Tokyo ‘So’ Bananas!

On the bus over the famous Sumida river of Tokyo recently, I had a ‘deja vu’ moment when I saw this Asahi building which is adorably coined by the locals as ’unchi’ building for the similarity of the supposedly ‘beer foam’ to the ‘unchi’ which, believe it or not, an auspicious word for Japanese! I couldn’t really remember at the time when I saw the building before. Well, it was years since our last visit to Japan and definitely then we didn’t see this building which I took a liberty of ‘borrowing’ this picture from JM Rocher on Flickr.  

And then I remembered! Tokyo Sonata film featured this very scene along its story.

Sweets in Tokyo have been extensively and seductively written in a book called ‘Sweet Talk’ by Anchalee, so when my chance finally came to visit Tokyo, I didn’t miss to try as much as I could the featured sensations and one of the best known among Thai (for this is available at Narita’s Akihabara shop for may be 500 yen) is this Tokyo Banana! (yes, that’s their real name!). So this is what I bought home for really on the road I couldn’t care less about shopping!

Inside the box (wrapped twice) are more packages! Each sealed with individual packet of moisture trapper. I think it is important that they keep these snacks fresh/soft for the filling and the cake to preserve the banana flavour/texture.

Here is when we break a piece, revealing the custardy filling that tastes just like mature banana with cream! To capture my experience eating this, I’d say it makes me think about a typical very soft jam roll with banana-flavoured filling. It is decent and nice, but certainly in my opinion not that great! I mean, if you want to buy it for souvenir sake or memory, that’s fine, but if you really look for a gastronomic revelation and already have a handful of snacks back home, then, you can really skip this. However, this is just me. My neighbour, Khun Ae, loves this. But when pressed, she said she would, choosing just one thing, sacrifice her waistline for a piece of glazed Krispy Kreme – which sadly has closed down all their branch in Hong Kong even prior to the crunch!

Served Chopped for the Faintheart

Removing myself from the vegetarian syndrome, which we have been getting quite a lot especially at home, we also went to Lung Wah restaurant in Shatin area of New Territories in Hong Kong. Best known for their roasted pigeons, the restaurant, once also a famous hotel for there were no accesible roads to the place, carries their own pigeon farm so they can assure the meat/fat ratio of the birds for a perfect crispy roast.

Hong Kong gourmands would say they want their roast served whole, so they can pick up the bird and tear it apart with their fingers! The bird is fatty with its skin super crisp and slightly salted, but of course salt and pepper is served on the side for additional flavours! You definitely need wet tissues here!

The idea of eating a bird has never been successfully installed in me. But once there, I tried! You know, it was sooo sadly delicious and quite addictive. The meat was so tender and aromatic! I am not a salt lover, so I just ate my pigeon as served, but please, I asked them to chop the bird for me cause then I could somehow relieve myself from the dead-and-alive connection of the lovely, well, animal!

Lung Wah is also famous for their tofu, served deep-fried and as dessert with the aromatic gwai feuy flower syrup. Here is the crispy fried tofu which we also very much liked. (Other famous dishes here include chicken congee/egg noodles/crispy beans and much more, you visit their site for more ideas).

And here are the birds – featherly alive and lovely. My husband, who stared at me in a total disbelief when I put my greased fingers down and annouced my love for the taste, just shook his heads and sent me a disapproving look (how dare him!). And then, he asked me a question that I simply can not print it down again for it will break my heart!

Another Vegan Surprise!

Still on the vegetarian trail in Hong Kong where we massively enjoyed the food. We went to Nan Lian Garden in Eastern Kowloon before, but didn’t have the chance to try their vegetarian cuisine until this last time. Nan Lian’s breaks the mold of the usual vegetarian restaurants with super cool ambience under a false, yet powerful, waterfall. The meals are available in both set and a la carte and we tried both which was quite nice, but not as tasty as the one at Po Lin Monastery.

Here is their menu at a glance! The service was brisk, businesslike with waiters on earpieces and handheld food-tracking/ordering machine. Clienteles are, you guessed it, nuns living at the nearby Chi Lin Nunnery and ederly groups and couples who also live in the nunnery’s nursing home facilitiy.

Here are some of their food which was very straightforwardly cooked – you can see what you’re eating which is good. The tastes are mild and exude healthiness. Plus the ambience of this place makes it possible to think that you are really indulging yourself in a healthier choice for a meal.

Here’s wantan soup from the a la carte menu.

 

 

Here’s stir-fried veggies with assimilated ‘kang puay’ or sun-dried scallop, a flavour-enhancing staple in a Chinese kitchen. This one, of course, is made from dried enoki mushroom.

 

On a final note, my book on Hong Kong restaurant is now on the 3rd print, with a new cover and 8 additional restaurants. I have 5 copies to give away for free! Umm. So, if anyone wants this, comment on my blog and the book is yours (Thai address only, please). One really last note on HK eating – on our last trip there (earlier this month), we could clearly see the impact of the economic downturn on the HK’s usual burstling streets and scenes. The streets at Time Square, which used to be at all times packed, are now vacant. Some restaurants are closed down, and some, such as Full Moon at the Elements on Kowloon station, is offering 30% discount. Have you EVER seen a restuarant in HK offering discounts on their food?!? This global recession is so real. Also, Krispy Kreme has bailed out entirely from Hong Kong. When we were there last July (08), we still bought home the donuts from their airport outlet, and now none of the Krispy Kreme shops can be found. Also, many other shops at the airport have already been closed down. This is very sad, and I hope you all are bracing for the worst and still enjoy your life nonetheless. The Book Fair is also coming around again. This time it happens during 26 March – 6 April. I will be there the last day to sell my book and also to collect the doll my publisher made for all authors as a token.

Vegetarian Vindication…

A highlight, from the first glance to the itinerary, of our recent work-trip to Hong Kong was the vegetarian lunch at Po Lin Monastery on Lantau Island. I have heard about this place for years and read several reviews about the delicacies there so I was naturally very excited to see that our first day’s ‘task’ was to try out the meal at the temple.

Funny thing was many things went wrong since our first step off the plane. My hubby had a broken shoe (yes!) and I had a severe nausea. So, it took us longer than expected to reach the temple at the top of Lantau Island. Lucky that we made it within the serving time of the meal. We had a 3-person set for HK$100 each which included a soup of clear noodle, a thick tofu sheet braised in lemon sauce, spring rolls, stir-fried mixed greens with the rare and expensive ‘monkey head mushroom’ and lily petals and another plate of cabbage and shitake stir-fried.

All dishes, according to my hubby and Phi Malee, were very good and delicately prepared. I, meanwhile, due to the sickness,  sat in silence with my eyes rolling back and forth between those two people eating with gusto! It was a cruel, torturing moment! After all I have read and craved for this meal and I got totally sick I couldn’t even open my mouth and eat! I definitely have to go back real soon for this!

The vegetarian restaurant at Po Lin Monastery opens daily for lunch during 11.30-16.30. Set meals for one is HK$60, but for those looking for extra treatments, VIP sets (like ours) are HK$100 per person. Phi Malee told us that if you really want to splurge on the good ingredients, call them in advance so they can prepare the VVVVIP for you for a certain charge. The dining room was clean, but no-frills with tables outdoors in case you need fresh air (which I did). I guess many people are familiar with how to get to Po Lin via Ngong Ping 360 cable car, but here is the website of the operator anyway.

Guess what we’ve been doing quite a lot lately..

We just got back from a 6-day trip to Hong Kong where we, truthfully, worked for a new project. And here is the natural part of our work, which this time was not solely about eating like before when I was finishing up my book, but more about trailing the cultural and historical tracks of HK, especially in the New Territories where we had never really explored before.

The trip was awesome, tiring and stomach-exploding but wonderful. The weather was everyday cloudy, but a bit cool (round 18-22c) which helped a lot. We travelled in a chauffeured 500 SEL with a private guide in courtesy of the HKTB. I never had to handle the door throughout the six days and now I am spoiled rotten!

However, no matter how hi-so the trip could be for a press, we still find the noodles there most comforting. We literally begged Phi Malee (our lovely escort) to find us good places for noodles, so here they are: noodles in soup, in stir-fried, with wanton and fish balls – all are good. The first picture was a noodle shop who specialized in fish balls in Yau Ma Tei area. The place was called ‘Ha Ming Kee’ noodle.

The second picture is of ‘On Lee Noodle’ in East Hong Kong, near HK Museum of Coastal Defense, where we were so close of having to queue up just for lunch. The crowd waiting in the windy state outside was so patient. And their noodles was just fantastic. They also sell thick toasts with butter and condensed milk which is now my new favorite snack (compared to scones and cakes before

The last pic is the last meal we had just before leaving at Kowloon’s Elements which stationed Kowloon Airport Express checkin counter. Full Moon is the name of the restaurant, and they were offering 30% discount on the simplest-yet-most-loved ‘wanton min’ noodle soup from the price of HK$30 to just HK$20, so we ordered 5 bowls in a roll without any other side dishes to ‘waste’ the space of our stomach

Will post more about the food there. Now on the scale of 10 of the ‘being busy degree.’

Organic Rhapsody

Here’s a good revelation about the normally fuzzy understanding on organic farming, that it contains no chemical widely used in other types of farming such as insecticide, herbiside and hormone – some of which are even permitted in other types of vegetations such as the perceived-to-be-better hydroponic and hygienic vegetables. And here’s a scary truth – nitrate compound in hydroponics farming is the major cause of cancer. So buyers beware next time you shop for these expensive stuff in the supermarkets.

I know this subject can be sensitive, because a whole lot of people are now banking on hydroponics when it comes to salad leaves. But it would be better if you can actually grow them yourself on the front lawn of your garden, make it a hobby that makes your fingers dirty and your heart a bit happy once in a while.

See, on the recent course of works, I attended this two-day event with Khun A, Anotai Gongvatana – the chef and owner of Anotai restaurant and Rai Pluk Rak farm in Ratchaburi. It was a commercial event, organized by Gaggenau - the ultra chic kitchen appliances maker from Germany, but it contained loads of useful information nonetheless that surely sticks in the back of my mind next time I go shopping. And the food served there are both delicious and healthy and even easy to remake back in my own kitchen.

Here’s the pizza baked in Gaggenau’s oven with its top-notch stone-bake functions with temperatures as high as 300 degree Celsius. Khun A kneads the dough and simmers her own tomato paste. And since another partner of this event include Siam Winery and TRIA (the holistic wellness center), we all also learnt about the nutritious facts of the food and the pairing of the wines in this occasion, too. 

And two days later we went to Khun A’s farm in Ratchaburi. See, we fought for her tasty seafood BBQ with vinaigrette/black olive dressing. And you know, pride is such a good thing to have when it comes to such a comfort food like mashed potato. 

Here is the mashed potato I helped making. See, it is such an easy dish, but the trick is the balanced temperatures of the mashed potatoes and the solution of milk & butter. You can also use the machine to help whipping it up, or a good masher will also do the work equally nicely.

Here’s the rose patel scones by Khun A, with all of us cheering on the side. She use the very aromatic organic rose petals from her farm to make this staple fancier – nice job!!

The last picture is the organic free range duck egg I picked up from the duck pen.. which I still have, with those earthy stains and all, in my fridge!

Tik to tickle…

Your taste buds, of course! Tik Potchana has been my (and my whole family’s) favorite restaurant for ages, but I didn’t have the chance to take the pictures of the food until my last trip to Nakhon Pathom’s Rose Garden when we had dinner there and it was the first time I was there for dinner when the glowing neon makes the scene even more luring!

Everytime we go there, we always savour the usual, heart-warming, tear-dropping delicious dishes of the deep-fried sun-dried freshwater fish of pla chon that is served with chopped fresh mango, shallot and chilies. Sorry I was so hungry while snapping this pix… but at least it is clear enough for you to see and imagine the taste.

Also… the deep-fried river prawns with loads and loads of crispy garlic.. and yes, you can have this with steamed rice and the fish sauce.

Last time we were there with a van-loaded of friends, we tried to order ‘clam tendon’ (adductor muscles) pad-cha which is stir-frying with loads of spicy herbs, garlic and chili – Thai style, but they ran out, so this time we do a big compensation. The muscle which looks exactly like scallop is, well what do you expect, tough!! and we complaint and ate and complaint (among ourselves of course) until we finished the whole plate and totally forgot to ask what kind of shellfish owns such a big tendon (now I am quite scared to know!). And after trying this, I’d rather order the pad-cha with either prawns or fish balls next time.

And here is their famous tom yum gung.. no need to describe this, right? but for those looking for a real Thai-style tom yum gung, this place is merely 80km from Bkk and worth every tyre-roll of your car. And we also ordered, trying to be healthy for a bit, a plate of broccoli & rier prawns – also super delicious.

And of course..we didn’t forget to savour (lucky they still had it for the dinner time) their hor mok – which is freshwater fish (pla chon again) steamed in curry emulsion – so goood. really!

Last time we were there with my parents, we also hoarded the food back for our friends, neighbours and our fridge after a dish-piling meal. And guess how much we paid.. only may be Bt1,600 for the whole thing. This time, 6 of us, with all these food and drinks and two pots of rice, just Bt1,300. So, this should make up for the gas price and the time and everything… just go there!

Just remember that they are closed on Monday. And here is their namecard – back and front for your driving information. Hope I had been helpful?

Naturally Nakhon Pathom

I now have a new favorite animal – the Thai water buffalo that is rather individualistic and stubborn with a mind of their own. Here one calf submerging in the organic fruit orchard paddy across the Rose Garden in Nakhon Pathom where I spent my last weekend partially working and enjoying a glimpse of slow rural life the place has to offer. 

It is quite hard to believe that this place is merely 70km. (about 1 hour drive) from my home in Ramindra. I was overreacting when I got this assignment, but when I was there, I just loved it. Rose Garden is now promoting a ‘City Detox’ program where urbanians can scrub away the city sludge in thier systems through various slow, mind-quieting programs that also include a visit to this orchard by row boat, feeding the water buffalos, learning something new about Thai rice paddy cultures, shows of coconut/palm picking with a chance to taste the super fresh coconut right from the tree – which happends to be another of my favorite activity, too.

Above is the bamboo bed where I took a quick nap while waiting for another group of participants to come. It was fantastic to remove myself from all the city clutters – and it is just a boat ride away! Wondering if they have a small stuio for rent while I try to finish my book? What about WIFI connection? I have no need to worry about the food because Rose Garden’s In-Chan Restaurant serves wonderful/not too expensive Thai dishes such as Pad Thai and so on (so much I couldn’t describe them all, other distinct dishes are dried salty beef coconut milk soup with pickled bamboo shoot, pork satay and various Thai chili dips with fresh local vegetables). And if you stroll along their ‘Rim Klong’ market, this is what you’ll see and enjoy.

Here’s the gui chai traditionally served in dried bamboo leave bowl, and Kanom Tuay (coconut-rice flour cake) served with the old-style wooden paddles. All things, Bt15-20 each, are delicious and you can stock up with the boiled fresh peanuts before leaving for the other side (the one that houses the baffaloes). Here is the dogs at the organic farm. When they are not barking, they just look handsome!

 

 

 

 

Sweet Sunday

What do you do when department store doesn’t do it anymore for you on weekends? I mean, we are so fed up with all the malls, all the food in the malls and even strutting along the corridors lined with similar stuffs of every single mall in town. So, we tried diverting our routes a little bit to, well, somewhere convenient, not too far, and of course delicious.

So, last week, we ventured out, yet again, to our favorite Somsong’s (Somsong Potchana) on Soi Wat Sangwet on Phra Arthit Road. I wrote about this place months ago, but we keep going back when we are in that area – which sometimes was our destination of the day. Anyway, the news is that last Sunday we also tried Ann’s Sweet – a small bakery next door to the famous Roti Mataba.

Ann’s Sweet is tiny, as any shop in the area is. And the place serves home-made cakes with Lavazza coffees or you can opt for bottled water or Thai iced tea (very very sweet). We were there after having a huge and super delicious lunch at Somsong (it was so funny when the owner came to get our bill. Her small, Chinese eyes widened when she saw the piles of plates and bowls in front of us. I only had a couple, the rest was the work of the smiling man next to me), we decided to walk it off a little bit and then got tried after crossing the road and then chose to sit in the air-con room of Ann’s Sweet instead.

So, we couldn’t just sit there, right? After all the tempting cakes, we chose a piece blueberry cheesecake and a chocolate cake. Both are good, but although I am a chocolate-cake lover, I like their cheesecake much more in this case. They have so many other cakes that look equally good and seem to gain approval from other bloggers, too, such as their strawberry shortcake (filled with cream fresh in layers), chocolate mousse and so on… but after that mega lunch, even my hubby was slow cleaning the plates.

And I don’t know what got into me (us) lately. Twice within the matter of these 2 weeks I was stopped in the middle of the road by policemen for breaking (I would rather damn the road signs) the traffic rules!! The first time last week happened when I was driving (or lost) out of the Air Force on Don Muang and missed the correct exit, and of course a policeman was waiting for me there – in the wrong exit. He almost jumped over the hood when he was trying to stop me.. I was on my way to a birthday party and my car was filled with the world’s best lookchin ping (grilled meat balls). I was charged for ‘being dangerously obstructing the traffic.’ Then the second time happened yesterday, on our way back from Ann’s Sweet, smiling and all, until we found two policemen in one intersection. Apparently, we were wrongly driving in the bus lane – gosh! Ann’s Sweet: Daily – 9am-8pm, T: 086-889-1383.

Paradigm Shift And Chine J Food

Don’t know if ever mentioned to you about Tinny – a long-time friend of mine who is both a great cook and a bullet-train talker. Apart from being a super mom of 2 teenage boys, she is now actively doing myriad of PR works for a number of clients, one of them the newly opened Indian Host who touted themselves as a ‘fine’ Indian dining restaurant. My hubbie and me both love Indian food and never missed the chance to try a good new Indian restaurant, remembering the times when we queued for a table at ‘Chutneys’ in Bellevue off Seattle where we enjoyed thick, smooth curry in a brassware along with warm, garlicky nan breads…  

But at Indian Host, with their very comprehensive menu that also includes Jain food, they serve everything in plain ceramic bowls and I didn’t have the chance to try their curries just yet because we visited there for an occasion leading to the Chinese New Year and Indian Host, capturing the coincidence that the upcoming New Year (26 Jan) is also Indian National Day.. so they want to promote the Indian Chinese cuisine instead..

Sounds interesting, right? Renu, the restaurant’s owner who also happens to be Tinny’s friend, explains that Chinese people migrated to India centuries ago and brought with them the dishes which were latered adapted to suit more of the Indian palates hence the new fused cuisine of Indian-Chinese with more vegetarian selections following Indian’s staples which are mostly vegetarian.

Well, for my personal joy steeped in Obama’s magnitude of charm and listening to the slices of his speech on global warming and all, I guess being vegetarian is very much a thing to do. So here we are, a paradigm shifted both politically and gastronomically!! A Chinese New Year banquet with the least meat contents in the history of mankind. (imagine the typical Chinese banquet where a whole suckling pork, peking duck, whole fish, pork knuckles, crab claws, prawns and much more would be served for their presumably auspicious meanings). Here are the dishes - delightfully tasty and yet vegetarian – for anyone looking for a change of contents for the ox year.

Here goes: the hot and sour soup /chicken version is also available

The crispy noodle – ladled with chopped veggies instead of prawns or chicken

 Stir-fried Hakka noodle

Scrumptuous munju veggie dumpling

And then their Indian ice cream called ‘kulfi’ in mango flavour and loads of chopped pistachio, my favorite:-)

 

And, pls don’t be misled by the first two pictures on top of the entry: they are real shrimps and lamb – just for those can’t live without some meats – both are very delicious especially the shrimp dish served with hot Indian inspired sauce. The restaurant is now offering 15-20% discounts for lunch and dinner. The address, map and menu is available on their website. If you happen to be there on 26th (next monday), be informed that they would like to see you dressed in colours of Indian flag (organge, green and white) so you’re entitled for a raffle draw and quiz, too.