If there's one meat that I love eating the most, it's gotta be pork.

So imagine the delight when I heard that pork will be the main ingredient of the food that I'll be sampling at Ante Kitchen & Bar.Tucked in the enclave of Solaris Dutamas, Ante Kitchen & Bar were initially an idea from 6 friends who sat down at a table one day discussing on what to eat. The name Ante was chosen due to them being poker aficionados who know the risks involved in opening a restaurant business and they decided to wager with their time, effort, money and skills to the stake, the "Ante".

As mentioned earlier, pork is mainly in most of their dishes and it was surely a delicacy that I looked forward to.

Some starter soups that our table ordered, this is the Chunky Mushroom Soup:Creamy and served with croutons, a great match to go with the soup.

And the Chef's Tomasco Soup:Also creamy and once the taste settles in, a little spiciness tends to kick in.

Some drinks to cool down our dry throats:It's Lemon Lime Bitters - soda and lime with bitters
Rosie's Lychee Fizz - lychee, lime and pandan leaf juice
Citrus Mint Cooler - lemon with orange juice
Ice Lemon Tea - erm, lemon tea in ice, LOL
and Passion Fruit Mojito - mint and soda with of course, passion fruit.

Other starters that we tasted were the salads. This is the Caesar Salad:With your normal Caesar Salad elements, eggs, lettuce, parmesan cheese with croutons and some hints of bacon tossed in house dressing.

And two other salads that were in our list were the Crispy Pork Trotter Salad and the Smoked Duck Salad:An out of the ordinary salad for me, not so much the Smoked Duck Salad but the Crispy Pork Trotter Salad.

Then it was onwards to the main course!

The juicy and yummy Char-grilled Pork Steak:It's served with berry cream sauce, mashed potatoes on the side and a baked apple on top.

And whenever I eat pasta, I always go with carbonara because I'm not much of a person who fancy tomatoes. Their carbonara pasta called "The Real Bacon Carbonara" is also quite a delicious choice:(For full review: http://www.ktheblogger.com/2012/12/ante-kitchen-bar-food-review.html)

My virgin visit to Subang Avenue was to Chilla Cup to attend the Coffee Appreciation Session that has been set up:A nice quiet place to chill out with adequate seatings. The area to order:Does this ordering system look familiar?Tony Tang from School of Coffee was the invited trainer for this Coffee Appreciation Session. He's the owner of School of Coffee in Singapore Polytechnic and is a consultant for cafes and restaurants throughout Malaysia and Singapore on coffees. He is also the Regional Barista competition judge which makes it all the more credible, doesn't it?

Together with his assistant that he brought along, Li Hebin, they're awaiting and are eager to educate us on the intricacies of coffee.

It started on the introduction to coffee, detailing on the lifespan of coffee beans which is about only 14 days while coffee beans that's ground only last about 5 minutes of freshness, samples of defective coffee beans were passed around for us to have a look

After a taste testing on chewing raw coffee beans to know the freshness, we finally get to taste some coffee. Goodies!
Started off with a small cup of Espresso, a really strong taste to it (that keeps me awake). What's interesting is that the coffee taste should linger in your mouth after consuming where the flavors just bursts out as you speak.

Next came the cup of Latte that was served with some art work:Creamy and deliciously good.

There's also a cup of Piccolo Latte served which is actually not available in Chilla Cup:My 1st time tasting Piccolo Latte. Never had it before. It's basically a mixture of Espresso and Latte, in other words, a milky, creamy Espresso.
Also, some Affogato:Basically, Espresso with ice-cream to me. LOL.

So then came the show of brewing method. It actually also involves the sound of brewing but don't ask me about it, I wouldn't know how to differentiate it, haha.
So 1st method shown to us is the paper sieve method which I remember doing this and drinking cups of coffee with this method a long long time ago during my school days.

(For full review, head to http://www.ktheblogger.com/2012/09/coffee-appreciation-session-with-chilla.html)

A Friday evening it was where I went over to a restaurant named Teow Chew Meng located at SS14 in Subang:They're introducing some new dishes into their menu at the Subang SS14 branch where all their new dishes starts off at a price of just RM6!

Whilst awaiting for the rest of the invited people for this food tasting session to arrive, we were served with some appetizers with an introduction of the restaurant.
Here's the Octopus:Chewy and nice. Goes well with the sauce that's been laid served together. Can taste that it's fresh.
And one more appetizer served to us was the Kerabu Mango:Teow Chew Meng started off in Penang before it opened it's branches in the Klang Valley area. The owner of this SS14 branch is the son-in-law of the originator.

We were first served with the Mee Sua Tow:The noodles are soft and nice and the mixture with the soup and ingredients all goes well together. But after awhile, I would say it would be nice if you put some condiments on it like light soy sauce then it would taste better.

Here's a chili that they made up on their own:It's called 'Laat Sei Lei' in Cantonese direct translation, Spicy Die You. LOL. Ok, it's more spicier than your average chili kinda like your cili padi spicy level. It goes well with the noodle dishes and definitely recommended to take with it to add a kick to it.

Here's the Roasted Duck Noodles:I would say it's averagely nice but with the kind of price they're selling, it's worth it.
Here's the Pork Noodle:I generally love eating pork.
But hats off to the next dish:The Beef Noodles. This is the best of the lot I tasted for the evening. Add in their special chili and you have a great dish.

The night of September 18, 2012 was when the Imbi Palace group launch their new rebranded image and had invited to about 140 guests to join in this occasion.

The place held for this was at the Pavilion's Grand Palace restaurant where we get to enjoy a delicious and sumptuous meal.

I'm impress that they started right on schedule which I've not seen for a very, very long time and am glad that I made it in time. LOL.
The MC, Ms. Jocelyn Lim started off with a welcoming note before passing it on to the Chairman of Imbi Palace Group, Mr. Lum Tuck Loy to say a few words and subsequently a photo op with the Executive Director as well, Mr. Chin.

The first dish that we were served is called the Double Boiled Cordyceps Flower with Top Shell & Fish Maw:It has a unique flavor combination of herbs and meat. It is said to improve skin complexion and cleanses our kidneys.
The Crispy Golden Peking Duck next follows which I very much look forward too because I love Peking Duck. There was also a demonstration by a chef carving the Peking Duck.
Served with some scallion and sauce, along with thin pancake like pastry called Momo:As expected, the Peking Duck was a nice dish that I enjoyed.
A Pan Fried Stuffed Scallop came next and this is how it looked like on my plate:The scallops are stuffed with fresh prawns and I can taste some other type of flavor on it from the juice and sauce that flowed out as I bite into it.

A unique "8 Treasures Truffle Chicken" was next on the menu and it has such a distinct presentation on it's own:Stuffed with 8 different type of mushrooms and with truffle sauce, this chicken also presented a nice rich taste to it. The chicken's neck is longer than usual due to it being hanged before roast and it's dubbed as "Kookoo" chicken. Bare in mind though that this chicken costs about RM80 a dish compared to the Peking Duck of RM70.

Here's a surprise dish that I truly enjoyed the most:The BBQ Broiled Spanish Pork Ribs. The picture above is the whole of it before it's cut into a piece for me to try.

Nice, tender and juicy. Some parts seemed to be a little too salty but nevertheless, overall it's my favorite dish of the night.
The South African Dried Abalone came next for us to feast (looks like we have worldwide ingredients!):The abalone is harvested from the unpolluted seas off the coast of Hermanus and follows the International Food Safety methodology in preparing it.
7th dish for the evening came the LanZhou Knife Shaved Ramen:Served in a soup like setting, it complements the ramen with it.
There's also a preparation demo that was done by a chef on how the ramen is prepared from a ball of dough.
The Braised Noodle with Duck Meat came as our 8th dish in the menu.

And finally, since the mooncake festival is upon us, the Snow Skin Mooncake was introduced:

SS2, Petaling Jaya has a lot of food variety around the area and that's why a lot of people flock to it. Tucked in the same row where Eu Yan Sang at one corner and Hong Leong Bank in the other is a Chinese restaurant named One Recipe Cafe:One Recipe Cafe is a place where they serve Chinese seafood dishes for consumption.Before I introduce you to some food that's served in the restaurant, here are some drinks that I would like to introduce. Starting with the Plum Juice:The Honey Lemon:And the Mocha for coffee lovers:For starters, here are some side dishes that could warm up your appetite.
Here's a dish containing Lobak, Prawn Rolls and Fish Paste served with some Kimball chilli sauce:Some Fried Sotong Balls:And moving on to the main course, here's one of their signature dish, the King Crab Fish Head Mee Hoon: