Marta's Kitchen @ Desa Sri Hartamas

After reading about Sharmila Nair's review about Marta's Kitchen in the The Star few months ago, I was adamant about giving this place a try.

After our church family day outing at Desa Waterpark, we made our way for a very early dinner.
We arrived at The Signature about 5.30 pm and found ourselves to be the only customers at that time. * By the way, we parked our car at Sri Hartamas (near Naughty Nuri's) and walked.

The natural lighting and simple decor creates a perfect relaxing dining experience.

Interesting floor art..always wanted to use them for my house but hubby objects:(

 How nice that you are able to see your food being prepared from this glass window.

We kicked-off dinner with a selection of tapas.

The ham croquetas (Croquetas de Jamon) were superb. Creamy bechamel sauce oozing out from the center of the ham croquettes. Yummilicious!

Don't bother about the free bread though. Even with the olive oil dip it still tasted bland.

The lamb kebabs were well marinated. I enjoyed every bite, although they were a little salty.

From left to right (Ham Croquetas - RM 19, Bread - FOC, Lamb Kebabs - RM 23)

Next, we had San Jacobo. Tender pieces of pork sirloin filled with iberico ham and melted cheese is surely set to WOW you.

San Jacobo (RM 25)

The only main dish we ordered was the Squid Ink Paella. We underestimated our tummies and thought that the portion for 2 will be small. When the paella came, we were rather shocked cause it was quite large even for 3 people.
Even shocking was that there was only 2 prawns 'decorating' the entire paella.
Well, the paella was actually quite good. Full of flavors and there's like tiny chopped squid embedded within the rice. *Note: Rather on the salty side.

Squid Ink Paella ( 2 portions for RM 70)

For dessert, we ordered churros with Valrhona chocolate dip.

Churros with Chocolate Dip ( RM 15)

Overall, the bill came to RM 192.00 (including 1 cup hot Valrhona chocolate - RM 12, 1 glass Sangria - RM 19 and 1 glass orange juice - RM 9).

End note: I would recommend ordering 1 paella and explore different kinds of tapas. Food was on the salty side but bursting with flavors.

Aunty Aini's Garden Cafe @ Nilai Negeri Sembilan

One of the things I did before moving to Negeri Sembilan was to check out new places to eat. Aunty Aini's Garden Cafe was among the top in the list because I simply enjoy Malay food. The spicier the better. Call me for a curry fiesta and I'd be there.

We couldn't find 'kaki's' to try out this place for the one and half years but finally we invited some of our Alor Star church members to visit us and brought them here for dinner.

This place is rather famous among locals and celebrities (think Gordon Ramsay and Anthony Bourdain). The restaurant is surrounded by plants and trees coupled with several water features makes the dining atmosphere somewhat relaxing and romantic. It reminds us of Mom Tri's.
Patrons can choose to dine in a 'pondok' or indoors.

Let's take a look at the beautiful setting inside.

Prior coming, I contacted the cafe and asked for the menu. From reviews, many suggested to order Aunty Aini's gulai daging salai masak lemak cili api and gulai tempoyak. However on the day we arrived, we found that the specialty of the day is gulai itik salai masak lemak cili api. Being a duck lover, I need not think twice about giving it a go:)

All of us loved this dish. Absolutely yummy. My only wish is that the dish was 5 times spicier.

Gulai Itik Salai Masak Lemak Cili Api (Smoked duck coconut milk curry with bird's eye chilli) - RM 15.50

Being a fan of tempoyak (introduced to me after I married my hubby from Sarawak), I was adamant to have tempoyak for dinner. So we order Gulai Lemak Tempoyak -Kupang.
Btw, tempoyak is fermented durian and it is awesome!

Gulai Lemak Tempoyak Kupang - RM 18.50

I found out that different states has different versions of asam pedas. Negeri Sembilan is famous for its asam pedas, but after trying it twice at different places I'd say I prefer a more watery and sour kind of asam pedas infused with lots of bunga kantan (torch ginger).

Asam Pedas Patin - RM 16.00

 The Kerabu Pucuk Paku was really good. No complains.

Kerabu Pucuk Paku - RM 9.00

One of the best rendang daging I've ever tasted. This is the dish Gordon Ramsay came to Malaysia to learn from Aunty Aini.

Rendang Daging - RM 18.00

Last but not least, we tried their Tapai (fermented rice) ice cream. The combination of tapai and vanilla ice cream was superb.

Tapai Ice Cream - RM 4.70

We had an enjoyable time dining and catching up with old friends at Aunty Aini's Garden Cafe.
Do make your reservation if you intend to dine 8pm onwards.
There's ample of free parking so there's no need to worry.

Address:
Aunty Aini's Garden Cafe
Batu 16, Jalan Sepang
Kg. Chelet, 71800 Nilai, Negeri Sembilan
Tel: 06-7991276

A Wet Thai Restaurant @ Sg Chua Kajang

We've had no problems finding good Thai food when we were staying in Penang and Alor Setar.

However, things are different here. We've tried many eateries claiming to sell Thai food but most of the time we ended up disappointed. 

Yesterday we made a trip to Kajang to try this established Thai restaurant at Sg. Chua. Part of the restaurant is beside the pond while a part of it is on the pond.

One can opt to seat indoors (air-conditioned room) or outside. We chose the latter because it was rather noisy indoors.

Let me show you around.

Our table

Another seating area

The pond (reservoir)

Sea of floating pond plants

Okay back to the food. We ordered Tomyam (portion for 1), Kacang botol (Winged bean) and Chicken with Basil Leaves.

The tomyam was delicious albeit not spicy enough (for our level). Next time, we will ask them to make it super extra spicy!

RM 9.00 (for 1 person's portion)

It's been a long time since I had Winged bean and A Wet Thai's  kacang botol did not disappoint. The stir fried kacang botol with garlic and dried prawns were really good.

Kacang botol (RM 12.90)

The last dish needs no introduction. Pad Kra Pow (Thai Basil Chicken) is one of my favourite Thai dish. A Wet Thai's Pad Kra Pow is slightly on the salty side. It would be better if they add more basil leaves and bring the spiciness level a notch higher.

Thai Basil Chicken (RM 16.90)

Total bill came up to RM 50+ including 2 glasses of Pandan tea, 2 plates of rice + 1 extra small bowl, 6% GST and service charge. A bit on the steep side I think, compared to prices of Thai food in Penang.

How to get there?

Food exploration: Baan Chom View Restaurant & Lobster and Prawn Restaurant

On our way up to Kata/Karon viewpoint, we stopped for brunch at Baan Chom View Restaurant. We were the 1st guests at 10.30am.
This place has nice views of the sea and from what I've read, the sunset view is even better.

We ordered Thai Fried Rice and Paad Thai (Total bill was 360B including 1 bottle of sprite)
According to hubby, the Thai Fried Rice lack belacan taste unlike the ones we've tasted in Alor Setar. We are beginning to think that maybe the food in Phuket is purposely catered for tourist's tastebuds. We Malaysians tend to like our food extra sour or super spicy...not those bland kind of food. The Paad Thai again lacked flavour but edible. Had to put heaps of chilli flakes on top to make it spicier.

For our last night dinner, we just walked in to a restaurant called Lobster and Prawn. We ordered 3 dishes: Massaman Curry, Morning Glory and Grilled Fish. Total bill was 821B.
All the dishes are were quite nice, not outstanding but okay.

Day 3: Kata/Karon Viewpoint, Nai Harn Beach, Windmill Viewpoint & Phromthep Cape

The weather forecast predicted rain and possible thunderstorm on that day. So we prayed and ask God for good sunny weather. By 9 am, it did not rain so we rented a scooter (*If you do not want to leave your original passport, you can leave a photocopy of your passport but pay 5000B as a deposit. The scooter rental is 300B for 24 hours and 80B for gasoline which was calculated when we returned the scooter)

The first place we rode to was the Kata/Karon Viewpoint. We arrived around 10am and there already so many tour busses parked there already. Most of the tourists we saw were from India and China and a handful of Thais and Europeans.
We only managed to get clear pictures taken once the crowd has left.

We rode out again at 3.30 pm towards the Windmill viewpoint and made a short stop at Nai Harn beach. This beach is much quieter than Kata beach. Had mango sticky rice for tea.

About 4.30pm, we headed over to the Windmill (a wind turbine actually) viewpoint. Apparently, this is a lesser known place compared to the famous Phromthep Cape. We almost had the whole area to ourselves. Trust me, the view of the sea is even better than that of Phrompthep Cape. We took so many photos and the selfie stick was really my best friend. I got sunburned, but for those shots it was worth it.

This man was trying to see attempt paragliding

About 5.20pm, we made our way to Phromthep cape. Throngs of people were already there waiting to catch the sunset. It was still so hot but it did not deter me from walking uphill and downhill to get some nice pictures.
I'll let you see these pictures for yourself.

I can see the wind turbine from here

Phromthep Cape

The setting sun

Sweaty and sticky but happy faces