: : Making Espresso : :

After having dinner at The Junk, 3 cousins and a gf went to have some homemade espressos.

Right. The necessary equipment to make espressos.

Yen : He got a posh looking one.

Ming : Bought it from Boots.

Then, of course, we have to have some coffee powder.

Put the strainer into the holder in the picture above before putting in the coffee powder.

Now put the holder into the bottom pot : shown on right hand side of the picture. BTW, those are Hui Ling’s beautiful and slender fingers.

Add hot water into the bottom pot.

Put the coffee pot on top of the bottom pot. Then put it on a stove on a slow fire. The coffee will start to come out of a thin tube within the coffee pot.

This is the little tube seen from the inside. The coffee starts to come out from the top and into the coffee pot. And, that is how one makes espressor the old-fashioned way.

I can still smell the coffee.

Yen : I used that cup to feed the dog.

He was kidding. Of course.

: : The Junk : :

It’s been awhile since I’ve met up with cousin Yen. So, when his brother asked whether I wanted to meet up with him, I agreed. We met up at The Junk Restaurant on Saturday night for a nice meal at very very reasonable prices. Also, was interesting in hearing Yen giving his views and comments on the food. This cousin of mine is a great gourmet chef and I do GOURMET.

To start off the dinner, we all had an appetizer. The soup of the day was cream of broccoli. Yen ordered this, hoping that it will be accompanied with plain bread. Instead it came with garlic bread.

Ming, Yen’s bro, had the mushroom salad. Wow! Seriously big and mighty. He had helped from his gf, Hui Ling.

Two nights in a row, I’ve been having crab. This time, it was a tempura crab salad with 3 soft shell crabs. Had to share this with Hui Ling. It was just too big an appetizer for one person.

The salmon steak in terriyaki sauce was delicious. This is what I always have at The Junk. Else, I’d be eating pasta. Anyway, the portions are always huge and worth every penny.

Ming had the rack of lamb in creamy sauce. Looks mighty tempting to me. I just love cream and it’s pretty hard to get good cream down here in Kuching. Sigh. I miss having double cream with mince pies during Christmas. Lolly, please bring some back to Miri!!!

Yen decided to try the lamb shank that Hui Ling mentioned was pretty good. Huge portion, with or without the leg bone. Underneath the lamb is a bed of homemade mash potatoes. None of the quick-mix type.

Hui Ling had some fettucine cooked in cream sauce. Temptation temptation temptation. 🙂 Will try that the next time I’m there.

Some pictures of the restaurant. Aptly named, you’ll one loads and loads of old stuff in this restaurant. There is a miniature Vespa scooter, old school tables, pictures, meat holders found in old old chinese shops, cash register and high court judge chair! This place is definitely a haven for interior designers. Everything on show is arranged by the couple that owns the restaurant. Note that it’s also a restaurant that does not serve pork. Halal? Think so but am not sure. Can always call to confirm. I do now that some of my Malay collegues at work do frequent this place.

Address Details :

George Ling / Roselyn Ling

The Junk

80, Ground & 1st Floor,

Wayang Street,

93000 Kuching, Sarawak.

Tel : 019 857 1870 / 016 889 2044

Open 6:30 pm – 12:30 am except on Tuesdays

Note that if you are interested of eating at The Junk during weekends, please remember to make reservations. It’s that popular. Weekdays are fine.

A note to technoLAHgist : The food was under RM150 for everything.

: : The Junk : :

It’s been awhile since I’ve met up with cousin Yen. So, when his brother asked whether I wanted to meet up with him, I agreed. We met up at The Junk Restaurant on Saturday night for a nice meal at very very reasonable prices. Also, was interesting in hearing Yen giving his views and comments on the food. This cousin of mine is a great gourmet chef and I do GOURMET.

To start off the dinner, we all had an appetizer. The soup of the day was cream of broccoli. Yen ordered this, hoping that it will be accompanied with plain bread. Instead it came with garlic bread.

Ming, Yen’s bro, had the mushroom salad. Wow! Seriously big and mighty. He had helped from his gf, Hui Ling.

Two nights in a row, I’ve been having crab. This time, it was a tempura crab salad with 3 soft shell crabs. Had to share this with Hui Ling. It was just too big an appetizer for one person.

The salmon steak in terriyaki sauce was delicious. This is what I always have at The Junk. Else, I’d be eating pasta. Anyway, the portions are always huge and worth every penny.

Ming had the rack of lamb in creamy sauce. Looks mighty tempting to me. I just love cream and it’s pretty hard to get good cream down here in Kuching. Sigh. I miss having double cream with mince pies during Christmas. Lolly, please bring some back to Miri!!!

Yen decided to try the lamb shank that Hui Ling mentioned was pretty good. Huge portion, with or without the leg bone. Underneath the lamb is a bed of homemade mash potatoes. None of the quick-mix type.

Hui Ling had some fettucine cooked in cream sauce. Temptation temptation temptation. 🙂 Will try that the next time I’m there.

Some pictures of the restaurant. Aptly named, you’ll one loads and loads of old stuff in this restaurant. There is a miniature Vespa scooter, old school tables, pictures, meat holders found in old old chinese shops, cash register and high court judge chair! This place is definitely a haven for interior designers. Everything on show is arranged by the couple that owns the restaurant. Note that it’s also a restaurant that does not serve pork. Halal? Think so but am not sure. Can always call to confirm. I do now that some of my Malay collegues at work do frequent this place.

Address Details :

George Ling / Roselyn Ling

The Junk

80, Ground & 1st Floor,

Wayang Street,

93000 Kuching, Sarawak.

Tel : 019 857 1870 / 016 889 2044

Open 6:30 pm – 12:30 am except on Tuesdays

Note that if you are interested of eating at The Junk during weekends, please remember to make reservations. It’s that popular. Weekdays are fine.

A note to technoLAHgist : The food was under RM150 for everything.

: : Native Food Fair + Breakfast : :

This was meant to be Saturday’s posting but got a bit lazy on Saturday to do much postings on food eaten for that day.

The Native Food Fair was so-so. The only native food worth mentioning are the chicken, fish and pork bamboo dishes and the paku (fern) that were on sale. I was really hoping for some stir-fried daun ubi (wild tapioca leaves) but they didn’t have any. Oh well. Bought a bamboo filled with kampung chicken (village chicken) and another bamboo filled with lemang (glutionous rice).

After buying the stuff, Maylin, Melvin and myself then went off looking for breakfast. Nothing appetizing to eat at the Food Fair since it was a small do. We decided to go to Chong Chun Coffee Shop in Central Park.

We all ordered the Singapore Mee Siam (Singapore Siamese Mee). Bizarre name, huh? Well, it’s the first time I’ve had it so I’m totally clueless as to why the name is like so. Slightly sour and spicy at the same time, it’s a pretty light mee for breakfast time. After eating it we were still hungry so we ordered some dumpling soup from the Kolo Mee stall.

The dumpling @ kiew is wrapped in spinach wantan skin. In fact, all the noodles at this particular kolomee stall was green. The picture was taken after we walloped everything save for the last piece. Maylin had to remind to take a picture. So, a pitiful piece of dumpling is the end result.

The Mee Siam costs RM3.50 a bowl whereas the dumpling soup was priced at RM3.00 per bowl. Unfortunately, this place is not halal. Could smell the pork in the dumpling. Sorry guys.

Anyway, got back home after dropping up Maylin and Melvin. Granny was so happy to see the bamboo sticks and was already starting to take it apart.

This is Granny holding the thin stick of bamboo with the lemang inside. Bought the smallest one at the fair so that we didn’t have to eat it for days. Mum, notice the new haircut? She’s starting to cut it like you. :p

First, she cracked open the bamboo with a knife and gently pried the bamboo away. The lemang @ glutinous rice was wrapped in banana leaf before being stuffed into the bamboo for cooking.

Granny cut the lemang in slices as shown in the picture above. It actually had a burnt smell to it as the bamboo was burnt on the outer layer. Still, she preferred it this way. The lemang costs me RM3.

The next dish to be removed from the bamboo is the manok pansor @ chicken in bamboo. The lady that sold it to me mentioned that the chicken is ayam kampong @ village chicken. It’s called that because the chicken is allowed to run freely i.e. not penned up, so the meat is very sweet but slightly tough.

For this amount of bamboo chicken, I paid RM15 for the whole thing. A rip-off? Maybe but when you consider the time minding the bamboo under an open fire while the chicken is cooking, it’s not that expensive. The chicken was very tough and Granny suspected that it’s an old chicken (one that has stop laying eggs) that was stuffed into the bamboo. Also, it was extremely salty so she added more water and cooked the chicken under a slow fire to soften the meat. She also added in some potatoes to remove the salt. Said that she heard it from one of the neighbours that potatoe will reduce the salt in a soup.

Melvin mentioned that the bamboo chicken they got was okay and that it wasn’t that tough. Hmm… maybe it was just my luck I guess. Oh well. All the chicken was finished by dinner time yesterday. :p

: : Granny : :

While re-editing the template for the Book Review Blog, Granny pop by to pass me something.

It wasn’t sweet and yet it wasn’t sour either. Just bland. Oh well. A dab of salt help to make it go down better.

I have this tendency to add salt to fruits that are not sweet. Somehow, it does taste sweeter with salt.

I absolutely adore pineapple with sweet soy sauce. Try it sometime. Tastes great.

: : Garden Seafood Steamboat : :

Okay. Another farewell party for the same VIP as a week ago. Vivien’s bye-bye party on behalf of the entire department. Took awhile to decide where we wanted to go and we finally settled on Garden Seafood Steamboat place where we can be noisy, rowdy and just downright undisciple when it comes to eating and belching. :p Yeah, we’re a pretty disgusting group.

While waiting for the soup in the steamboat to head up, we started with appetizers. Appetizers were roasted prawn seasoned with chillis and pepper. However, we only had one plate as we were all too busy with the crab. Or rather, AMan was.

This was roasted crab, again seasoned with chilli and pepper. As well as a lot of MSG, could feel my neck and head shivering like crazy. As mentioned, AMan was eating crab like nobody’s business and David was giving him a run for his money. They must have polished off ten crabs each! They had so much that they finished all the crab for the night! LOL!

Finally, the lid was opened and the steaming smell of tom yam soup was released. This steamboat joint is a buffet style of restaurant i.e. pick what you would like in the soup and just add it into the pot. Of course, one does have to pay for any wastage so be forewarned.

The steamboat we had uses charcoal for fuel rather than the common gas stove. In olden days, charcoal-fuel-steamboat is very common but not so much these days. Steamboat is actually a Mongolian dish that is absolutely wonderful during cold rainy days (which it was on Friday night) and wintertime.

Instead of tom yam soup, one can ask for chicken stock instead. One great thing about steamboat is that by the time the soup has been boiled for a long time, the soup itself would have so much flavours in it. The downside of steamboat is that one has to ensure that all the food is thoroughly cook else one gets diarrhoa.

For Westerners eating this for the first time, please do not forget your diarrhoa pills. You might be in for a nasty shock if you’ve never eaten this before. It can be quite upsetting to your stomach. Once you’re over that hurdle, you should be fine. 🙂

Address Details

Garden Steamboat Restaurant

No. 28, Jalan Nenas,

93400 Kuching,

Sarawak.

Tel : 082 – 257777, 257962