CL's Birthday Feast

At 530pm on CL's birthday, "I want to eat Japanese food" was what he said once he got home from Uni. He made the call to Shira Nui and got us 2 counter seats for 6pm seating. Honestly, I didn't expect to have any available seats for us at all. Shira Nui is always full and has to make booking at least weeks before.

CL requested to try their omakase menu since we always go for À la carte and had a good reason to pamper ourselves. :)


Chefs busy at work behind the counter.

We managed to shot all the delicious sushi before popping them into the mouth. Chef even asked why we like to take photos of the food. It's to remind myself what I had eaten/tried.

Chef brief us on every pair of nigirizushi when served and told us to have it with soy or no soy. We had so many that I don't exactly remember what each nigirizushi is exactly made of. I just have to let the photos to do all the talking. :)

1st pair of nigirizushi

2nd pair of nigirizushi was Salmon seasoned with shichimi togarashi and pan fried. 5th pair of nigirizushi was oyster grilled with mayo. Both pictures can be seen on my previous entry.

**OMG.....while going though my old entries, found out that the 1st time we ate at Shira Nui was last year during CL's birthday.

3rd pair of nigirizushi.

4th pair of nigirizushi was grilled beef. Picture can be seen on my previous entry too.

6th pair of nigirizushi was Ark Clam.

7th pair of nigirizushi was tempura lady finger stuffed with crab meat. It was really different.

8th pair of nigirizushi was tuna lightly pan fried on the surface.

9th pair of nigirizushi was white fish belly marinated in some sauce.

10th pair of nigirizushi was grilled scallop.

Up to this point, only me, CL and another customer were still going. The rest already surrendered and ordered dessert.

This was a complimentary nigirizushi from the chef. They constantly tried new idea, new combination and seek reviews from the customers. This nigirizushi is made up from white fish, bacon and plum sauce. I find the bacon taste was too strong and covered/hidden all the rest of the taste.

11th pair of nigirizushi. White fish torched with miso.

12th pair of nigirizushi was tuna with special sauce. Special sauce made up of avocado, spicy chilli sauce and miso.

13th pair of nigirizushi was salmon belly torched with salmon roe.

Can you believe at this point, we can actually eat more! The chefs were pretty shock especially after 10 pairs of nigirizushi, we still requested for more. HAHAHA. But we had to stop after number 13th as it was already 8pm and that when their 2nd seating for the evening start.

It was a really good experience for both of us. We both enjoyed the meal a lot! Sitting at the counter, watching 3 chefs busying making sushi, slicing sashimi etc. Totally no idea what nigirizushi we will be served.

Hmmm.....when will be my next trip?? On my birthday???

CL's Birthday

It was CL's birthday last week. We went for a very nice + expensive Japanese dinner at Shira Nui on the actual day (my next entry). As we were both too full after the dinner, CL didn't manage to blow his candle till few days ago.

I didn't forget to buy some candle a week before his birthday. :)

5min Chocolate Cake which I baked. Super easy! All ingredients available in the pantry and 2 mins in the microwave! Super dangerous recipe!!!!!

Food I Cook/Bake in April

Baking banana bread was the best way to use up overripe bananas. To had freshly baked banana bread for breakfast on a weekend morning was having all the ingredients measured and stored aside the evening before. 1st thing in the morning after I woke up was mixed everything up and pop it into the oven to bake.

Meatball is another nice, simple, easy dish which taste well for lunchbox.

Char Siew Pork Spare Ribs. Totally clueless what to cook the spare ribs with so went for Char Siew flavour which is CL favourite. I can cook anything and everything with Char Siew sauce and he will comment it's nice. This dish turn out really nice as I had the ribs marinated 24 hours and I grilled it slowly under middle fire. Yum!

Quiche

It was my 1st time making Quiche. In fact I don't think I ever ordered quiche outside. But it seem really easy to make and a colleague of mine started making all different types and having it for lunch.

I manage to find a pie dish few weeks ago at Box Hill and I kept delaying trying to make quiche till 2 weeks ago when my buddy and godson were here for a short visit.

The quiche turned out really nice. All of them loved it including my godson. It was bacon,leeks and mushroom quiche. It was so easy to make that I made another 1 last night for CL pack lunch/dinner and my dinner. The pastry was purchased from Coles. I didn't try making my own pastry as I heard it was hard without a food processor. Hopefully I'm able to find time and try making. I'm starting to work on site from end of next week. Looking at the schedule, the earliest for me to be situated back to office is Aug. Going to clock quite a bit of extra time at work soon.

Before going into the oven

Fresh out from the oven

After sliced

Yum Cha Ending Without Dessert

Belated Post
19th April 2009

Kam Fook restaurants in Sydney are very famous, well known. During our (me & CL) uni days, we only manage to Yum Cha at Kum Fook during special occasion like after our exam or someone birthday as we were so tight on budget. As for dinner at Kam Fook was totally out of question. I love their yum cha. Last time I had yum cha there was 2 years ago at Bondi Junction,Sydney with my parents.

When I found out Kam Fook is coming to Melbourne, I got excited. It was supposed to be opened end of 2008. But we ended up waiting for months till April 2009. Why the long delay? Who knows. But it only proved they definitely earning a lot/at least enough to cover their lose from the restaurants in Sydney.

We planned to do some shopping at Westfield on Sunday morning and at the same time try the newly open Kam Fook Yum Cha if we manage to get a table. We were happy when we had no trouble getting a table, in fact the place was pretty empty. Bet their opening news has not really spread.

1st impression was actually pretty good. Tea was served fast and trolleys of food came fast too.

First we had Char Siew Bao, Chicken Feet and Pork Spare Ribs.

Chicken Feet was good. Full of flavour and not over cooked. It doesn't break into parts when I lifted it up using my chopstick. As for the spare ribs, nothing fantastic, the usual.

Char Siew Bao was disappointing. The filling was nice, not too sweet, not too dry nor wet. BUT the dough was not soft and fluffy enough. It was quite compressed and dense. :( I admit, when it comes to Char Siew Bao, I super picky!!!

Next was Congee (pork and century egg). The serving was HUGE! BUTTTT another disappointment!!!! It look thick but it wasn't! After a few stir, it all became super watery. Plus it was bland, tasteless. *faint* 1st time we adding soya sauce to our cooked food.

Follow up was Siew Mai and Har Gao. *shake head* I don't really remember what the siew mai taste like except it was dry. Definitely didn't leave good/ bad impression on me. As for the har gao, it was definitely dry! The skin was dry the filling was dry. Both oversteam???

After 6 dishes, we conclude the food wasn't as good as Tai Pan nor Golden Dragon Palace which were only 5 mins drive away from Kam Fook. So food wasn't their selling point.

As for their service, it all went downhill after we were seated within 15mins. Patrons started coming in, more tables were filled. We were being ignored! Trolleys stopped coming our area after they saw us stopped eating. What's there for us to eat when we had finished all the food we ordered and waiting for more????

Noticed we aren't being served, we decided to skip everything and go for the dessert. Saw the trolley, spend 15mins waiting but it never made it to our table/area. In the end, I had to asked a waiter who was topping up hot water for our tea what desserts were available. His answer was " I call the gal to push the trolley over". (For those who aren't familiar, only waitress served food/push trolleys/take order. Waiter job scope is set up table/clear table/ top up hot water for tea.) We spend another 15mins waiting for the trolley (can see we desperate for our usual dessert) and I finally told CL that forget it, we should just leave. I was sick of waiting!

That was our 1st time of Yum Cha ending without mango pudding for him and taofu fa for me. Ending our Yum Char after 6 dishes and adding soya sauce to my congee. *shake head* :(

I won't be going back there again unless someone who I can trust tell me they had experience a enjoyable Yum Cha there.

At the end of the day, we bought 2 slices of cakes as dessert which we had at the comfort of our own home. Btw, the cakes were delicious!!!! Tried their cakes before and knew it will not disappoint me at all. Sorry don't remember what's the stall named but it was just beside the Westfield Food Court. It also served pretty cute little cupcakes.

Where has my time gone???

I haven't being blogging for the past few weeks and I just found out last night when I was looking thur the pictures from my camera. I'm just to busy (more like lazy right?) Seriously need to be more organise and discipline.

I have being trying very hard to start my day early, reaching the office after 7am. Clock a bit more time on the project as it's pretty tight schedule + they kept changing the requirement *sigh*. Not really enjoying work at the moment actually. Well, other than suck it up and concentrate on work what else can I do????

My best buddy and godson came for a short visit, 7 days (our 1st guest since the move).
Me and Godson
It was really last minute, she confirmed her trip on Monday and flew in overnight on Friday. I didn't manage to spend a lot of with them as I need to work. So it's just the evening which we chilled out at home after dinner. I think they enjoyed the trip and I hope they did. :)

I definitely learn something from their trip. Really ponder when I and CL will be ready to start a family. We know it's not the time now but when? Hmmm don't think we will ever have an answer for it. At present, we love our freedom too much. (He definitely agree with me on that)

I preparing to have a tight schedule month ahead. For work, it's finishing up the project and commissioning(Cadbury want to start production 1st June). Outside work, I'm attending a wedding, bbq, yum cha, dinner gathering all organised by Club Alfred. Also at the same time start preparing, cleaning, shopping for my in-laws arrival in June.