From the imperial

It was a Saturday. Schooling day for Jan and Jay, replacement for the Gawai eve holiday. 

It was also meet the teacher day so I was busy meeting the teacher on 2 session, 1 morning for Jan and 1 session in afternoon for Jay. My kitchen was off that day, as I did not cook any meal.

Hubby and I went to Y. Y. Cafe for breakfast with friends. As for lunch, I bought nasi lemak from one of the stalls there. 

As for dinner, I used Grab to order my food delivery. I opted for Imperial Duck at Chan Bee Kiew Road (Padungan) as I was craving for roasted duck. The last time we had its roasted duck rice was back in 2018 in its Stutong shop. Other than roasted duck, we used to enjoy its roasted pork and nourishing soups as well. 

5 sets for our Saturday dinner. Rice set with vegetable, fruits and drink.

3 sets of chicken rice set for the kids. They weren't crazy about roasted duck. 

Soya sauce chicken rice set (RM15.50)

Hubby and I had the Imperial duck rice set. Yummy, satisfying dinner from the Imperial Duck. I did missed their roasted duck. 

Imperial duck rice set (RM16.90)

As for the drink, it was iced lemon tea. I gave 1 cup to the Grab driver since we would not be able to finish all 5 cups.

Iced lemon tea

Together

My brother invited us and together with my sis and family for a Father's Day dinner at my parents' house. We had it on Saturday instead of Sunday. 

The last time everyone was together was on first day of CNY, so many months have passed. My nieces and nephew suddenly grown so much!! 

My brother bought most of the food and when we reached there, he was still outside, buying and collecting food from few places. 

Of course, not all were bought. My mum whipped out her special fried mee hoon. Fried mee hoon with canned pork mince with bean paste. I love it so much.

And this pot of fish maw soup was also cooked by mum. Rich in collagen, they said. 

Pizza was ordered through Grab so it was already on the table when we were there. The Godfather's thin crust pizza (RM48.80 for 2). My bro recommended its thin crust pizza. First time I tasted pizza from The Godfather, located in Swee Joo Park. 

Hawaiian pizza with smoked turkey ham, and Pollo E Funghi pizza. Most slices gone into my Jay's tummy!! Lol. 

At 101 Premier, he bought the grilled sting ray (RM41) which was my mum's favourite. The sambal was salty and spicy at same time. The fish was very fresh. No wonder my mum loves it!!

Beside the grilled sting ray, he also bought 40 sticks of satay (chicken and pork) for RM40. 

And 15 grilled chicken wings (RM50). The kids seemed to enjoy both satay and chicken wings but the meat were rather dry and tough. Not good for old teeth to bite and chew!!

Next was the dishes from BBQ King Seafood restaurant in Jalan Song.  4 dishes for RM240.60, as we ordered seafood. Pre-booked so my bro just went to pick up from the shop that evening.

Garlic chili steam white clams were the hit of the evening.  The broth was so good and garlicky. 

Teochew steamed ngo fish so it would be easy to take and kids can enjoy without the fear of bones.

These curry fried prawns were just alright; pretty spicy for my tastebud.  

Lastly was the mixed vegetables.  Must have a vegetable dish to balance up all the meat dishes, right??

So, that was how we celebrate Father's Day. Actually more like Parents Day since we did not do anything for Mother's Day last month.  A lovely and delicious dinner to celebrate the occasion. And a nice catch up and gathering with my family too.

So-so only

I went to Galacity for breakfast one morning with hubby and Jan.  We wanted to try new place as we were bored with few choices in our area.  And some more, we were hunting for a good dim sum around Kuching.  We understand that our favourite dim sum restaurant no longer serve dim sum; they only maintain their Chinese and Asian dishes and ala carte now.

So, our  search for dim sum made us came here, but we could not find that dim sum shop that we came for.  Ended up with this food court in Galacity.  Many food courts and coffee shops there, but this cross-junction with 4 surrounding food courts (Heng Ki Kopitiam is one of them) attracted us. It was full house even though it was around 8am in the morning. Luckily we managed to find a vacant table for the 3 of us.  

Jan and I went one round to check out on the stalls. So many stalls, so many choices, really can't decide what to have. There was one dim sum stall in one of the food courts, so hubby went to order some to try.

 

And prawn chee cheong fun from another stall. What a big portion of ccf; but taste-wise it was just so-so. Rather tasteless and the ccf was rather thick.  I prefer the one from this food court in Batu Kawa.

As for the dim sum, hubby ordered only 4 baskets.  Not much choices according to him. 

Chive meat dumpling

Meat rolls

har kaw

siu mai

No, not that good.  We still like the one in Boulevard Restaurant although the dim sum here were cheaper (around RM12.50).  Rather bland in taste, it was so-so only. 

Hubby ordered meat porridge from the porridge stall.  He enjoyed it with a century egg (which I didn't take shot of). Initially I ordered fried kway teow with clams (RM7.00) to enjoy there but since we had dim sum, I could not finished my kway teow.  So takeaway for the fried kway teow and char kueh. Jan had fried mee hoon (RM4.00) from the same stall.

fried kway teow with clams

I had the fried kway teow for lunch that day. Enough wok hei, and they used the fresh clams, not the one in the can. 

We shared the char kueh for lunch. Not that salty though although I requested for the salty version instead of sweet and mix taste. Anyway, it was good enough for me.

char kueh (salty version)

One by one

When my father-in-law was around, he used to help my mother-in-law made sandwich in the hospital canteen in Kapit. He used to work in army camp when he was young. British camp where he learnt to make sandwich from them. His sandwich was very nice, I remember as I have the honour to taste it once. It was creamy, and tasty. Can't get enough of it. 

How he made his toast sandwich? My mil shared his recipe with me.

Making sandwich is very easy and versatile. You can basically add anything  you want in your sandwich. For this sandwich, we have butter, cheese, tuna, egg and mayonnaise. Lettuce would be preferred but we didn't have any at home, so can do without or add tomato slices in it.

And of course, bread. My kids preferred thicker bread slices, so I bought this long bread RM6.50 from Taka.

So, now let's get making and layering one by one. 

We used up the whole loaf. Cut the brown sides of the bread away. Did we finished all the sandwiches?? No. We ate some, we kept some in fridge for the next day. Some, hubby brought to Sri Aman to enjoy. 

Methods:

1. Boiled 4 eggs till cook. Once cool, peel the shell and mash the egg. Add butter into egg mash and mix well. (fil really mashed the eggs till creamy, but mil did not.  It is individual preference)

2. Mashed the tuna as well. Add mayo into it and mix well.  (I bought the tuna flake in water, while the tuna with mayo is preferred.  Again, fil mashed tuna very fine; hardly any chunks etc)

3. Cut the sliced cheddar cheese into small mince. Add equally on both the egg butter mixture and tuna mayo mixture. 

4. Assemble time! Spread butter on one side of a bread.(Planta spread is preffered as less oily, instead of butter)  And another side of a bread slice.  Then spread egg butter mix on it.  Then spread some butter on both sides of a bread and place on top of the egg butter mix.  The other side of the bread, add in tuna mayo mix and spread well.  Then top with the buttered bread slice.

Old Bank

This coffee shop was renamed Old Bank Cafe (老本行) and bought over by new owners few years ago. 老本行 (Lǎo běn háng) literally means "old saving". Correct me, if I am wrong. One of our favourite breakfast place around our place.  We liked the Foochow char chu stall , kolo mee stall and Malay kuih stall. Once a while, I would order Sarawak laksa there; taste-wise it was alright but other places serve better, fragrant and tastier Sarawak laksa than this stall.

That particular Friday, the Dumpling Festival, hubby and I went there again for breakfast.  Hubby was on a long break as he was going for his 3 nights 2 days fishing trip that weekend.

This round, we opted for kolo mee stall.  It has been a while since we have its noodle.  His business pretty good so some day, the waiting time was rather long.  And since no many people around, so we tried our luck and ordered its noodle.  Luckily it didnt took long for our food to come to our table.  A bowl of kolo mee for each of us and a kiaw soup (dumplings soup) for sharing.  Actually we didnt ordered the kiaw soup. The lady mistook my order,  I ordered 1 pack of dried dumplings for my mother-in-law but she gave us a kiaw soup on the spot.  Anyway, it was alright for both of us; we tried to finish them although we were full from the kolo mee.  Fortunately the kiaw was very nice.  Meaty and tasty.  Could detect the prawn and meat filling in the dumpling wraps.

While we were there, we also bought a pack of this roasted meat from one of the stalls.  RM18 for 200g of roasted pork belly!!!  Not cheap at all.

And while we were dining, an old uncle was going from one table to another table selling his goods. Only left 1 pack of groundnuts and 1 pack of this Taiwan golden kuaci when he reached our table, so we decided to buy the kuaci pack from him. RM15 for this imported pack (260g).

We never seen this golden kuaci in Kuching, so I was rather excited to try it out.  My mil likes sunflower seeds, so once we got home, my mil and I immediately tried the kuaci.  Yes, it was good.  Bigger seeds, sweeter and harder texture. They were nice to snack in.

First day

Can't remember the last time we went all the way to Buntal for lunch but definitely it has been a while. 

Our usual lunch place in Buntal is Teo Seafood; we patronised that place few times. This round on the first day of June (which was a public holiday and Gawai celebration in Sarawak), we decided to venture deeper into the fishing village and try Lim Hock Ann Seafood instead. Actually we have been there a couple of times too but I couldn't find any post on this place. I guess I never wrote about it here.

Anyway, this was my hubby's preferred place so we left the ordering to him. It was slightly after 11am when we reached there and few tables were booked and few were already taken. We found a nice table overlooking the beach. 

It didn't take long for our food to arrive on our table.

First was this sea cucumber soup. Not too starchy,  tasted slightly sour, which I enjoyed. 

Then a deep fried threadfin fish slice was next on our table. Of course, the kids' favourite. Super fresh and tasty. 

Another soup ordered which was the clam soup. Clear broth but full of flavour. You could guess how it tasted like by looking at the ingredients in the claypot.  

Everyone's favourite vegetable dish, which was stir fried cangkuk manis with egg. 

Prawns are a must-have when it comes to having seafood lunch, don't you agree?? So, a plate of steamed prawns for us. Super meaty, sweet and delicious.

Of course, we never missed out on Kuching o-chien (oyster pancake), which was easily cleaned up in a quick time!! Crispy thin pancake with juicy oysters on it. 

By then, we were pretty full so when this chilli crabs came, we only could tasted few bites. Remaining, we took away and reheated for our dinner. 

And our lunch was totalling to RM366 plus drinks. The crabs were around RM120.00 while prawns cost RM50 and fish was RM60. Other dishes between RM20-RM30. 

Siew pau

Hubby and I were at the Rubber Road few days before Gawai. So we dropped by this Kuching Siew Pau shop to buy its baos. The shop is a few shoplots from Rojak Ayam Satok Dapo Along cafe. 

The local would know this famous Kuching Siew Pau (or Sio Bao). I have been to the shop once with my SIL but many years ago. That time, she bought some for her Sibu friends before flew to Sibu.

My mil loves sio bao so we bought 3 of them, 1 each of curry puff and yam puff. RM2.80 each for sio bao and curry puff, while it was RM3.80 for yam puff.

They were freshly baked, so they were so good to be eaten straight away. The skin was flaky yet crispy and tasty. The fillings were generous so one of each would be enough for a small eater.

Yam puff

I liked the yam puff, the most. I always have a liking for yam puff. 

Curry puff

Jay ate most of the curry puff, while my mil took most of the sio bao. She tasted the one we bought from Y. Y. Cafe but not to her liking.  She mentioned the sio bao from Kuching Siew Pau tasted better. I wonder if she missed it. She is now in Sibu, staying at my sil's house. She went to visit 2 uncles of hubby who are cancer stricken in Sibu middle of this week. 

Siew pau

Anyway, which one is your favourite?? Curry puff, yam puff or sio bao?

 

If you don't know me by now

I love eating fish! Since I was very small, I love fish!! 

Let me share with you my most embarrassing moment. Actually not so embarrassing since I can't remember it well. But I thought it was rather funny. 

My parents always told me this story when I was very young. Happened when I was a young child, not yet went to kindergarden. One time, they caught me nibbling on raw fish in the fridge!! Yuk!!! They didn't said how much I had eaten but since I didn't have stomachache or side effect, I was doing fine. So now you know, how much I love fish!! 

So my parents ranting to my then-boyfriend (now, hubby) on how I grow up eating fish. And this embarrassing story will come to the surface. Oh well, since I did it, I guess I just need to accept it. Lol. And luckily, my hubby likes fishing. He always said he is into fishing for his wife!!! He took up this sports few years ago. Most his fishing rods, Reels and fishing gears  were bought online. He spent a lot of these tools and you know how much they cost!!

My man is back to his overnight fishing trips. His first trip was early in May. 3 days 2 nights trip to deep sea. 

Expecting him to catch mackerels that time but no sight of mackerels at all. My MIL wanted to make fish balls out of mackerels but alas, another time for that!! Instead, he caught other fishes home, not fully filling up his ice box. Not much catches but still quite a lot for us to enjoy after gave away few to my parents and sis.

We bought all the fishes (around 21 of them) to a fishmonger stall in Desa Wira to help us clean and descale and gut them. For a fee of course. Hubby gave the fishmonger RM50 for his service. 

My mil loves to cook sweet & sour fishes. We had this dish with different fishes few times.

Most of the sea fishes are great to steam. Healthy and tasty cooking method to enjoy the freshness of the fishes. Other can be deep fried or grilled, and my mil did tried making fish balls out of a big fish (last fish on a chopping board in the 2nd photo above). Remaining, fillet it and deep fried which the kids enjoyed. She also used the same fish to make curry fish. The fish tasted similar to mackerel but stronger fish smell. So, curry or asam curry a better way to deal with its strong taste.

My man will be going for his fishing trip once a month (as long as weather permit). So, we are expecting more fresh sea fishes from him in the coming months.