Thai Express @ The Pavillion, KL

 

2 weeks ago, I accepted an invitation to attend the premier special of “The Storm Warrior II”. It was courtesy of Astrolife. I will be writing another blog on me and my wife attending the movie premier.

After we have gotten our tickets for the movie, I passed by Thai Express Restaurant inside The Pavillion. As I remembered that I have a discount voucher for Thai Express courtesy of American Express credit card, I suggested that we should try out this restaurant for dinner while waiting for the movie to start at 9.30pm. We gotten ourselves a nice U-shape couch facing the feature wall of the restaurant. The tables are spaciously placed and the ambience is cosy and suitable for a small group of 3-5 person per table.

The feature wall of Thai Express, The Pavillion

The RM10 discount voucher from American Express

The Festive Promotion menu

While we were running through the menu, we saw this Festive Promotion menu on the table. After spending some time running through the menu, we decided to order set A which comprise :-

1. Fried Egg with Diced Vege & Minced Chicken

2. Special Stir Fried Fish with Dry Chilli & Onion

3. Minced Chicken & Vege Soup

4. 2 plates of rice

Since my wife is a huge fan of soft shell crab, we ordered a plate of the deep fried soft shell crab. The waiter who served us was very courteous, who I am not very sure whether he’s a Thai or from other nationality. He’s definitely not Malaysian in my opinion.

The dishes took around 15 minutes to arrive. There were not many tables of customers when we were there. If not mistaken, there were 3 tables of customers excluding the both of us.

When the first dish of the fried egg came, I was utterly disappointed by the presentation of the dish. Just look at the photo below ! Splatter some diced potatoes and chicken breast with a taste that resemble a canned baked beans on top of 2 fried egg and you call that a dish from a Thai Restaurant ?? For a while, I thought I was in an army boot camp, lining up to get my ration of daily kitchen food which you either eat it or leave it. It just tasted like how I described it tasted like.

Fried Egg with Diced Vege & Minced Chicken

Next came the equally unappetising stir fried fish. I guess the name Special Stir Fried Fish came from the “special” appearance that you would not expect it to come from a Thai restaurant. From the look of the dish, you would think that it came from a road side stall. Maybe a road side stall would come with better presentation. I just don’t know whether the cook was having a bad day or I just made a very bad mistake of choosing this restaurant for dinner. Another plate of dish that will put you off the moment you see this plate of “thing” being served on your table.

Special Stir Fried Fish with Dried Chilli & Onion

By the time the soup arrived, I didn’t even bother to want to take a photo of it. It was equally bad or should I say heavily “ajinomoto-flavoured” bowl of soup. Just throw in some oversized chicken meat ball and chop some Chinese white cabbage into small pieces and whoala, you have a bowl of soup.

The only grace saving dish I would say is the ala-carte deep fried soft shell crab that we ordered. But, I don’t know what’s the special sauce I see that came along with the crab. I remember that the menu says special mango sauce or some sort but all I see is those Thai chilli sauce which you can easily get from your neighbourhood grocery shop or hypermarket.

The total bill came to about RM60++ after the RM10 discount voucher, service charge & govt tax added in. I was so disappointed with the meal that I don’t think I will make another visit to this restaurant chain.

Clarisse turns 1

 

Last Sunday, Clarisse turns 1 year old. We had a simple celebration the day before, Saturday.

It was solely a family affair with my aunties and uncles and a few Dad’s close friends making up the numbers. We had a dinner at a nearby Chinese restaurant which our family always frequent whenever we don’t  know what to eat or where to eat. A dinner minus all the elegant and elaborated Chinese dishes. No big huhhah, no special dishes as a matter of fact, Clarisse is still a young toddler. She wouldn’t know what’s all the fuss about. She will just sit through the dinner wanting to eat everything that she sees us adults eating.

After the dinner, we went back to Grandma’s house for the cake-cutting. I like the cake very much. Dad ordered it from his friend’s cakehouse. Though I was kinda disappointed that the cake was not baked in the design on a letter “1”, it was a very nice looking cake afterall. Don’t believe me ?? Judge it for yourself from the photos below.

Top view of the birthday cake

Hello Kitty, Sailor Moon and a few other cartoon characters greeting the birthday girl

It’s a chocolate sponge cake with cream. This cake is not so creamy as compared to the one which we had for Grandma’s birthday. The one we ordered for Grandma was too  over-generous with the cream. It was like eating a loaf of cream rather than eating a cake.

The birthday girl, Clarisse and the parents

Photo-session with Clarisse was a real challenge. She was too eager to look everywhere except to where the camera is. The flame on the candle was a constant attraction to her and her curiosity got the better of her. Kept on wanting to approach the candle. In the end, we didn’t manage to get many good photo shots. Just  a couple that will keep us in remembrance of her 1st birthday with us !

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

CLARISSE ENG JING YI !!!

Spoilt for Choice

Choosing aand deciding a new techware can be such a daunting task. Sometimes, would you feel that you would gladly want to be in a world with lesser choices and you can make decision either with not so many options in front of you ?

I have been planning to get a Netbook for quite some time. I find my current Laptop – Lenovo Y410 a tad too heavy for my liking especially I when I need to travel for business trip. I like my current laptop for its splendid Dolby sound but the slot-in DVD writer is not something I’m happy with. The cranking sound it made when you insert a disc into it can be somehow annoying. Carrying a 2.4kg laptop over your shoulder can be quite soar over some time.

So, I have been thinking of getting a Netbook. As I mainly use my laptop for MS Office application, Internet and occasionally games when I’m bored, Netbook should be able to serve my purpose fine. I have been reading some reviews on Netbook and have shortlisted a few Netbook which I like :

1. Toshiba NB200

I find Toshiba NB200 Mini Notebook’s range of colour : Snow White, Indigo Blue, Silky Pink & Satin Brown very attractive. It’s ergonomic full-sized tiled keyboard has the Sony Viao’s feel. It’s comes with a hard-disk protection with built-in 3 accelerometer. The Satin Brown colour piece looks super high class !

2. Lenovo IdeaPad S10-2

This Netbook comes with a 6-cell Li-ion battery which is great if you are always on the go and finding power plug can be a challenge for you. However, it tends to raise the Netbook up. From the display unit I saw at Sec14’s Digital Mall, it comes with Dolby sound system as well

3. HP Mini 311 / HP Mini 110

HP has always being my favourite brand for its desktop. However, I have not been able to check out the Mini yet. Don’t know how well it feels on the fingers.

Most of the Netbooks in town now are still on XP Home or Vista Basic. I am hoping to get a Netbook which comes with Windows 7. Maybe I should wait a bit longer until at least all the Netbooks are pre-installed with Windows 7 first before I make a final decision of which Netbook is the best buy to suit my taste and needs.

Initally, I have a buyer who’s keen to buy over my Lenovo Y410 but since I have delayed my interest in buying a Netbook, the potential buyer’s interest has also cooled off. I think my Lenovo Y410 would be a catch for whomever is keen to buy over as I have upgraded it to 2MB Ram and added  years International Warranty at the point of purchase and I have just used it for less than 1.5 years.

Well, I am not in a hurry anyway. There’s still time to scout around  >.<