meal. I like
this place, there’s a homely sort of feel to it, and they serve good
barbecue meat. Do they deserve the “specialist” title? Personally, I
think they do. πŸ™‚

Boxing Chicken Rice

scr food corner

Boxing chicken rice! Doesn’t that sound intriguing? The name of the
dish is the best selling point of this rather mundane (but tasty)
preparation. I was searching for food just now (I’m typing this at
home, so it would be “last night” by the time you read this) and walked
past the Singapore Chicken Rice (scr) stall which seems to have
expanded their menu to include the chicken rice variants like salad
chicken rice etc. I was interested in boxing chicken rice though.

scr shrubbery

My apologies about the foliage that obscured the right side of the
first picture. I couldn’t very well move it, look at the size of the
shrubbery and pot. Photographing the outlet from the other side would
miss the main menu wall which has boxing chicken rice (watch the virus
infected chicken box each other!) photo on it.

boxing chicken rice

This is the photo of the menu banner which depicts the Boxing
Chicken Rice dish. It appears to be dubbed boxing chicken rice due to
the double chicken drumsticks…I imagine some marketing person thought
that looks like the chicken are having fist fights or something to that
effect.

scr boxing chicken rice

This is the Real Life (TM) photo of the dish. It doesn’t differ all
that much from the menu picture which is a pleasant surprise. The
drumsticks are the small ones from the wing of the chicken. It tastes
like Ayamas mini drumsticks without the Ayamas flavor. The boxing
chicken rice had a great sweet and sour sauce permeating the dish, this
imparts a nice taste everything. There is also a nicely done sunny side
up egg and some veggies. The rice is chicken rice eg real chicken rice.
I liked it, it’s a nice change from the normal chicken rice Singapore
Chicken Rice offers.

On another topic, does anyone know any er…”duty free” liquor
outlets in Kuching? I used to know one in 3rd mile – fly by night
operation, closed down the same year it opened (when I was in Inti). In
case anyone is wondering what “duty free” liquor outlets are, they’re
the ones that buys in bulk from duty free Federal Territories like
Labuan (usually) and Langkawi (unlikely due to distance) and sells them
at a reduced price (RM 40 – 60 each 750 ml bottle), undercutting
legitimate bottle shops price wise. I didn’t have any problems in KL –
Svenskt Brannvin vodka @ RM 30 (40% 700 ml bottle) in the Swedish
Specialty Shop at your friendly local Ikea outlet. πŸ˜‰ Thanks for the
tip, Stephanie! I brought several bottles of that and O.P.
Anderson Fine Old Aquavit (another bargain buy @ RM 22.90 for 500 ml,
40% vol) over but er…inventory levels have dropped below the
personally preset threshold level so a re-stock is necessary to
maintain consistant amounts.

vodka vodka

If my math is right, I need at least 1/4 bottle with benzos to sleep
each night, since I drank about 1 1/4 bottles since I arrived (not
including other alcohol containing beverages). Anyone who has a problem
with this can send mail to devnull@sixthseal.com which would naturally
be routed to /dev/null. I go to work on time, I do my work well since
I’ve had a good night’s sleep (I don’t get hangovers, since I hydrate
myself before sleeping), and so what I do at night (which is legal btw)
is my own business. Anyway, any kang tau about duty free in Kuching,
please email to veritas@castitas.com
instead of commenting here okay? Thanks! By the way, I told the truth
about the email addresses – there really is no veritas@castitas.com or
a veritas@sixthseal.com, they all go to the me@castitas.com and
me@sixthseal.com catch all address. So there. :p

P/S – Before the harm reduction police (HRP) jump on me, let me
state that some people think that benzodiazepines combined with another
CNS depressant like alcohol will instantly put you six feet under.
Please do not mock them, for they’re looking out for you, and indeed,
this combination has caused fatalities in the past, but er…it’s not
as dangerous as the HRP makes it sound. But you did not see that last
sentence! I repeat, you did not see that last sentence. Please don’t
drink and take benzodiazepines at the same time. Thank you very much,
I’ve done my civic duty.

P/P/S – I have to tone down the sarcasm, it seems to dominating my posts lately, forgive me. πŸ™‚

P/P/P/S – The conglomeration of veritas and killuminati into a
single entity may have caused unexpected perceived changes in
personality. My apologies, now that I’ve admitted everything, I have no
obligation to stick to the “personalities” that I’ve created. I’m being
the real me now, a bit of an asshole at times, quite a lot of “drug
elitism”, sometimes sarcastic, but generally I like to think I’m a nice
guy, so I hope that you can forgive any transgressions and adapt and
perhaps get to like me as me. πŸ™‚

P/P/P/P/S – I was ethanol impaired when I wrote the above last night…

All Joy Good Food Center

all joy good food center

This is All Joy good food center in Wisma Saberkas. I was surprised
to see this outlet still standing when I went to Saberkas to get a
monitor during my lunch break. There is some nostalgia when I saw the
familiar sign and dining place – it hasn’t changed at all from memory.
I remember going here often when I was younger and living in Kuching,
so you can imagine how long this establishment has been going.

all joy food display

I can’t say there’s much going on, food wise, at All Joy. To tell
you the truth, I don’t even know why my family used to dine here often.
Their offerings don’t seem to have changed at all and it’s nothing to
write home about. I have vague memories of going for their King Burger,
but that was it. I ate one of their rice dishes this time – it was what
the others used to eat last time.

all joy waitress

I had Sze Chuan Chicken Rice (RM 3.80) and a popia (RM 1.50)with
special cendol (RM 1.50). The rice isn’t chicken rice ie chicken
flavored rice, I knew that from previous visits. It’s rice with the
dish of your choice, and there isn’t much on offer. My apologies about
the messed up photo – I wanted a candid shot of the All Joy waitress
bringing my tray of food over, but I miscalculated the fast flash lag
time and only got a partial shot.

all joy lunch

This is my lunch. From left: The packaged utensils and a serviette
(which is a fucking pretentious word people use to describe paper
napkins, which is in turn a fucking pretentious name people give to
tissues ;)), a bowl of broth (which is a fucking pretentious name for
soup, and please, feel free to throw the hot bowl of soup at anyone who
uses the terms “serviette” or “broth” here, in fact, the management
encourages it ;)), popiah, the Sze Chuan Chicken, bottle of chilli
sauce, and Special Cendol.

all joy mag rack

Perhaps the appeal of All Joy (Good, don’t forget that) Food Center
is due to the magazine and newspaper rack it provides to enhance your
dining experience with reading material. πŸ™‚ Anyway, like I said, I
picked up a monitor (choice between an insanely high dot pitch
Panasonic 17″ for RM 410 and an LG Flatron ez for RM 465, chose the
latter) from Saberkas after lunch…but I don’t have a net connection
at home yet.

I wrote this at home and am posting it now from a diskette (those
little square black things that stores a meager 1.44 MB of data) at a
cybercafe in King Center. I don’t know when I’ll be connected since I
don’t even have the time to go to a Kedai Telekom, but I’ll do so next
Monday lunch break. Anyway, I noticed that sixthseal.com is becoming
food-centric (as someone put it in the early days of its inception)
again, so to spice things up – a pill report by veritas this weekend!
=D I kid, no such thing will be happening, though I’ll do a write-up of
lormetazepam, a benzodiazepine I’ve only recently (for about 3 weeks)
become acquainted with. No, I didn’t write lorazepam wrongly, I said
lormetazepam. This weekend then, have a nice one people!

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