14/9/07, Midnight
Matadoe, Mata-Mata
Just finished watching 'Hairspray' at the Mall, great movie by the way, and going for a little supper. Was thinking of going to the Sing-U-Me at the corner but Matadoe just suddenly caught our eyes. I have noticed the place before but didn't go in before. Feeling adventurous, we ventured forth into a 'journey of discovery' LOL.
The place is great with really good ambience and decors. The staff served us promptly as expected. Looked through the menu and the prices are reasonable. Then come the ordering.
Sadly, my first choice of Spicy Wing is not available... then I decided to have Swedish Breakfast at midnight... hehe or should I say it's my sahur? However, after awhile the waitress came back and told me it is not available also... Ok, and I changed the order again to Tacos. Lo and behold, it is not available too! Am I being punished for thinking of eating supper!
Seeing my frustration and maybe a vein throbbing on my temples*, the waitress recommends chicken burger or beef burger, which she thinks is certainly available. The beef burger's picture did caught my when I look through the menu but it seems very heavy for a supper and I am theoritically on a weight lost program. (Eh, I know I am not suppose to have supper but...) *Just kidding, I am in good humour most of the time and I just finished watching a fun movie.
The beef burger came and as expected, the portion is big with lot's of fries. The burger looks different, the bun seems out of shape. Looked at the inside and saw really green lettuce and thick slices of tomatoes and cucumber. Think I am gonna like it...
Then the moment of truth comes.
I took a big bite.
!!!
It is very, very, very delicious!!! Totally yummy!!! Much, much better than McD's Doublecheese Burger. It is a good thing they ran out of spicy wings, swedish breakfast and tacos! Think I used too much ! in this paragraph... but I LOVE MATADOE'S BEEF BURGER!!! It's heaven on a plate. I really love the perfect marriage of the cheese and beef patty.They both have very strong taste and they make such intense couple.
(Damn, getting hungry writing this blog...)
Other than the utterly-delicious beef burger, I also ordered Earl Grey, ah, my favourite tea of all times. The tea they served is nice but not really hot enough. But the pot is huge. Its exactly, 4 and one-fifth cups of tea.
This restaurant is gonna get a fantastic review.
BUT, there's a big but.
Some inconsiderate, babaric, suicidical-and-wants-everyone-else-around-them-to-die-early-as-well-like-a-suicide-bomber-in-Iraq, big, gigantic idiot started smoking indoors! INDOORS! That just ruins the whole atmosphere. Was waiting for the waiters to stop them and started counting the mili-seconds...
NO ACTION TAKEN!
Can't stand it any longer with my suffocation and eyes irritated by the burning, acidic smoke, I cut short the stay and proposed that we leave to save our own life.
Rating
Ambience: 3/20 (Could have been a 18 but the smoke took 15 points away... and I am being kind. My health is at risk here)
Presentation of Food: 12/20 (Looks great but the burger bun just looks weird.)
Smell of Food: 15/20 (As it should be)
Taste of Food: 19/20 (!!!, enough said)
Service:2/20 (very good waitress, helpful and quite pretty also but 15 points off for not stopping the smokers from smoking. Not professional enough, you got to care about the well beings of your other patrons!)
Total Marks: 51%
Verdict: Contrary to the "almost-gonna-boycott" marks, this place is a must go, but do bring along a gas mask just in case brain-dead smokers visits again.
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Friday, September 14, 2007
Of Yayasan and Nyonya
13/9/07 Evening
Yayasan Complex, BSB
I was in Yayasan Complex last evening for the Gerai Ramadan there. It is very special considering even fast food restaurants like KFC and Ideal Cafe and Grill took part. It even have Indian food and dim sum. There are tables and chairs set up so the patrons can just break their fast there.
Was checking out the stall when the the cannon fired. BOOM! That marks the start of Sungkai and a call to prayer follows. Thousands of spoons must have met dinner plates simultaneously at that particular time period!
Back to the stalls, it is very small compared to those set up all around Brunei. My most notable purchase would be Zaika's combo meal. That meal is damn expensive. I ordered Chicken Masala ($3) and the person just scoop in one piece of chicken and a lot of sauce. I was alarmed! I thought it would at least come with some rice or even a plain roti. A $3 piece of chicken! This better be good!!! In the end I ordered that with plain briyani($3), dal ($3)and a cup of lassi ($1.50) all for the price of $8 since it is a combo. This is so far the most expensive food I bought from food stall considering the portion.
So was the purchase worth the price? No. I think it is worth only $5. The masala is tasty but too small. Think it is worth $1.00. The dal just taste weird (worth $0.50), the briyani is nice but too plain as the name suggested but I still love the Basmati rice (worth $2). The lassi is great(worth $1.50) Should give the lassi a try.
Verdict (Zaika's Stall): AVOID. Only the Lassi is reasonable.
Overall the Yayasan Gerai Ramadan is pretty good, some variety but try to avoid Zaika. So, schedule a visit to Yayasan one of these evenings, but I want to emphasize again... Avoid Zaika!
14/9/07 Noon
Nyonya Restaurant, Gadong
Kinda forgot about the profound disatisfaction of buying from Zaika... must be the lassi working its magic! This lunch time I manage to go to Nyonya's to try the $0.99 dim sum.
In Nyonya, there's a lot of people there and I remember the last time I went there we are the only customers. Think they are not used to handling more than one table of customers because the service is so damn slow. It turns out we have to wait for the waiters to serve us. Waiting for waiters, twisted isn't it.
About the dim sum, the siew mai looks over cooked, the skin of shark fin dumpling is very dry and we have to eat dim sum with fork! By the time the dim sum is in our mouth, it is ruined! Sounds like a bad reveiw coming eh?
Truthfully, it is the best halal dim sum I have ever had!
And I love the ambience in Nyonya, especially the place for washing hands. It has a nice mirror and decorated with flowers and other decorations. It feels like a sacred altar for self-worshipping.
Now back to the dim sum. I really like the chunky, meaty feel without it being a challenge to bite. Really like the shrimp dumpling but can't really rate it because the most important part, the skin is ruined everytime I pick it up with a fork, and don't even expect me to pick it up with my hands!
(Talking about shrimp dumpling, I firmly advise against the ones in Foodzone Yayasan. Looks great and that's it. The skin is too soft, and the prawn in the is mushy!!! You aren't suppose to chop up the prawn you idiot! Sorry for being emotional... but its about food!)
Now comes the part for rating Nyonya' Dim Sum offer:
Ambience: 18/20 (Very good especially the "altar")
Presentation of food: 10/20 (Points off for the dry skin in shark fin dumpling)
Smell of food: 15/20 (Nothing special, just mediocre)
Taste of food: 13/20 (Best halal dim sum I ever had but a tad too salty. Marks off for the weird tasting plain water)
Service: 15/20 (Points off for slow service but gained some with the very beautiful cashier)
Total marks: 71% (very good considering my picky-ness)
Verdict: Good and definitely will go again sometime during this season.
Yayasan Complex, BSB
I was in Yayasan Complex last evening for the Gerai Ramadan there. It is very special considering even fast food restaurants like KFC and Ideal Cafe and Grill took part. It even have Indian food and dim sum. There are tables and chairs set up so the patrons can just break their fast there.
Was checking out the stall when the the cannon fired. BOOM! That marks the start of Sungkai and a call to prayer follows. Thousands of spoons must have met dinner plates simultaneously at that particular time period!
Back to the stalls, it is very small compared to those set up all around Brunei. My most notable purchase would be Zaika's combo meal. That meal is damn expensive. I ordered Chicken Masala ($3) and the person just scoop in one piece of chicken and a lot of sauce. I was alarmed! I thought it would at least come with some rice or even a plain roti. A $3 piece of chicken! This better be good!!! In the end I ordered that with plain briyani($3), dal ($3)and a cup of lassi ($1.50) all for the price of $8 since it is a combo. This is so far the most expensive food I bought from food stall considering the portion.
So was the purchase worth the price? No. I think it is worth only $5. The masala is tasty but too small. Think it is worth $1.00. The dal just taste weird (worth $0.50), the briyani is nice but too plain as the name suggested but I still love the Basmati rice (worth $2). The lassi is great(worth $1.50) Should give the lassi a try.
Verdict (Zaika's Stall): AVOID. Only the Lassi is reasonable.
Overall the Yayasan Gerai Ramadan is pretty good, some variety but try to avoid Zaika. So, schedule a visit to Yayasan one of these evenings, but I want to emphasize again... Avoid Zaika!
14/9/07 Noon
Nyonya Restaurant, Gadong
Kinda forgot about the profound disatisfaction of buying from Zaika... must be the lassi working its magic! This lunch time I manage to go to Nyonya's to try the $0.99 dim sum.
In Nyonya, there's a lot of people there and I remember the last time I went there we are the only customers. Think they are not used to handling more than one table of customers because the service is so damn slow. It turns out we have to wait for the waiters to serve us. Waiting for waiters, twisted isn't it.
About the dim sum, the siew mai looks over cooked, the skin of shark fin dumpling is very dry and we have to eat dim sum with fork! By the time the dim sum is in our mouth, it is ruined! Sounds like a bad reveiw coming eh?
Truthfully, it is the best halal dim sum I have ever had!
And I love the ambience in Nyonya, especially the place for washing hands. It has a nice mirror and decorated with flowers and other decorations. It feels like a sacred altar for self-worshipping.
Now back to the dim sum. I really like the chunky, meaty feel without it being a challenge to bite. Really like the shrimp dumpling but can't really rate it because the most important part, the skin is ruined everytime I pick it up with a fork, and don't even expect me to pick it up with my hands!
(Talking about shrimp dumpling, I firmly advise against the ones in Foodzone Yayasan. Looks great and that's it. The skin is too soft, and the prawn in the is mushy!!! You aren't suppose to chop up the prawn you idiot! Sorry for being emotional... but its about food!)
Now comes the part for rating Nyonya' Dim Sum offer:
Ambience: 18/20 (Very good especially the "altar")
Presentation of food: 10/20 (Points off for the dry skin in shark fin dumpling)
Smell of food: 15/20 (Nothing special, just mediocre)
Taste of food: 13/20 (Best halal dim sum I ever had but a tad too salty. Marks off for the weird tasting plain water)
Service: 15/20 (Points off for slow service but gained some with the very beautiful cashier)
Total marks: 71% (very good considering my picky-ness)
Verdict: Good and definitely will go again sometime during this season.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
My Favourite Time of the Year
Greetings, today marks the start of the Holy month of Ramadan. It's my favourite time of the year... It is not because more than 1 billion people around the world will be starving... , I am not that evil yet! LOL. I love this time of the year because this is the month of FOOD!
All around Brunei, there are stalls being set up for this special month. You can literally smell food in the air! I'm wondering how can those fasting people stand this, it must be a torment. Better yet, there will be tonnes of food promotion this time of the year.
The best things about Ramadan are:
1) There are 50% discount from RMS group... they own my favourite Italian restaurant Fratini's (also available in the Miri branch). They also own a classy American diner and authentic Indian cuisine.
2) Nyonya restaurant offers Dim Sum at 99 cents each! That's freaking cheap! But it is for lunch only... Was thinking of going today ... but my sister slept till 1pm. Well, may go tomorrow.
3) One of my favourite: Japanese food buffet at Misato (called Edo Ichi elsewhere) at $12.90 only. A very rare move for a franchise restaurant especially for Japanese food. I think it's a great deal considering my typical expenditure per visit to a Japanese restaurant is at least $20... and I'm not even full yet.
4) As usual, there'll be Ramadan stalls selling huge variety of local and not so local cuisine. Read from the newspaper today some stalls are coming up with new secret recipe such as Thai style bbq chicken... the picture sure looks great. Think will give it a try if I can find this Awang Ali. Wonder from which are is he in? Gadong? Stadium? Bandar? The news also said some stall will introduce their secret recipe in a few days time... how I love competitions. Capitalism rules!
Millenium Restaurant is offering a Middle East buffet but its at $16.xx Kinda pricey considering all the food promotion around. There are also a lot of $5 buffet around also but this is not that special since we do have some restaurantthat offers $5 buffet all year round.
Will be going to Yayasan Complex tonight for their Gerai Ramadan. Found out there are some really good restaurants like RMS's Zaika are taking part.
That is all for the special update from Borneo Food Hunter. Bon Appetit!
All around Brunei, there are stalls being set up for this special month. You can literally smell food in the air! I'm wondering how can those fasting people stand this, it must be a torment. Better yet, there will be tonnes of food promotion this time of the year.
The best things about Ramadan are:
1) There are 50% discount from RMS group... they own my favourite Italian restaurant Fratini's (also available in the Miri branch). They also own a classy American diner and authentic Indian cuisine.
2) Nyonya restaurant offers Dim Sum at 99 cents each! That's freaking cheap! But it is for lunch only... Was thinking of going today ... but my sister slept till 1pm. Well, may go tomorrow.
3) One of my favourite: Japanese food buffet at Misato (called Edo Ichi elsewhere) at $12.90 only. A very rare move for a franchise restaurant especially for Japanese food. I think it's a great deal considering my typical expenditure per visit to a Japanese restaurant is at least $20... and I'm not even full yet.
4) As usual, there'll be Ramadan stalls selling huge variety of local and not so local cuisine. Read from the newspaper today some stalls are coming up with new secret recipe such as Thai style bbq chicken... the picture sure looks great. Think will give it a try if I can find this Awang Ali. Wonder from which are is he in? Gadong? Stadium? Bandar? The news also said some stall will introduce their secret recipe in a few days time... how I love competitions. Capitalism rules!
Millenium Restaurant is offering a Middle East buffet but its at $16.xx Kinda pricey considering all the food promotion around. There are also a lot of $5 buffet around also but this is not that special since we do have some restaurantthat offers $5 buffet all year round.
Will be going to Yayasan Complex tonight for their Gerai Ramadan. Found out there are some really good restaurants like RMS's Zaika are taking part.
That is all for the special update from Borneo Food Hunter. Bon Appetit!
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