Kuching Festival Fair 2013 Part 2

We parked at the City South Council ....

The Council .... 

We were early .... so we lingered about ...

4 cats at play ..... these cat statuettes were in front of the Council building. Kuching City is littered with these cat statuettes .... these ones .... hmn ...  in my opinion.... needed a facelift .... or rather ...a fur-lift. Maybe a new coat of paint would do them wonders! 

Then we made our way to the Food Fair nearby. In this post, I would be focusing on the food. There were over 200 booths selling both local and international delights. Some of the vendors are popular eateries or restaurants in and around Kuching.

There were so much food! From Chicken rice to Japanese mochi to Oyster omelette to Dim sum to Chee Cheung Fun to Satay to Kolo Mee .... endless list!

Here are some pictures of the food ....

Rico's burgers, pizza, pocket pizza, chicken wings

Trays containing skewers of shao mai ... or sio bee as they are known in Kuching

Naked fish

These fishes were grilled over charcoal .... the skewers rotated consistently till the fish cooked. I presume they were "naked" because they were devoid of msg. 

There's popsicle inside this contraption!! Not sure how they do it ... but it is this thing that churns out the posicles. 

Chee Cheung Fun or rice rolls with char siew, prawn or a mixture of both. This rice roll auntie usually sells lui cha ... but she's taking a break now to sell these instead! 

Coffin bread ... a Taiwanese specialty

This was the stall with the longest queue. Much as I would like to try the product, I could not bring myself to queue. I hated waiting.

Fried Fresh Milk, see the queue .... tsk tsk tsk .... scary  ...

I stood in front to see what the fuss was about .... and chatted with an uncle who was waiting for his order. He had waited for half an hour, he said. And when he got his Fried Fresh Milk in a bag, he kindly let us snap a picture of it. Aunt took a shot but I did not. I peeked into the bag ... and saw golden squares resembling tofu cubes .... It's essentially frozen milk ... cut into cubes, battered and deep-fried. I suppose the novelty of the item itself was an attraction. 

At the Pandan Thai Delights stall ... I was drawn by this large wooden mortar bowl and its pestle. I thought it looked so exotic.

A traditional wooden mortar bowl

The stall sold Thai dishes, one of them being this famous dessert. 

Mango Sticky Rice

The crowd started pouring in from 5.30 p.m. onwards .... and queues started to form in front of popular stalls. The plastic tables and chairs were slowly filled up by the hungry diners. It was fun, soaking in the festive like atmosphere .... and feasting my eyes on the food not commonly seen .... and of course .... overloading my nose with the delicious smells of food! Yums. Next post, what I ate.

Kuching Festival Fair 2013 Part 1

I was privileged to visit the Kuching Festival Fair, as it was drawing to a close. This annual event was held at the Dewan Masyarakat, near the City South Council building, a landmark of Kuching City.

The Kuching Festival Fair entrance, see the Kuching City South building at the distant ... 

I went with my 3 aunties .... and we had a ball of time there! The attraction was of course, the food stalls. There were more than 200 stalls selling all sorts of food! Of course, I could not try them all, much as I would like to.

A look at some of the stalls ....

A row of stalls ..... 

People queuing up for yakitori ... next to it is a stall selling shao mai ...

TwinklePan popcorn next to a stall selling Teochew Oyster Omelette

Besides the food, there was also a trade fair. There were booths selling toys, clothes, cars, household items, and many more. We were attracted to a trinket stall that sold key chains. 

Lots of key chains ... mostly in the shape of animals and predominantly mice. I wondered why "mice". Hmn .... was it because Kuching was Cat City .... and well ... cats love to catch mice .... lol .... anyway .... the thin pieces of coloured key chains were RM2.00 and would be personally engraved with wordings of your choice. 

The craftsman at work .... he could even carve Chinese wordings though he was not Chinese

Just outside the gate was .... 

Stepping into the garden

I loved the lush gardens! It was well-kept and the flowers were in bloom, and the fauna provided cool shade from the scorching evening sun.

Love to look at the water fountains ....

 Oh pretty!! 

There were also structures of traditional ethnic houses ... 

Ooo ... tricky to walk on the narrow bridge ... 

A mini Bidayuh baruk

And even a wishing well!! 

Wishing well .... do you believe in wishes? 

Well, I wish we could stay longer at the gardens ... maybe next time. All in all, we spent 3 hours at the fair ..... next post, the food! Stay tuned.

Off To Kuching

MasWings isn't very consistent. The last time I had travelled on it, I was served a packet of peanuts and a small glass of juice.

Hence, I thought I was going to be starved this time around, since I was travelling at dinner time. I went to the airport, armed with some buns, and ate them while waiting for my flight. It was delayed for half an hour, much to my annoyance.

Then on board, when I was expecting peanuts and juice ...... we were served a sandwich bun and juice. Hmn .... was it because it was Ramadhan? People had just broken their fast at that time .... and MasWings thought to supply something more substantial than just peanuts??

A sandwich and a glass of juice

I smelled the freshness of the bun as people started eating on board ... I opened it up and checked the filling, and was impressed with the neatly arranged slice of lettuce, 2 slices of cucumber .... and hmn ... not sure .... probably a mixture of tuna and egg. I took one bite ... and found it tasteless. I did not like it. :P

Shopping For Intimates

There is a local brand of undergarment that I am fond of. I find their products to be comfortable and reasonably priced. Recently, I bought a pack of Tanga. There were 2 pieces in a pack.

But after the first wash, and by hand too, I found that one of them had torn at the band. I inspected it closely .... and I surmised that it had not been sewn in.

Upset that a brand new piece should tear, I lodged a feedback at the website. I was not sure whether they would reply, but I wanted them to know the defect in their product.

So I was pleasantly surprise to get their response a few days later via email. A few exchanges ensued, where I even managed to email to them 2 photographs of the tear. Finally, they offered to replace it for me.

Yippee. But I had to wait for stock to arrive to where I was .... and that took about a month .... and finally, today, I exchanged the defected piece to a new piece.

So glad! So glad also that the staff was helpful, polite and apologetic for the whole experience. And I'm definitely so glad that I can continue to support the brand. :P

Back To Surf & Turf

My friend had not been here .... so well .... since I found the food to be alright, I did not hesitate to come back. We ordered 3 items, and 2 drinks. We paid RM68.20 for our food. Here was what we ate ....

Dinner ... Fish and Chips RM15.90
The batter was crispy .... and inside was still juicy. It was not bad. I loved it dipped in tartare sauce. The fries .... got soggy quite quickly. 

Char Siu Chicken Wing, RM 9.90

This was the best item for the both of us, as it was really yum. It did not taste like char siu ... but the chicken wings were really well marinated. The flavour really penetrated the meat. I was not sure whether it was grilled or deep-fried, but it was really crispy on the outside. Very shiok indeed. 

Lamb shank , RM 29.90

The lamb shank was tender .... and the gravy tasted quite strongly of spices ... not sure what herbs and spices ... perhaps clove and cinnamon .... I quite liked to eat it with the barley risotto. The gravy in the bowl was too little, though. So we asked for more and they obliged. :))

Our drinks ... fresh apple and orange juice, and lime juice

Funny that at the end of the meal, my friend asked me if I was full. Well ... yeah .... I was ... but she could do another round with carbs. Lol. She was missing her rice!

Black Fungus Salad

My friend came back after 10 p.m. .... and then we decided to experiment. We wanted to make black fungus salad. We had pre-soaked some black fungus before we went out. So when we came back, we shredded it finely and then blanched it in hot water.

Then we drained and seasoned it ..... with sesame oil, organic lime juice and salt. We then placed it in a container and chilled it. 

Black fungus salad

The next day ..... 

"Come .... try," I invited another friend, C***. 

"What's this?"

"Our experiment," I said.

"Hah??? I'm not a guinea pig," she laughed.

"It's yummy," I tried to convince her ... 

She hesitated, but on second thought, grabbed a fork and scooped up some black fungus .... and yeah .... she liked it and helped herself to more. Lol. She even asked us to make more next time. 

Well, this was the recipe that my former colleague used to dress her kelp salad. Since we did not have kelp at home, we decided to substitute kelp with black fungus. Black fungus had similar texture to kelp ... and so the dish was a success. We enjoyed the crunchy fungus coated with the fragrant sesame oil and flavoured with the tangy lemon juice. Delicious, and healthy. :)) 

I'm Lovin' It : Samurai Burger

It was 5.10 p.m.

"No queue-lah!" I told my friend confidently. The queue normally starts at 6.00 p.m. when McValue meals are sold.

But when we reached the outlet, there were 4 long queues .... 2 queues waiting to place the orders and 2 more queues to collect the orders. Geez .... by the time we sat down ... it was 5.35 p.m.

Well, I had my "Warrior Meal". Lol. I think I love the name more than I love the burger.

Beef Samurai Burger

First of all, I loved the size of the beef patty. It's a quarter-pounder, and the beef patty was huge! What I did not like was the teriyaki sauce coating the beef .... which I found to be too sweet. It felt like eating a sweet burger. The lettuce was totally unseen .... so I suppose you can guess the miserable amount that went in there. There was mayo in the burger ..... but it was totally tasteless, being overpowered by the sweet sauce. In other words, I did not like the Samurai burger. Bear in mind that it's purely personal, because I know of lots of people who love it. Chicken Samurai was also available ... but I did not think I would want to try that at all.

I also had the Sakura McFizz and the Crisscut Fries.

Sakura McFizz was essentially Ribena and Sprite. It was not bad a combination, but it was nothing special to me. I loved the Crisscut Fries A LOT, though. It was crispy and crunchy and flavoured .... so it beat the ordinary Fries hands down.

There was also Taro Pie for a limited time ....

Taro Pie 

It was sweet ... and the taro pieces could have been more fragrant, but I loved the piping hot filling because it brought a satisfying end to the meal. 

My friend ate a Triple Cheeseburger + a Double Cheeseburger. So that made a Quintuple Burger. Lol.

 Triple Cheeseburger

I'd never have the Triple Cheese before ..... maybe I'd try have that one day. :P