30th May 2010... post about photoshots

Beach side view just off Hard Rock Hotel Penang. Should have removed the branches on top right.

Looking to the left...

Beach side with increased color saturation. I don't have CPL yet at that time.

A shot off my 2nd room window during rainy day. Hand held.

V and I walked around Pavilion food court, we overwhelmed by so many different cuisines and choices. We come down to either Madam Kwan or Tony Roma. Madam Kwan is about asian food specialized in nasi lemak. Tony Roma on the other hand is about western food specialized in beef ribs. 

I am a fan of ribs and V is a fan of nasi lemak. It is a hard choice. Since V satisfied with the hokkien fried noodle yesterday, she followed me to the Tony Roma :)

Several uncle/auntie dip the hands at the reception counter to grab the badge. We thought it is free for all. So we follow suit. We grab a fridge magnet instead since we collect magnets (when come home, only knew it is not a magnet). Later found out it is for kids only but the waiter is kind enough to give it to us anyway..

The view from outside of Tony Roma. 

Tony Roma is full despite it is a wednesday afternoon. I personally felt it is quite pricey too. But KL ppl seems can afford this for lunch on regular basis. Good for them.

I ordered the Bountiful Beef Ribs. Roma Rack since lunch rack only comes with 2 ribs. 

I didn't order this but it does end up on our table. So I guess it is free. It is baguette with garlic butter.

Since we ordered set lunch, it comes with soup of the day. For today, it is beef+vege soup. Served with a small pack of crackers.

Detailed look on the tender soft beef cube, carrots and celery.

Tony Roma's famous bountiful beef ribs served with fries and coleslaw. I would prefer them to serve with mashes potatoes instead of fries if given a choice. The ribs looks small for the price. 

In case you found that the taste is not strong enough, there are some dip sauce for you. Spicy sauce, Tony Roma Original, Smokey and Columbia Honey. Also there are heinz chilli and tomato sauce (not shown).

I tried all except spicy sauce. I don't want to ruin the taste of the beef ribs. After tried all 3, I still can't make up my mind which to go to. Ended up I mixed all 3. :)

Last but not least the beef burger V ordered. It tasted very good as well but I don't really like the patty. It is soft but V loves it. Again come down to personal preference. This is more worth it as it only cost RM24.90 (half the price of ribs).

Tony Roma Restaurant

LG1.15, Level 1, Pavilion Kuala Lumpur,

168, Jalan Bukit Bintang,

55100 Kuala Lumpur.

+603 2143 3378

D90 + Tamron 17-50mm Test Shots @ Home

I recently changed from a Sony user to Nikon user. D90 price dropped substantially recently probably due to new models coming out soon. I grabbed this chance to convert as I am unhappy with Sony's noise performance and sub-standard viewfinder. No doubt Sony lens especially 16-80mm Carl Zeiss that I have is sharp and colour is vibrant, but generally Sony's low light performance is quite poor. A700 was a good one but it has been discontinued and I kept waiting for the replacement since then. It was a long wait. Furthermore, most of my friends are Nikonian prompted me to switch as well.

My D90 + Tamron 17-50mm didn't please me that well. Tamron comes with focusing issue. As you can see from the picture above, the eyes is not sharp. This is with auto focusing. I brought this whole set to Megastar, Alex helped to confirm the case. I scheduled to get a replacement Tamron lens sometime this wednesday. Hopefully everything will be good by then.

Here is another similar shot with manual focusing. I am not that good at manual focusing since Sony's viewfinder which is narrow and small made manual focusing very hard. 

As you can see the eye's is sharper. I shot this at F4.

Another shot with manual focusing. But I do notice the barrel distortion at the corners. I wonder if this happens to all Tamron 17-50mm?

Snacking @ The Loaf, Pavillion, KL

The Loaf gave me a very good impression of its fine food during my visit to their Langkawi's branch. The Loaf in Pavillion is made up of two storey, this is the bakery while the upper storey is the bistro.

Read my previous post here

The famous item sold here is cheezy cup cakes. Namely U hu hu. I have no idea what it means.But after google'd it, it means that is the sound Japanese women makes after they are happy and satisfied.

Here are two U-hu-hu. The top is Oreo and bottom is chocolate. I personally felt the Oreo is the better one but V says chocolate is better. It all comes down to individual I guess. All are good, go grab some. There are so many flavours to choose from.

Complimenting the U-hu-hu, we ordered the iced chocolate. This drink is particularly not recommended as it taste like just Hershey syrup and milk. It is too pricey for this kind of quality.

Craving for more creative food from the loaf, V walk another round and bought this chocolate filled danish. The danish is soft and layered correctly, perfect. Good job. Highly recommended alongside with U-hu-hu.

Seafood & Fried Hokkien Noodle @ Cu-cha, Jalan Alor, KL

Sometime ago, I blogged about the Cu-cha restaurant located at Jalan Alor. 

Read the previous post here 

This trip, V and I are re-visiting this place.

We ordered orange juice and Thailand fresh young coconut respectively. 

Our appetizer is kam heong la-la. Clam cooked with curry leaves. The la-la dish looks small for 2 person but after examining carefully, it is actually quite a lot. The reason is they only serve with one side of the shell. Normal restaurant comes with both sides making it looks more.

V's favourite, Hokkien style KL fried noodle (aka hokkien char or fook kin chao). It is thick yellow noodle fried with pork lard, squid, vege and prawns. This noodle is pretty famous throughout KL. Cu-cha's hokkien fried noodle in my opinion is as good as ultra famous stall such as Jalan 222 and Petaling Street's.

Last but not least we ordered fresh prawns fried with salted egg yoke. Fortunately only 5 prawns else our cholesterol will really shoot up.

Popiah @ Sisters Crispy Popiah, Sg. Wang

Sisters crispy popiah is a popular chain booth selling popiah around KL. I seen it in a few places before. So far still not seeing any in Penang. The one I went to recently located in Sg. Wang.

Pricing is okay for KL standard by it is pricey compared to Penang / Ipoh. For a little more than RM3, we can get 2 roll of popiah instead of one. But here is KL, so I ordered two rolls as I am sharing with V. I just ordered the normal ones. So total cost RM6.

Here comes the popiah complete with use & throw bamboo chopstick and steel spoon. It is presentable, let's see whether it tastes good.

This popiah is filled with a lot ~ 1/2 (see from picture) of fried crunchy stuff. So making the popiah crispy. It has very little sweet turnip (hokkien: bang kuang). Hence it also felt dry when eating. 

It definitely taste nice when eating the first roll, but felt too dry for second. If I were to eat more than 1 roll, it would be Penang's version of wet type. 

A more detailed look at the ingredients. No chilly?

As I mentioned earlier, my throat felt dry. Time for an ice-cream as dessert. 

Here is a turkish ice cream. It is has sticky chewy feeling. To demonstrate the stickiness, the seller normally turn the cone upside-down when you want to reach for it after paying :)

Eh.. this ice cream cost RM5 for 2 flavor mix. Single scope is RM3. Well.. KL everything is expensive. It is a heaven for rich people.

2D/1N KL trip for my visa

The journey to KL started with lunch at PG airport. I eat in McD. Guess what, it has double the patty and it is called Double McChicken. It is a little too big for my mouth. I prefer the normal single McChicken or Chicken McDeluxe.

When reach in KL LCCT, it rains so I have to take umbrella and walk towards the shade. This is my 1st time in LCCT, this is a new experience for me.

The umbrella carrier from Air Asia. I would say it is innovative to prevent us getting all wet. Air Asia cost

I noticed that the conveyor belt bag entrance/exit can see outside.

I was greeted with a nice hotel, Millennium. It is located in Jalan Bukit Bintang, at the heart of shopping district. Opposite Pavilion, walking distance to Lot 10 and Sg. Wang. 

Anyway I still have to pay the taxi RM15 to send me to Sg. Wang because it is raining. I wanted to pay only RM5 but he wanted RM15. Try not to take cab in the hotel area next time.

The bathroom is fairly good with both shower and bathtub. Although the bathtub is a little dirty for hotel standard.

On my way home to Penang

Waiting for my flight to go home. I am so bored here.

Executive taxi is rm10 extra but provide a lot more leg room. This round i am forced to take the executive, next round i might choose to take it.

Wednesday Pink Day @ Baskin Robbin

There is a promotion in Baskin Robbin every wednesday as long as we can shown some pink color items/garments, we will be able to purchase "double scope" ice cream at "single scope" price.

The catch is you pay for single large scope (regular) but get double small scope (junior).

Don't get fooled :)

From the price list here, single regular is $7.50 while double junior is $9.50. So the discount is $2.00 instead.

None the less, it is still a discount and attracted quite a few buyers. 

The 3 musketeers here for example.

Eh... wait. I am holding a camera phone on the right and ice cream on my left. That makes 4 of us.

100% worth brunch @ delifrance bistro, paradise resort, penang

I call this meal 100% worth not because it is very tasty or menu price is cheap. The reason for calling it worth is we have 50% meal voucher. :)

The voucher is from Paradise Resort since I joined their membership programme. The voucher is good for 10 person dining but this round only V and I. A little wasted.

(we already had 2nd and 3rd round with 6 and 7 person respectively.. aiming for 10)

Almost everytime I ordered the beef ribs as it is expensive and tasty. Expensive is to make full use of the 50% discounts and keep calling the same meal due to it is really nice.

The meat is tender soft and melts in the mouth. But spaghetti below varies from each visit, not satisfactory so far. But the goodness overcomes the short coming by far. It comes with complementary free flow of coke too.

V order one of the breakfast set. The egg is a little imperfect but overall tasted okay. It also comes with juices. Value for money if given 50% discount. For full price, I don't think we will come.

V's breakfast set also comes with a cup of coffee or tea. 

This is from another visit. I think is 3rd visit. The lobster soup tasted like Prawn Mee soup.
Well, some of you might say lobster taste like prawn also. By the way, not nice. Order at own risk.

If you are reading this blog, know me in person and interested to join us for the 50% discount dining experience, let me know.

Italian food @ Ecco Cafe, Chulia Street, Penang

Ecco cafe located in Chulia Street. It is on the left if you coming from Penang Street.

It's openings hours are as above.

It looks like an old coffee shop. Don't expect this to be romantic. It is old and a little hot especially on sunny days. However, to my standard, it is clean.

Here is a snap shot on their menu. After visiting twice, I would suggest pasta more than pizza.

Fruit juice comes in ample portion. A nice full mug.

This is Truz (refer menu above). Cajun spiced chicken and banana in cream sauce. It comes with two slices of baguette. It tastes very much like other carbonara based pasta. The banana doesn't gives much taste to the sauce itself. However, it taste more like a banana chunk topping.

As for recommendation, I am uncertain. The reason is my 1st visit experience is this is the best fettucine carbonara I tasted in Penang. But my 2nd visit, the Truz tasted bland. 

I am not sure I am going to go for a 3rd visit. I might give it a try some day.

The Truz also comes with shrimps and mushroom too.

V had Louisiana pizza. It just tasted okay. You might like it if you likes thin crust pizza. It looks authentic.