Ajisen Ramen at Gurney Plaza

Ajisen Ramen was found at Kumamoto, Japan in 1968. Currently Ajisen Ramen already have 400 plus chain in worldwide. Ajisen Ramen targeted to open 1000 and above food chain worldwide. Ajisen Ramen is “World Ramen”.

This is a 3-4 months old Restaurant found at Gurney Plaza. It's found on the ground floor just next to Nando's. Yesterday was my second time eating there. The place is usually packed for lunch and dinner. Majority of the poeple there are all Chinese. You wouldn't see a malay person there was the Restaurant sells pork (non-Hallal).

Ajisen Ramen shop. Look properly and you would see Purple Cynthia in there posing.

There were four of us waiting to pig out last night. Each of us ordered 4 different types of Ramen. If I can recall all the names right, Jean (Spicy Char Sui Ramen), Cynthia (Non Katsu Ramen), Ed (Paiku Ramen) and I (Ton Toro Ramen). As side orders we ordered the special Taufu and the Japanese Dumplings (I forgot the name!).

The Ramen noodle itself it nice and smooth. To tell you the truth it looks exactly like the Spaghetti Pasta. From what I have tried, I think each Ramen dish uses the same soup which is whitish looking. Then the variety of taste only comes from the meat they put in your soup.

The first time I came I tried Ed’s Ramen which was some Pork ribs Ramen (name can’t recall). I did not like it as it had a very strong pork taste. So I was stayed away from any pork ribs ramen on my next visit.

My order yesterday was good. No strong pork taste. According to Jean my dish Ton Toro Ramen, meant meat from the Pigs Cheeks. Hahhahaha no wonder it tasted so good. No fats at all. Portions there are quiet reasonable. Halfway eating I was so full.

Ton Toro Ramen, meat from the pigs cheeks which I ordered.

The other Ramen from the rest, I guess it was all good for everyone. No complaints. Everyone was quiet slurping their Ramen.

Paiku Ramen which Ed ordered

Non Katsu Ramen which Cynthia ordered

Spicy Char Sui Ramen which Jean ordered

Aside from the Ramen, one of my favourite side dish was the Cold Tofu Dish. It is served cold and the gravy sauce like has some sour-ness to it. Can’t really say what are the ingredients, but it’s superbly good. I think there’s some pounded up sesame seeds in it. Highly recommended to those who can eat a cold dish.

Cold Tofu Dish

Then there is another side dish which is good. It’s called the Japanese Dumpling. It’s tasty I must say. I once had a bad experience with this Japanese dumpling I tried somewhere else. It was awful. So when they orderd this I was skeptical in eating it as I remembered how it tasted like the last time….but phew no…it’s 100% better. This dumpling is served with vinegar like sauce which you dip in. Wonderful.

Japanese Dumpling. Serves 5 pieces but here's missing 1 piece which went to Ed's stomach.

However an improvement for this Restaurant would be to cut down on the salt content in their Ramen soup. It's abit on the salty side. All else thumbs up for this Restaurant.

Cafe Kheng Pin

For lunch we decided to hop over to this coffee shop found along Penang Road and at the corner of Jln Bawasih. Dad recommended to try the the Lor Bak, Char Koay Teow and Chicken Rice.

Coffee Shop was packed with people. We were lucky to get a place to sit. There were about 7 stalls selling which were; Chicken Rice, Char Koay Teow, Koay Teow Th'ng, Lor Bak, Wan Tan Mee, Chinese Satay and Century Egg Porridge. The Char Koay Teow and the Lor Bak stalls were in the Rasa Rasa book.

Ed ordered the Chicken rice, Lil Panda jean ordered the Char Koay Teow and I had the Wan Tan Mee. For side orders I ordered 10 sticks of Pork Satay and Lor Bak.

The Lor Bak stall apart from the common fried stuffs they had something different, 2 types of fried squid. One was the whole squid fried (size of your middle finger) and fried tentacles of the squids. I ordered the prawn fritter, lor bak, fish, taufu and the whole squid. The Lor Bak dish came first so we ate it. It was good. Fish and prawns were fresh. Taste was excellent. The squid on the other hand wasn't wow. The fried batter covering the squid was broken away and the squid was left all nakedly white in front of us.

Lor Bak with the nakedly white squid

Then came my Wan Tan Mee. It was good and up to my standard since I can be quite fussy when it comes to the type of black Soya Sauce they use. This was perfect tasting. The Wan Tan was also soft and juicy and had a reasonable amount of meat fillings in it.

Wan Tan Mee which was good

While waiting for Lil Panda's Char Koay Teow I was boasting to Jean that I spoke in Hokkien to place the order. I said, "Aunty, Char Koay Teow chi ley, chiak, mai hum, hair nui" Jean was impressed. But 5 minutes later the funny thing happened. The aunty came up to me and spoke in English, about my order again. Cis.....looks like she didn' t understand my hokkien after all. There goes my "kembang-ness" as Ed and Jean laughed.

Char Koay Teow which tasted so so by Jean

Pork Satay arrived and I kept quite not telling Jean that it was pork until she ate a stick then only I told her (jean hates pork). But cis again, she knew it was pork. Satay was ok only. Not wonderful. It was marinated the usual serai way and served with the peanut sauce. I still prefer my Satay Babi man at Bangkok lane.

Pork Satay. Nothing much to brag about

The Chicken Rice, Ed was disappointed as it wasn't up to his expectation. It looked good but taste wise he didn't like it. But alot of people were ordering it.

Ed looking all disappointed with his Chicken Rice

So, we recomend you to try this place one day for the Wan Tan Mee and the Lor Bak. We shall be back again to try the Porridge and Koay Teow Th'ng.

The damage on the table done by Jean. Look at that cheeky smile of hers.

Jusco Members Day Sale Madness

Went for Jusco's Members Day Sale today and boy was the place really packed and noisy. There were so many people shopping, fitting rooms were having long queues, Cashier counters were having never ending queues and it was as noisy as a Night market. Perhaps worst than it.

The cashier counter

I came with mum as a teman. Thought she might be busy shopping but she could not stand the sound, so my shopping was cut short. Only manage to get myself a casual black skirt and a colour shirt for only RM 51.00.

Wanna know what was making the place so Noisy? Ok, at certain times they will announce a price reduction on a certain item. The promoters incharge are equiped with a loud speaker. So when the time hits....the alarm goes on and they will start announcing the price reduction. You can hear them shouting out loud "mari mari, 80% discount", "Mari mari lelong lelong"" Mari mari stock baru" Take for example the ladies handbag. They had discounts up to 80% at certain "lelong" times. People actually go crazy. You will see handbags flying from the front to the back. Hands in the air and people all squashed around the rack. And when you hear "mari mari stock baru", that's when the promoter is actually walking in with a big box of new handbags which he practically 'pours' the bags out from the box and over the peoples head aiming straight to the rack. During this time bags go flying and people start rushing to grab the bags. But you wanna know the funny thing about this....you see majority of guys in the crowd...hahahhaha. They actually get bullied by their girls to help snatch a bag of gold!

This is a picture of the handbag area. If you look properly you can see a brown box about to pour out the handbags.

And as usual, I did come across some brainless idiots who are uncivilized and inconsiderate. I was lining up at a fitting room place. There were these two lady's in front of me with about 20 pieces of clothes to try on or more. They had it all in a basket. I was so irritated with them that I nearly wanted to tell them off and show them the sign on the fitting room door that writes "5 garments per fitting". But I decided to walk away and line up at another place where the people followed the rules. I kesian the rest behind them. I peaked at them at times. They had their faces black and long waiting for these two ladies to come out...hehehhehe. I think those two ladies took around 30 minutes to finally come out from the fitting room. My gosh, damn those ladies, brainless idots.

Then at the grocery area they also had lelongs. There was a counter having lelongs on maggie mee, powder milk, milo, toothpaste etc. However the items were limited to 2 units per customer receipt. I saw alot of people buying cream crackers. Saw a trolley all filled up with just cream crakers. Madness!!!!

Then another funny thing was even the bakery there participated in this lelong business. They had stacks of freshly baked buns up for sale and loads of pizza's on sale for only RM 4.99 (a RM1 reduction) I manage to take a picture but it was not good enough as I was abit shy to go infront of the promoters to snap shot them. Hahahahahha.

Picture of the backery madness. See the guy with the white hat, he was the person incharge of lelong-ing the pizza's

So all in all, I must say this is an experience you must not miss.

To my gilrfriends: The next Jusco sale you interested to teman me? Mum was a bad teman and I know Ed would be bored stiff.

My Hand is Aching

Today I decided to join my collegues for Badminton after work. I cannot remember the last time I ever played Badminton. All I can remember is playing at my Nanny's house with Fiona and the front gate as the netting.
So I reached the place at around 6.30pm. Could have been earlier but I took the wrong road. There was about 8-10 badminton courts there but my factory only booked 4 courts for us. There was 5 of us and I was the odd one out, so I sat down and watched them 4 play first. Halfway through I was thinking, this is going to be boring. Then one of the colleague stopped to let me play. Woohooo...how sweet of her.
At first I was feeling abit shy cos I wasn't too sure if I still remembered how to hit the shuttle cock. But thank goodness didn't make a fool of myself. I still had my "experience" from the childhood days.
At around 7pm more people came in and now we had to play real badminton game with the countings and all. After each set we have to let the next group play. Bummer....but am proud that I manage to sweat. Now have to suffer away with my aching arm.

Savory Onion Pancake with Egg Fillings

Today after work I suddenly got in the mood of cooking up something. So after my walk on the field I decided to make a savory pancake for breakfast.

I'll try and briefly explain the ingredients and method of making this.

2 big onions
2 cloves of garlic
Sage
4 cups flour
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
Salt
Pepper
3 eggs + 4 eggs
Milk
Salad Cream

First step, grab yourself your sunglasses to wear as you'll be cutting onions.

Get your most fashionable sun glasses

Then blend the onions and garlic and put to a bowl.

Blended onions and garlic

Boil your eggs, depends how much egg fillings you want. Here I boiled 10 eggs as I want going to feed an army.

Boil the eggs

Now to make the pancake mix. Take 4 cups of flour in a bowl mixer. Make a hole in the middle and break 3 eggs into it. Add in 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence and a dash of sage spice. Add in salt and pepper to taste. With a whisk spoon stir and beat the ingredients until it comes into a thick mixture. Pour in milk to dilute the mixture and slowly add in your blended onions and garlic mix. Keep on stirring, adding in the milk until you get a not so watery texture. Something like a lassi drink texture.

This is the texture of the pancake mix before beating it with a whisk

This is the correct pancake mix texture which is ready to cook

Put your pancake mixture aside and head on to make your egg fillings. With the boiled eggs take of the shell and give it a mash with some lemon juice, salad cream, salt and pepper to taste. The egg fillings are suppose to taste like those egg sandwich you eat but with a pinch of sourness.

Once the egg filling is ready, it is now time to cook your pancake mix. Prepare a non stick pan, heat it up and have a bowl of butter nearby. Once the pan is hot put in abit of butter to coat the pan. Then pour in a bit of the pancake mix on the pan. You have to use the other hand to turn the pan around so that the pancake mix will nicely cover the pan and form a nice circle pancake. You need to be fast here. Repeat the steps until you finish all of your pancake mixture.

Use a non stick pan

This is how it looks when your cooking the pancake

On a table place your egg fillings and cooked pancakes to cool. Then take a circle pancake, cut it into two and nicely line the egg fillings near the end. You would the need to fold the half pancake into a popiah like shape. How much egg fillings you want in each popiah shaped pancakes depends on you. However a tip: try to put alot of egg fillings in your popiah as less fillings gives your pancake not much taste.

Take note of the blue container, that is the chopped up egg filling

Hard at working folding the pancakes and the egg fillings

And walla.....you have your Savory Onion Pancake with Egg fillings fit to serve Queen Elizabeth.

Lovely to eat when freshly made

My Darlings

Let me introduce them

Scruffy Duffy
Casey Melleney
Lucky a.k.a. Big Dude
Winnie the Pooh

These are my darlings in my life. Spoilt no doubt and pampered.

Scruffy is the oldest and she’s the leader of the pack. Yes that’s right…the smallest rules. She’s small but she’s smart and cannot be messed with. She has given birth before to 6 pups which I gave away to good homes. She’s fussy at times and playfull. She’s good at fetching the ball which is surprising for her mix breed. However now due to old age she’s started to have cataract.

Scruffy looking all grumpy as she was asleep when I disturbed her for a photo. She needs a bath

Casey Melleney was adopted by me from the SPCA centre. I adopted her on the same week my previous dog passed away. She was once an abused dog which has effected her mentally. She behaves differently from the other dogs and takes sometime to trust humans. She’s scared and shy sometimes and extremely fat. But I still love her and she is happy to be with me. However due to old age kicking in, she’s starting to loose her hearing.

Casey being camera shy. She's running up the steps

Lucky a.k.a. Big Dude is a handful to manage. But with his naughty and playfull personality, who can resist not loving him. He’s the only male among the ladies and sadly to say is still a virgin. He weights 29 kg and has a big built. However he is still skinny looking under his furr. He’s spoilt to the extend that every night he gets to choose which air-cond room to sleep in. He’s number 1 at burping, drooling and not forgetting snoring. He also loves eating fruits and vegetable.

Lucky posing away for his photo shot

Winnie the Pooh was adopted about two years ago from a couple who gave her away. She’s stubborn and lazy. I got her especially for Big Dude to mate with. However she does not seem attracted to Big Dude and growls at him every time he tries to be “naughty” with her. I sometimes call her “the toe stepper” as she can step on your toe without realizing and stay that way for sometime. She weight’s 30kg so it does hurt at times when my toes get stepped on. Her hobby everyday is to sleep. When she goes out for a walk the max round she can go around the field is 2 rounds. After that she’ll sit her butt down on the road and refuse to walk again for a 3rd round. She also has the privilege to choose which air-cond room to sleep in at nights.

Winnie doing what she's good at...sleep

Big dude and Winnie anticipating for a walk on the field

Wednesday Activity

Ed has been away from the island since Sunday. Life for me has been a bit boring. Go to work, come back from work, walk with the dogs and watch TV. Sounds really good but I somehow get restless and bored.

Yesterday mum cooked pizza which was excellent. Too bad I did not manage to take snap shots of the tiny pizzas. **Pizza Dough was bought from AMei Bakery**
After the pizza making boredom kicked in and I decided to do a movie marathon with my mum.

Movie no. 1: Georgia Rules
Starring: Lindsay Lohan, Jane Fonda, Felicity Huffman, Dermont Mulroney, Garrett Hedlunc, Cary Elwes, Zachary Gordon

Synopsis: This movie explores the complicated and humorous relationships of between mothers and daughters. When the mother could no longer handle her rebellious teenage daughter, she takes the daughter to the one place she swore she could never return- her mother’s house (the grandmother’s hse). This Grandmother played by Jane Fonda has rules of her own which is called “Georgia’s Rule”. During the stay there a secret was told by the daughter (Lindsay Lohan) which shocked both the mother and grandmother.

***Well I should not say more. It’s a must watch show if your in the mood for some mother daughter time together.

Movie no. 2: Perfect Stranger
Starring: Halle Berry, Bruce Willis
Synopsis: In New York, the investigative reporter Rowena Price (Halle Berry) sees her scoop about a gay senator spiked by her editor. She quits her job in the newspaper and meets with her childhood friend Grace by chance in the subway. Grace tells Ro that she had just been dumped by the powerful and wealthy owner of the greatest New Yorker advertising agency, Harrison Hill (Bruce Willis), and she was threatening to tell his wife about their affair. When Grace is found dead, Harrison becomes Rowena's prime suspect. With the support of her hacker friend and former colleague Miles Haley, Ro is hired for a temporary work in Harrison's agency to get close to the executive and investigate his life.

****It was a good show as it had a good twist at the end of it. Thumbs up. However if your one who likes action packed, this movie is a big no no for you.

After the movie marathon it was around 10 something. Did some tick session with my dogs and went up for my shower and off to dreamland.

Is your workplace culture like this?

I came accross a really funny email which was forwarded to me. It is funny to know that there are such things happening in the working world these days. In the picture you will see that the the lower levels do all the dirty job while the manager levels and above only observe and instruct.

In my current working experience, I do see such things happening. But there are some good leaders who do work together with the lower ranks. Those who are humble enough to be seated together with the lower levels and undertand their problems and issues they encounter. But they don't seem to last long in the company.

Then there are some who push issues to other departments and often like to escalate others. These type of managers are hard to work with as they can never open up to listen to the problems the lower ranks face. They are a real pain in the arse to work with. Some are just to egoistic to admit a mistake made. Even worst they cannot even give a smile or acknolwedge a greet when we walk pass them in the office, we somehow seem not to exist and transparent in front of them. I hate that alot. How can we respect such people.

Sometimes I wonder if this was how they were treated when they started off at the lower rank. Shouldn't they know how it feels? I guess it all comes down to the culture of the company and how the management operates. Or is this how the Asians work.

A phrase learnt during my years of working

"Tai Chi"- this word is used to explain how a person or department pushes responsibility to others.

Ed's Favourite Duck Rice

Today was a lazy Sunday we both had. We both woke up around 11.15 in the late morning. Planned to have some indonesian food in town. But after Ed's visit to the barber we both got lazy to drive all the way down to town. So we headed to Taman Pekaka for Ed's altime favourite Duck Rice.

The coffee shop is called Happy Cafe. It is a corner coffee shop just situated next/opposite Tesco Extra. I only manage to take 3 shots of the place as I was feeling abit shy when Ed told the Duck guy that I was going to post the pictures on the internet.

This is the picture of the coffee shop

The duck uncle of nice to pose for me before he butchered the duck.

This is Ed's meal. I still feel the uncle gave him extra rice.

Birthday Wishes to a Special person

Happy Birthday Rosalind Chai Nyuk Lan

We Are Back!!!!!!

We are Back.....we were lost for about a year with no updates. Lazy-ness kicked in and eventually forgetfull-ness came in as we both forgot the password for this blog... But nevermind that......all has been resolved.

How have we both been.....well the pictures below will tell. Enjoy.......

Ed still doing what he is best for......

Me, Cheryl still the same Sexy Babe....haha hoho hehe...err???

We're both still out looking for food...........

Tony Romas Onion Rings

We're both the same except a few pounds more from all the eating....

But wait we have others in this Island who have the same interest. But whether if they are gaining pounds too...that we both do not know.

Ros a.k.a. James Bond babe reject: Well she did audition for the role for the latest James Bond Casino Royale but competition was tight when Eva Green walked in

And the two serious ones who you cannot fool when it comes to food. They mean serious business

So stay tuned as we shall be updating soon on what we have been doing over the past year.

I had two cakes

Have you ever been that crazy with food? Have you ever travelled so far just to eat something? Well that's what me and my friends did.

It was actually an early birthday celebration. The Dugongs planned a makan trip all the to Jitra, Alor Setar. There's this Thai restaurant there which I once tried last time and enjoyed the food. What was really excellent there was their crispy chicken with Thai Saue...MMmm to the max. And this place was also where I first got introduced to a unique dessert- Coconut Jelly.

After dinner look what they got me...a Birthday cake!!! Yahoo...So they lighted the candles but did not sing any birthday song as they all felt 'malu'.

Then on my birthday day itself, I had to work. Yea company was having a new system. Was slaved to work the whole weekend. Had to work until 1 am in the morning just to mearly be in the office to do data validation. But enough of the complains, my colleagues gave me a surprise. The first surprise ever I have got. I was at my table doing some work. Then suddenly a colleague was telling me that there is a meeting in the meeting room. So fine I got up all grumpy and walked my way to the room. As I opened the door, in the split second I was telling myself how come the room was so dark. So as I stepped into the room....everyone in the room started to clap their hands and they sang my birthday song. Man was I so surprised. It was so unexpected. They bought me a Secret recipe cake, Americano. It was Good!! And as a present for me, my superior said that i can go back. Yahooooo.....pretended to go "ah nola no need, then it's not fair for the rest" But hahahha they insisted so fine, I rushed back home after that.

What a birthday. Thanks everyone.

Boo's sick

As I write this post....behind me wrapped under a thick blanket is Boo SNOORING away....boy oh boy...how am I to sleep with him in the future....Need to buy ear plugs...

Well he's sick...suddenly got a very high fever, soar throat and whole body aching. Saw the doctor, he's not diagnosed with any Bird Flu. Thank Goodness.... Guess he just needs alot of rest as he hasn't been sleeping enough since the weekend.

So as for me I already have a slight soar throat...I think my body's fighting the germs....I better dose myself with lots of vitamins. So okthen..have to wake him up now to open the door for me to leave...It's going to take me around 15 minutes to wake him up....help!!!!