Buzzing with FOOD

Annalakshmi is an international chain of vegetarian restaurants operating in a unique concept of "Eat to your heart’s content, Pay what your heart feels". It is a Non-profit organization.

Eating is considered a sacred ritual everyday in everybody’s life as the prayer goes — “thank you for today’s bread”. Anna means food and Lakshmi is the presiding deity. Hence the food served is “Prasad” - a sanctified offering. Any food or drink prepared lovingly, selflessly is delicious and nourishing, not because of its recipe and rich ingredients, but because of the spirit of self-less.

It has a branch in Perth called as Annalakshmi on the swan, located on the Swan River.

read more here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Contact:

Annalakshmi Vegetarian Restaurant

a.k.a The Temple of Fine Arts Malaysia

 1, Babington Avenue, Georgetown,
10300, Penang

Tel: 04-2288 575

http://www.annalakshmi.org

 

Others:
Payment is purely on donation basis (Pay as you wish)

Business Hours:

11.30am onwards - Lunch
6.30pm onwards - Dinner

(Monday to Sunday)

GPS:

5°23.460′ N   100°16.726′ E

Map:

Dim Sum Food Restaurant - such a common name for a dim sum outlet. But does it make itself less noticible?? Obviously not. And especially during weekends, it is lucky if you can get a table when you reach this restaurant. We were there at 8am on a Saturday and we could barely see any empty tables. After walking a few rounds, we spotted one and quickly "jom" (reserve) the table.

This same restaurant turns into a buffet-style steamboat (Town Steamboat) at night but also serves dim sum while you are enjoying your steamboat!!! Value for money huh?!

There’s a section for pan-fried yong tau foo items too.

Fried items. So many to choose from!!

Black Pepper Siew Mai. I didn’t put high hopes when I took it, judging by the looks but it was surprisingly good.

Siew Mai, the normal version. Smaller piece but contains 4 per basket instead of 3.

Har Kau. Sweet juicy prawns wrapped in soft skin.

Fish ball wrapped in beancurd skin and steamed.

Fried prawn roll. Lots of small prawns with spring onions wrapped in beancurd skin and deep-fried.

Chai Thao Koay - Radish Cake. This is a pleasent one, not too soft or too hard (from over-fried) and have nice taste of radish and grind dried shrimps.

Fried Har Kau. Very crispy and again yummy prawns inside.

Zhim Tzo?? Dunno what it’s called but it taste like artificial crab meat wrapped in beancurd skin and glazed with sweet and sour sauce.

Something like Siew Pau but it’s in rectangle shape. I believe the filling is the same as the siew pau. Very crispy and flaky outer layer.

Here’s the Siew Pau. Take-away for my grandma!! (but I ended up eating one of it)

Hong Kong style Chee Cheong Fun. This is the only place where they let you help yourself with the amount of soy sauce and chillies. The chillies was good, with chunks of dried shrimps to give a flavourful taste. The Chee Cheong Fun was a little too soft though.

There’s also a variety of noodles which you can order from the waiter/waitress. We had Char Hor Fun (RM 4.50).

The gravy is very thick. Taste is normal, nothing spectacular! They have crispy noodles (sang mien), singapore fried mee hoon, tang hoon, and even curry fish head (if my eyes serves me right) too. What an abundance of choice!

We planned to take-away the Char Siew Pau but couldn’t resist the temptation. So we ate one before leaving.

My parents say the filling is a tad too sweet for them. I wonder if it’s only our tastebuds or others think so too.

Weekends are self-service. You go to the counter and grab what you want but remember to take the card along with you so that the staff can jot down the pricing. At the end, go to the payment counter with this card.

3 of us ate 12 plates of Dim Sum and a plate of Char Hor Fun. Tea cost RM 1 per head. Total bill came to RM 37.

This time we miss the Egg Tart (was still in the oven when I asked for it) and the Wu Kok - Two of the must-eat items . Will go back again next time!!! Check out Lingzie’s post on this!!

Dim Sum Food Restaurant
63, Macalister Road,
10400, Penang
04-229 7273

Opening Hours: 9am - 3pm (Mon-Fri) & 8am - 3pm (Sat/Sun/Public Holidays)

This restaurant is just opposite UMNO building at Macalister Road. If you come from Komtar, the restaurant will be on your left, at almost three-quarter way to the other end. It is located just beside Sun Yat Sen Memorial Centre. Parking is available behind the shop (fixed charge per entry).

Map:

Checklist

If you think that you:

• want to have steamboat but too lazy to prepare it yourself
• crave for steamboat but put off by the weather and heat, wishing there’s air-conditioning while enjoying steamboat
• want to have steamboat yet don’t want to miss the bbq-ed food but don’t fancy doing it yourself
• long for chocolate fountain dessert but think it’s only available in hotels/classy restaurants
• want a safe (no gas tanks around every table) yet fast way to enjoy your steamboat

As mentioned, if bbq-ing or grilling is not something you enjoy but don’t want to miss the food, it’s here where you pick what you like and this man will kindly prepare it and serve you when it’s done.

The interior of the outlet. It’s fully air-conditioned and all tables uses electronic stoves.

The ingredients:

Record breaking number of sauces

Soup variety:

(left-to-right) Fish base and Chicken base

Tomyam base and Herbal base

My verdict and order of liking of the soup:

• #1- fish (pleasant taste at first, ginger covers up the fishy taste, but very salty after a few rounds of ingredients)
  
• #2- herbal (no over-powering strong herbs taste, a bit mild in the beginning but nice ending taste as the ingredients adds saltiness to it)
  
• #3- chicken (taste pretty normal)
  
• #4- tomyam (a bit too mild and lack of aroma, not spicy enough)

All done and ready to be eaten

Finger food:

Item includes fried noodle, fried rice, nuggets, fried chicken wing/drummet

BBQ/Grilled items:
(items not at the grill section can also be sent to grill)

Mix skewer (prawn, chicken meat, capsicum)

pandan-wrapped chicken, squid, beef slice, chicken slice, mussels, ham, sausages, turmeric-marinated prawns, stingray, crab (seasonal)

Favourite grilled of the night (which happen to be not at the grill section but from the steamboat section); fish cake and Japanese tofu

Desserts:

Fruits, tong sui (black glutinous rice that night), jelly, chocolate fountain and ice-cream (5 flavours)

Creativity award goes to:

Worst+no-artistic-skills award goes to me (right pic) (As long as get to eat, cincai la right??)

Now in promotion:

Daily Lunch Set @ RM 6.90 (includes free-flow drink and a dessert)

Steamboat Price:

Business Hours:

11.30am - 3.00pm
5.00pm - 11.00pm

Contact:

No. 27, Jalan Nagore,
10050 Georgetown,
Penang.

Tel/Fax: 04-210 1122
URL: www.jlsteamboat.com
(Catering service available too)

For other reviews:

Criz
Steven
Jian
Mary
Allen Ooi

Overall, I feel it’s a cozy and quiet place to have a nice steaming pot of steamboat. Not a huge outlet but enough to accommodate at least 10 small tables and 3 big round tables. Service wise, attentive at the beginning and it’s mostly self-service after that. Grill service might be a little slow depending on the crowd. A reasonable place to consider.

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To continue from where I left of…this Part II of the invited review at Haven Delights will showcase some of the popular dishes which were specially picked by the owner and chefs of the restaurant. The restaurant currently serves fabulous cuisines from Japan, Korea, Hong Kong and Shanghai with a twist of fusion thanks to their group of four experienced chefs.

Now on to what was in store for us during the dinner meal.

The eager wait was worth it when we were served the cold cuts of Hotzzz Abalone and Unagi Tofu (both can be found in the buffet menu).

The Unagi Tofu was a good start to a meal, being light and sweet which opens up our taste buds. A piece of unagi is placed on top of a square slice of tofu and garnished with spring onions, bonito flakes and sesame seeds. The sweet sauce compliments well with the silky tofu.

The Hotzzz Abalone is made up of abalone slices topped with homemade spicy paste and eel sauce. The spicy paste opens up our appetite to the otherwise rubbery texture of the abalone. Not really spicy but enough to "warm-up" our mouth for more dishes to come!!

Then came the main dishes.

Chicken Ban Ban (RM10) was the first dish. It’s a kind of fusion Japanese fried chicken with egg in chef’s special mayo sauce. There are 3 types of sauce which acts as the accompanying sauce for the fried chicken as well as a garnish. On the bed of the dish is deep fried egg.

The fried chicken cubes are juicy but mild in taste i.e. seasoning.

Luckily the 3 sauces (wasabi mayo, sweet sauce & mayo) saved the day…opps saved the dish by providing a sweet, spicy and sourish taste to it. Somehow the plain and simple fried egg tasted so good when combined with all the 3 sauces!! Nice work there!

Next up was Red Dragon Prawn with Jammy Sauce (RM20). Despite the name, it’s actually fried prawns and white dragon fruit in jammy sauce and not some special species of prawns. There’s about 5 prawn pieces and lots of capsiciums, white dragon fruit, onions and carrots.

This colorful dish is made up of battered medium-sized prawns with a special fruity sauce concocted by the chef. White dragon fruit was the main ingredient of the sauce and although in the photo there looked like some kiwi-like balls, it’s actually the white dragon fruit.

The tangy and citrus like sauce is a refreshing taste and even the plain red cabbage side dish tasted good with this lovely sauce.

The Korean Beef Kimchi (RM16) was fried homemade kimchi with beef slices. The kimchi has a good balance of spicy and sourness.

I did not try the beef slices but others say it’s tender and juicy.

Presentation wise, it’s a tad too normal but as long as the dish is good, others come secondary, right?

The Motoyaki Scallop (RM14) is grilled scallop with homemade spicy mayo sauce. We were delighted when this was served and it looked real nice and presentable. The scallop is hidden by the covering of spicy mayo sauce which consist of thousand island sauce, tobasco, chilli-flakes and black sesame. It is then baked before being served.

The actual size when you order it would be 4 pieces per plate and not like what is shown here.

The spicy sauce is actually quite overpowering and the scallop, although being the main attention, is side-tracked. All I could taste was the spiciness of the sauce instead of the freshness of the scallops.

One of the western-style food served was Lamb Teriyaki (RM18). The grilled lamb is marinated with herbs in homemade sweet sauce.

This dish passes the marks for being tender and having nice sweet sauce. I’m not a fan of oily/fatty portions of the meat, so this was alright for me. Others felt that if they include the fatty portion, it would have tasted even better.

One of the dishes I like for the night was Homemade Spicy Chicken (RM15), a dish of fried chicken with homemade spicy sauce. The chicken cubes are deep-fried and cooked in spicy sauce made up of fermented black beans, garlic, onions, curry leafs, lemon grass and sesame seeds. The sauce is cooked until it becomes a thick and rich in aroma.

The chicken is very crispy on the outside but tender. If you asked me to choose between the chicken ban ban and this homemade spicy chicken, this will definitely get my vote. But it could probably be due to my liking for spicy food. I had two helpings of this!! haha

The Shanghai Honey Spare Ribs (RM18) is fried spare ribs with honey sauce. Of all the dishes, this one fared the poorest. It was way too salty and there’s hardly any sweet or sourness in the dish. Also, the piece portion is way too huge and unless we have knives and forks, it is a very messy way to eat with chopsticks coz it’s not so tender and we were biting and pulling it away from our mouth at the same time!

It would probably taste better if eaten with rice but the chef ought to revamp this dish!

This dish is Tempura Cheese Maki (not in menu), a surprise dish by the executive chef. I like surprises and this turned out to be a nice surprise. Maki roll is pan-fried and then baked with cheese and mayo on top. A usual order will come in 8-pieces per plate. This chef’s secret recipe finger food (as we were told) are only served upon special orders.

A very innovative dish by the chef and I enjoyed it. The fusion of western (cheese) and japanese (sushi) is prevalent here! Kudos to the chefs here who are willing to try out new ideas.

Although there’s suppose to be only one special dish for the night, we were treated with another special dish of Chicken Bomb. It’s a new creation by the chef and hence no pricing yet. It is actually spiced grilled salmon wrapped in chicken meat. Presentation was very interesting, with blue-flames in a cup.

But unfortunately the dish did not turn out to be up to mark due to its weird combination. The chicken meat was not tender and the taste was bland.

The grilled salmon inside taste even more weird. The spices and herbs didn’t blend well and end up making this dish unappetizing.

Maybe the chef can change the way of cooking this dish or even consider to leave this out from the menu.

We also has the chance to try their HK Style Wan Than Mee (RM22). It is a little pricey but the wantans are really huge!!

The accompanying chilli for the noddle is good. The noddle tasted way better with chillies.

The wantan is a real burst of juicy prawns, just like in dim sums. But I just wonder why they didn’t add spring onions or more seasoning to the wantan filling.

Another noddle dish for the night was Japanese Yaki Udon (RM12). Fried Japanese rice noodles with bonito flakes.

It was a little too watery and there’s hardly a strong hint of seasoning in this dish. But a later serving (this time done by the main chef) rectified the earlier hiccups and it’s taste was much improved.

Then it was time for desserts, the one most bloggers have been waiting for. We are somehow a bunch of sweet tooth who just can’t resist having desserts. This is Macha Ice Cream (RM8), green tea ice cream with red bean paste and mochi (glutinous rice ball).

The green tea taste is very strong, leaning more to the bitter taste. Liking is up to each individual as some would prefer a sweeter version while some loved this bitter-sweet version. I enjoyed it and even felt that is tasted a little bit like the Haagen Daz green tea ice-cream! The sweetness of the mashed red beans compliments well with the bitter ice-cream. The mochi is nothing to shout about though, a little bit hard in my opinion.

(oh dear, it’s melting and we were still snapping away. Haha. But that’s never our complain. It’s great to be out dining with like-minded people who enjoys food photography and eating the food of course!!)

We not only had one but two types of ice-cream. This one is Kuru Goma Ice Cream (RM8), which is black sesame seed ice cream with crushed peanuts.

This flavour is indeed for the sweet tooth. It has the right level of sweetness and also very fragrant. The crushed peanuts gives a perfect end to the melted ice-cream in the mouth!! Thumbs-up!!

As mentioned in earlier post, they do serve buffet lunch or dinner at a price of RM49.90+ (children half price) with a limitation of orders within 2 hours. There’s a buffet line where you can get your food and you can also specifically order the dish you want from the buffet menu list.

HAVEN DELIGHTS @ Penang Times Square

77-L1-34, Jalan Dato Kramat, 10150 Penang, Malaysia.

Tel: 604-210 8855, 604-210 8856   

Business Hours: 10.30am-11.00pm

For other reviews:

http://crizfood.com/

http://penangtuapui.com/ 

http://what2seeonline.com/ 

http://stevengoh.com/

http://nickchan.net/

http://gourmetgarden.com.my/ 

http://www.lingzie.com/ 

http://yummy-station.com/ 

http://alliefoodtalk.com/ 

http://cariso-food.blogspot.com/

http://reginatravel-foodparadise.blogspot.com/ 

http://www.foodpoi.com/

http://thenomadgourmand.blogspot.com/