Food - Sydney Trip

This Sydney post also has been delayed for long time. Just to share a few delicious food that we enjoy eating during our few days stay there.

1. Sydney Fish Market
Sydney fish market is well known for it's fresh seafood product. Though some might thought this place is abit touristy, but it still worth to pay a visit to enjoy the freshness of the seafood there.

 Cheese-baked crayfish fresh from the market. Choose the way you wanna to cook it.

 Fresh Oysters

Fresh Shashimi Abalone. No regret to order this. Yummy!

The market is open daily from 7am- 4pm and to go to Sydney Fish Market, easiest way is to take Sydney Light Rail. More details about the market, you can log to the website Sydney Fish Market

Sydney Fish Marker

Bank Street & Pyrmont Bridge Road, Sydney NSW 2009

2. Chinese Yum Cha at Marigold Restaurant

Yum cha at Marigold Restaurant is a must visit for us each time we to Sydney. They served a yummy and decent Hong Kong style dim sum. The restaurant is located at near Chinatown and if you plan to go over weekend, be early or call to book table in advance to avoid disappointment.

 Clockwise: Braised chicken feet, steam rice roll, stuffed tau fu pok

 Steamed Beancurd

Must order: Siu mai

One thing I like about yum cha at Marigold is their variety of food available during the yum cha session. Above are just a few of the foods that we ordered as we are too busy enjoying our food, no time to snap more photo on the food :)

Marigold Restaurant (Marigold)

Level 4 & 5
Citymark Building
683-689 George Street Sydney 2000

 That's all for now. For those who plan to visit Sydney soon, hope you will have a pleasant trip!

Legoland Malaysia

Ooops it's been long long time since I last update my blog. Many things has changed during this period. Back to Malaysia again and start a work life at KL after being a 'temp house wife' at Melbourne. Life still goes on =p

Let's move to something interesting. My hubby was a Lego's fan since young and when we got to know that  Legoland will be setup in Johor Bahru, we were so excited and been waiting for the theme park to be completed.  Legoland Malaysia was completed in September, 2012 but due to huge crowd of visitors and also we are away from home, thus our trip has been delayed till last year Christmas (Dec 2013).

Apart from the theme park, Lego themed Hotel was also built up beside the theme park. Initially we are planning to have a night stay at the Lego hotel as we are way attracted with the room theme, unfortunately the rooms were all fully booked during festive season. Thus we took up the 2days 1night Legoland package from Thistle Hotel Johor Bahru (Thistle Johor) which the price was pretty decent.

We started our journey from KL in the early morning and stop by Malacca for our favourite chicken rice ball before head to Johor Bahru. Before our journey, we did a quick study on the theme park and key attractions we are looking forward is the Brick Shop, hoping that we can find some 'special' or hard to find Lego collections and also there is a part where we could actually buy our Lego bricks that we missed out at home and it is priced by weight. Similar like we are buying candy from the candy bar, we choose the bricks we like, weigh and then pay it. =)

During our visit at the park, we also saw the Legoland employee wear a cute Lego name badge. We thought of getting ourselves a customized name tag for ourselves too which it will make a memorable souvenir from Legoland. We been looking around all the souvenir shops and lastly knew that the name badge is only for employees. We are little disappointed initially but hubby suggested that why not we make one ourselves since we can buy the bricks from the souvenir shop. =P. Below is the outcome:

Overall the theme park was not bad but not too large compare to other international theme park. There are still rooms to improve. Rides are mainly suitable for kids and foods inside the park are also pretty well priced in my humble opinion. Do visit Legoland Malaysia website for more details.

Bangkok - Land of Smiles Part 1

It's been quite a while since my last post. I actually went back to Malaysia for good, yes! =). Went to Bangkok, Thailand last week for a short trip. It was my first trip to Thailand and was excited to see everything in this land of smiles. Basically I just went for a 4 days 3 nights trip and went to couple of main attractions in Bangkok. Shall do some review in the upcoming posts.

First Meal in Bangkok
Cuisine Type: Local Thai Food
Shopname: Thai Food Very Good And Very Cheap by Im-chan
Address: Sukhumvit Road, near Soi 39

EST - Local Cola brand

Thai Noodle in Pink Sauce

Pad Thai with Chicken

Oyster Omelet

One type of taxi in Bangkok

Melbourne Aquarium

Although I have been staying in Melbourne for quite some time, but we never pay a visit to the famous Melbourne Aquarium which are located at the CBD. Perhaps I'm abit skeptical on the number of exhibits in the aquarium considering the size of the building. However I was wrong when me and husband finally pay a visit to the aquarium during the Anzac day off.
 

It was a long queue at the ticket counter on that day, luckily us to skip the queue as we already bought the ticket online in advance. We are greeted with friendly staff upon admission to the aquarium which a staff asking us to pose some funny position for photograph session. Little we know that the gimmick was actually for a souvenir album with our photos in it. But we end up did not buying it although it was a nice shot as the album is a little pricey for us (AUD 35 for 3 piece of photo).

The first exhibit to greet us is the famous 2nd world largest penguin, The King Penguin and the Gentoo penguins. OMG, the King Penguin were really really GIGANTIC! I never see that kind of size of penguin before to be honest.

King Penguin

King Penguin

The penguins that we used to see at Philip Island and St Kilda beach was relatively small, perhaps just one tenth of the King Penguin size. The King penguin height is almost same 4-5years old kid or above adult knee level. These guys are from Antarctica and together with them also is the Gentoo penguin which is a little smaller. Gentoo penguin reminds me about the Happy Feet cartoon with it's feet in orange color.

Happy Feet - Gentoo Penguin

Almost as tall as a Kid!

Melbourne Aquarium has large collection of the King Penguins

Apart from the Penguin explore, there are 3 main sections to explore which are the Seahorse Pier, Coral Atoll and Shark Alive. There is a part in the aquarium where visitors could have a nice view on the daily feed by the divers. Melbourne aquarium has a large collection of sea lives including a gigantic stingray which really amazing. 

Do visit the Melbourne Aquarium where you are at Melbourne. The place really worth a visit especially on the gigantic penguins and stingray. We had a wonderful day that day. For more information on the aquarium, do visit their website at www.melbourneaquarium.com.au

Toyoko Inn Hotel Tokyo

I have been delaying this post for some time as I was busy trying different method in making soft buns =). Really hope that all Japan posts will be useful information for anyone who like to travel to Japan for trip. In this post, I would like to recommend the hotel we stayed during our trip to Tokyo last October. In fact, I have been staying in this hotel, Toyoko Inn for all my previous trips to Tokyo.

Toyoko Inn is one of the famous hotel chain in Japan and it has numerous of branch throughout whole Japan. Lately I also found out that, they also already spread their wings to Korea! As we all know, accommodation is not cheap at Japan especially in big metropolitan like Tokyo and normally the room size is pretty small. Fortunately, Toyoko Inn offers a decent room price with average of about 5900Yen per night (please check their website for latest rate).

Twin Room

What I like most about Toyoko Inn is that all the hotel is located close to the nearest train station which is important for free & easy traveler like us. Beside, the rooms are really really CLEAN and I just feel like home when staying in the hotel.

Like other hotel, every room come with a FREE internet access, electronic toilet and breakfast is included. Yes, they provide Japanese style breakfast together with western style. Love their breakfast to the max because they serve various flavours of onigiri with pickles and miso soup. What a hearty meal.

Breakfast at Toyoko - Onigiri with radish pickles, salad and miso soup

Another best part of Toyoko Inn is they have a complete room reservation system at their website with English language which make it easier for foreign travelers to reserve their rooms. Besides, for room reservation, no charges will be applied during online reservation, payment only require during check-in. This give us a flexibility for us to change the reservation in case of any changes in the itinerary.
However please do not abuse in using this facility! We should only reserve the rooms when our itinerary is confirmed and inform the hotel in advance in case of cancellation.

Besides, Toyoko Inn is offering a membership program whereby Toyoko Inn Club Card Members will get a 20% discount on Sundays and Holidays of the lodging country, and also 5% discount on weekdays and Saturdays! With this card you can accumulate points with number of nights at Toyoko and in return you could use the point to redeem a free night stay at Toyoko Inn.

Do visit their website for more information. Definitely a recommended hotel to stay when you are traveling around Japan!

Tokyo Must Eat Part 2: Ramen - Takoyaki -Yakitori!

Tokyo Must Eat - Part 2

Apologize for the long delay post on the Tokyo Must Eat Part 2 as I need some time to get through the numerous of photo that we snapped during the trip =). Hope you enjoy Tokyo Must Eat Part 1. As promised, below is the list of food that not to be missed when you are at the Land of Rising Sun! Hope you enjoy the photo.

List of Must Try & Eat
4. Yakitori
I guess everyone shall familiar with yakitori which also know as grilled skewer. It is a popular food among the Japanese especially as a snack with beer after long hours working in the office. There is a alley in Shinjuku with many small eatery shops selling yakitori and other small snacks. The alley was named as "Shinjuku Yakitori Alley". You could find different type of yakitori at this place ranges from different meat, seafood and also vegetables. Please bear in mind that most of these shops do not have any English or pictorial menu. It is truly a typical Japanese after work eatery area. Fortunately the shop that we went have a English menu and they charge a small amount of 200yen per person as entrance fees. We ordered a combination of 5 skewer and a yakisoba. Price is not cheap but worth a try. We enjoy the food with surround by the locals.

Yakitori - Chicken heart, meatball, gizzard, thigh meat, skin

Yaki Soba

5. Takoyaki
Takoyaki is also one of my favourite Japanese snack. I used to buy these balls from Jusco Mid Valley when I'm back in KL. Thus, I would never miss this snack when I saw this Takoyaki chain near our hotel. Made fresh, these balls really really yummy with generous of bonito flakes and mayonise on top of it. You could choose with different fillings. Typical fillings is with octopus, FRESH small octopus. Takoyaki is common in Japan and it can be found at any eatery stalls along the street. Worth a try!

Takoyaki

6. Ramen
Ramen! Ramen! I still miss the ramen that we had near our hotel so so so much. It taste so good and I remembered the first night we arrived at Tokyo, we immediately went straight the this ramen shop for a hot bowl of "char siu" ramen. It was so warm as the night was chill and after that we had a good rest after a long haul flight. For a nice bowl of ramen, it is not only the soup base and ramen play an important role. The char siu and the soft boiled egg are equally essential. Not many ramen shop could produce a good and tasty piece of char siu. Not in Malaysia nor Singapore. Char siu at Japan really taste different! The ramen shop have been my regular visit whenever I stayed at the hotel at Ninggyocho. I"ll post another post on the hotel we stayed in Japan, hopefully will be a helpful guide for one who plan to visit Tokyo soon.

Ramen

7. Oden
If you a steamboat / hot pot fans like me, then you must like oden. Oden is a Japanese winter dish that contains different type of ingredients such as fish cakes, shells, eggs, konyaku, daikon and more boiled in a soya based dashi soup base. Oden can be easily found at any 24 hours convenience store such as 7 Eleven or Family Mart. They are sold in food carts with skewers of the ingredients simmering in the broth. Don't underestimate by its look. It really taste much more better that it look.

Oden at Food Cart

Oden - Skewer of clam shell, konyaku, round fish cake. Yummy!

Glimpse of Melbourne City

City of Melbourne

Last week a friend of mine came to visit us at Melbourne and I got the chance to bring him for a 2 day tour at the Melbourne CBD. As he was a professional photographer back in Malaysia, I got a chance to learn up some "technique" from him on how to get a good nice shots. Below are some snaps of some famous landmarks in Melbourne.

Royal Arcade - View 1

Royal Arcade - View 2

Flinders Train Station - View from Southbank

Flinders Station

Southbank

City Circle - Free Tourist Tram

Government Offices near Parliament

 p/s: Tokyo Must Eat - Part 2 will come next (delayed for long time ;)  )

Tokyo Must Eat - Part 1

Japan is indeed a place with excitement and delicious food. I got the chance to visit Tokyo for several times during my employment with my ex-company and fell in love with every bits of this country. Never get bored with it's food and yummy delicious food is found anywhere at Tokyo even just a street food. With recent personal trip to Tokyo again, it was my longest stay period at Tokyo, 10 days. I got the chance to explore many of its nice food. Hope you enjoy the food photos taken although some of it might be look pretty standard Japanese food that we always see at elsewhere.

List of Must Try & Eat 
1. Bento Box
Deemed as one of the fast food meal for Japanese. Often come with various type of cooking style, ingredients and attractive packaging. Always fresh and available at all JR train stations. Normally we will buy this bento box before we depart to a long distance train and we will enjoy it in the train while looking at the nice scenery outside the window. It was really good.
 

                                      Gyu don - Beef Rice Box

 

Buta shoga yaki don - Pork Rice Box

2. Omelet Rice / Omu Rice

Omelet rice is another type of rice that are  popular among the Japanese. I would say it is a rice dish with both mixture of western & asian element in it. Very nice and healthy type of food.

Omelet Rice with Hamburg - Sauce: Mushroom & ketchup sauce. Yummy!!!!!!

3. Donburi

Donburi refer to Japanese rice bowl dish and is  consisting of fish, meat, vegetables or other ingredients simmered together and served over rice. Donburi meals are served in oversized rice bowls and served together with a bowl of miso soup (wikipedia). Some of the common donburi as such as tendon, unadon, gyu-don, oyakodon and many more. It's can be found at any restaurant in Japan such as Yoshinoya. My favourite donburi would be the gyudon & unadon. How about you?

 

Tendon ( Tempura rice bowl)

Buta yaki don (Roast pork rice bowl)

Airline In-Flight Meal

Some people say that in flight meals often very bland in taste and it's just another microwave heated food. I'm quite disagree with this statement as I tasted a "yum" in flight meal before when i flew with Japan Airlines 3 years back. I had a delicious & authentic taste of the gyu-don during my flight back from Tokyo. =)
During my trip to Tokyo end of last year (Nov 2012), we took up a flight with Cathay Pacific from Kuala Lumpur and stop over at Hong Kong. Although it is a long haul flight, but overall the service of Cathay Pacific was great and the in flight meal were delicious as well. Just have a look with the pictures below:

                                                                 Asahi Beer

                                                      KUL- HKG: Chicken rice

                                                     KUL-HKG: Omelet with sausage

                              HKG - NRT: Pasta with cheese with Haagen Dazs ice cream!

 

HKG - NRT : Black bean chicken rice. Yum!

                                                 NRT - KUL: Gyu-don with Kit Kat

                                   NRT - KUL: Spring onion with ginger chicken rice

                                                       Forgot the name of this meal :)

Stay tune for my next post on Tokyo Must Eat! :)