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First Meal of 2009 ... by Night Angel

Thu, 01 Jan 2009 15:01:58 GMT

Technically speaking, it is not the first, but the second because I didn't count breakfast for this as it was just some bread. Today, I met Jason (wreckoning) after some time (last time it was before autumn and we had some really good Japanese food for lunch together), and we, being two food lovers, went to Kowloon City and search for great local food.
This time I didn't take many photos as we were talking and talking like crazy good friends (actually we are, haha!). However, I must show you this famous dish from a local restaurant, which always has long queues outside.
This famous dish is the beef cake, in which you can find fresh and hot minced meat. With some kind of special sauce it was made with, this cake was just so good and tasty!

So that started my new year. We also had some spring rolls with mutton and some great dumplings. After that we went to another restaurant, the traditional Hong Kong tea house, and had another light meal.
So, what's your new year resolution? How about follow me for some more good food? Ha, but first, be sure to do more exercise! One just can't only eat!
Oh yeah, that's part of my new year's plan too!

Macau Tenmasa ... by Night Angel

Sun, 28 Dec 2008 04:38:33 GMT

As from the previous blog, you know that this blog is about our lunch at Tenmasa of the Crown Hotel in Macau, and it was one of the most prestigious Japanese restaurants here, specializing tempura of all kinds. Now, let's take a look at the wonderful deep-fried food.
The meal of course started with a little appetizer, but I had no idea what it was. The jelly thing had actually no taste, no idea...

The waitress brought us the tempura soy sauce, and it was for vegetable tempura only. For seafood ones, you use sea salt instead.

Then the chef in front of us brought the raw seafood, preparing the tempura for our sets.

He started with the typical shrimps, and then the fish...

And yes it was a fish! Then we had eggplant, and then mushroom which looked like some kind of plant...

After that, the rice of the set came, together with a bowl of noodle, which was for my lady.

The chef continued to fry the other tempura, including this really interesting thing. On the left it was pumpkin, and the right was sesame roll with tofu inside!

Then the scallop came, which was wrapped by a piece of seaweed. Finally the last tempura was served, and it was a tempura cake with shrimp and scallop slices inside.

The meal was very good and you could see the tempura were very well made and dry, not oily at all. We were so full after that, and a green tea was served as a break before the dessert.

And it was black sesame ice-cream! Very smooth and very "sesame"! The bowl was very pretty too!
The meal wasn't very expensive, HK0 per head only but with such great quality! Located at the 11th floor of the Crown Hotel building, this is one of the great places to eat when you come to Macau! I guess in Hong Kong, you can only find two to three places with such great tempura, and one of them is definitely Inagiku at Four Seasons.
Seriously my throat hadn't recovered yet but facing such good food, how could I resist? XD

Revisiting Macau ... by Night Angel

Sat, 27 Dec 2008 16:34:00 GMT

On Boxing Day me and my lady went to Macau to have some good food and fun. It was still Christmas holiday and you can imagine the streets and shops were filled with people like the Christmas day. The worst part was that you had to queue up outside some good restaurants as everywhere were people. Perhaps the waitiing time was the best moments for us to appreciate the Christmas decorations surrounding us...

And we went to Cheong Kei again for the famous egg noodle with shrimp eggs. This time we also ordered another famous dish, the steamed fish skin! It looks like flat and wet but it was actually very crispy like chips!

The final dish is the deep-fried fish balls, very good!
After this brunch we went to a high-class Japanes restaurant at Crown Hotel, but I will talk about that in the next blog. We will continue and talk about the tea. This time we had some typical street snacks, the curry fish balls, and trust me, this one is so curry and spicy that you have to drink water after each ball!

And I bought this bun called "black pepper bun", which comes from Taiwan. Too bad I missed it when I was in Taiwan because that shop wasn't open until 2pm, but now I had a chance to try it. Made by putting the buns in a big oven burning with charcoal at the bottom, these buns had a strong smell of charcoal, but inside the pork had a strong smell of pepper! It was pretty good!

Let's take a look at the delicious Japanese food and tempura in the next blog!

The Art of Being Thankful ... by Sigma

Wed, 24 Dec 2008 19:51:39 GMT

As we all know, internationally the celebration of Christmas has begun in very different countries and communities. If anyone isn't familiar with the origins of Christmas, it is the assumed birth of Jesus Christ of Christianity. However, prior to the birth of Christ, many celebrated a similar holiday in western belief systems. Still, we are presented with a holiday that celebrates the birth of Christ as well as the one day of the year that we are very kind to one another because its both societally acceptable and traditional. As the belief evolved, the pairing of Christmas became not associated with the birth of Jesus, but the santa ideology - specifically after an European man that made gifts for the needy children every year. The current Christmas, at least in many American families, focuses on Christmas based on the European man.
That said, it is very much expected to give gifts to one another in this time. I was in a brief conversation with a friend of mine and she asked me what will you be getting for Christmas and I said politely nothing. She looked surprised and began to ask if my family celebrated Christmas and I simply replied I haven't received a gift since 1995. After the conversation, it left me a bit down and depressed over things because I haven't received a gift since 1995. I began to view this from a different viewpoint however. What did Christmas mean to me?
I suppose it is a day to be thankful for what I do have. Maybe that too is the societal norm that was instilled on me in my family regarding the holiday. Even still, when I think of the things that have happened to me, I begin to sit in prayer. Many things in my life have happened to me, especially this year. With the loss of my father, the loss of my job, as well as my savings to pay for my father's funeral, I began to wonder should I be thankful for things? On the one hand, many will argue no because of the last few months I had. But I also have to say that a lot of good things happened to me as well.
I think the best thing that happened to me was discovering zhen fa in the most improbable manner. The experiences that opened up since my joining have affirmed to me that several paths and lineages opening up are just for me. Personally, I find this as a large note for various reasons. In the past, such practice and even insight was left to the elite of society. For one thing, I am not elite - in fact I am very poor. It has always been a dream of mine to learn something different in this manner. As masters and others began to open their mouthes and hearts to the few that truly search for it is truly a blessing of the Gods. Many others have tried in a similar manner just to be "used" as many will call it. So the opportunity to learn this and not belong to the ethnicity nor predominant chinese society fills my heart with a world of good.
I think the second large aspect I should be thankful for being mindful. For a year and a half, I have been mindful of my actions - both good and bad. Letting go of several things that haven't worked for me that I practiced for years took great grace from the divine. Many will live in the world as if they find nothing wrong with their actions - as if their conscience is dead or perhaps very silent. Perhaps it is as well a divergence of bruising of their ego, I am not perfectly sure of this (I am a psych major not a sociology major even if I love sociology). For me to be given help to realize what hasn't worked in my life is a large thing to be thankful for because others do not. Perhaps it is humility.
I think that while Christmas is a great holiday to savor the gifts for the ones we love, we should never forget that we are given gifts everyday from the divine. Some are very small gifts, and others are very large. Regardless of this, please let's not forget the divine gifts in favor of the materialistic gifts. All things must be yin and yang as it is said.
Merry Christmas and God Bless.

Agnès b. le Pain Grillé revisited ... by Night Angel

Wed, 24 Dec 2008 07:49:26 GMT

Some time ago I went to Agnes B's cafe, and it was a pretty nice place. Last weekend I went to another le Pain Grille, but this time at the newly open Agnes B La Loggia in IFC. Taking several shops including the corridors in front of them, this "la loggia" turns part of the IFC shopping mall into a English-style village.
The restaurant has a much prettier decoration, and with one side of the restaurant facing the harbour, this le pain grille definitely has a more comfortable and open ambience. With all the nice services and high price tags in the menu, I am sure that this place aims to attract high-class people rather than the general.
The meal of course started with bread, and also a little egg tart which was not sweet like the Hong Kong style egg tart. It looked big in the image but it was just a finger size.

And the bread was also "designed", but probably not by Agnes herself. It had the typical symbol that Agnes B always had.

My appetizer was pan-fried scallops served cold with orange slices, and I must say I still prefer it hot. I had no idea why they needed to be served cold as they were already pan fried.

Then the main course came and it was a veal tenderloin in a special sauce by the kitchen. It was okay, but not really exciting to me. The bean was a nice addition, but I personally didn't much like the smashed kind of vegetable.

Overall I think the quality was average, but it was not good enough to have such a high price (HK0 per head). I guess I paid much for the brand only. The place however was nice, and if you have a chance to go there, I suggest you taking a seat at the cafe outside the restaurant, where you could have a piece of cheesecake and a nice coffee, and spend a Saturday afternoon alone. That would be a much better choice.

The Very First Blog ... by Sigma

Wed, 24 Dec 2008 02:10:40 GMT

I have been an avid visitor of angelworld for the greater part of four years. I like the site because it is aesthetically pleasing to me, but more importantly, not many people in America know of the site's existence (while this is a very small view of things, albeit ignorant, I have an explanation for my comment). I don't usually blog, but as an outlet for things, I decided to blog. Many people blog about their life, and I wish to do the same. But the blog will be a bit different. I guess this segues into who I am as a person.

I am 23 years old and in my senior year of undergraduate school under psychology. This is a drastic change from my biological sciences major. I guess the large change has a lot to do with what happened last year as well as this year. I guess, for the most part, I have been blessed to witness various changes in and out of my life. While they didn't appear as blessings, in retrospect, they were quite the blessing.

I think the largest change in my life (besides my major change in college) was the opportunity I stumbled on from a google search. I cannot say much about the information available, but it is quite a treat to have the opportunity to stumble into it. In many respects, this ushers a new wave of more open communication for people that are looking for a philosophical path or have studied a philosophical path before. I am a westerner of course by definition, but the opportunity to learn several things from great men of the east makes me personally blessed. But unlike the past people that had to travel and pray to god (also have a little bit of divine grace) to find that one person that has several abilities and philosophical insight I think I was lucky because it took me an hour to search and say - this is my path.

Coincidentally, this also relates to my psychological major. I would like for things to change within the realm of science and take a personal understanding of things from a quantum level. Understand that I am truly and merely just a student, I can't share much and my journey of life is just beginning. But what Ican share is a few words, some insights that can help others. Or if you love hearing stories that will blow your mind followed by comments and my personal feelings, then this is a good blog to see. I guess for the lack of time I may be able to make a post, I hope that this blog will be sufficed.

I hope for good things and to contribute to the beauty and philosophy of this site because I have truly admired this site for a long time. Thank you for the wonderful page Night Angel and I hope the next version will be fantastic. God Bless

Taipei Food Rush 02 ... by Night Angel

Mon, 22 Dec 2008 09:23:22 GMT

Our food trip has yet ended on Saturday when night fell. Before we went to the night market, we went back to Taipei 101 to make some night shots at the top of the building. It was a different scene! This was what I got and you could see today's view of Taipei at night time.

Cannot find Taipei 101? I shot this on the top of this building, damn >_>
And then we headed towards the famous Shilin Night Market, where you could find the food stalls packed together under one of the shelters. You would see long queues but you just have to wait or else you won't be able to have a taste of real Taiwanese food.

The first thing of course was the Taiwanese style fried chicken! But the queue was so long that it extended to the bus stop 50m from the store. During the wait, my sister got back when another famous Taiwanese snake, the shaved ice, and this one was in chocolate flavour!

Finally I got the chicken! It was so good! And it was much bigger than what I expected!

Going into the food market, we saw this funny snack which I had no idea how to describe. It was a fried bread like thing wrapped by a piece of thin pancake thing. This one had black sesame inside but it just tasted so-so.

And then you could find the famous peanut candy in one of the corners...

And finally, we had this thing called Sausage-in-sausage, which looked like a hotdog. The "bun" was actually sausage casing stuffed with glutinous rice, and then was sliced and stuffed with a Chinese-style sausage. It was actually very good but pretty heavy...

And finally we couldn't eat more, and we retreated back to the hotel, where we found this huge wood sculpture. It was all wood logs, but cut into a sphere! Crazy masterpiece!

The next day we started the day a bit later as we would like to have brunch at the famous Taiwan restaurant called Din Tai Fung. It is so renowned that all the tourists just want to go there and try their famous Shanghai soup dumplings. They have a lot of branches but still all of them have long queues after 11am. Therefore, we went there at 10:30am in order to get a seat. Thank God it was just opened and there were only a few customers.

Now the food came. We started off with a kind of vegetable that you can only find in Asia, which was very popular in Taiwan. I couldn't find the English name but in Chinese it is called "yau mo cai", meaning "ink vegetable. However, ours looks like too green to be ink.

Then the "drunken chicken", actually marinaded chicken in Shaoxing wine.

And then the main course! The Shanghai-style dumplings with pork and crab meat inside! Delicious!

And my favourite noodle, the traditional steamed beef soup noodle!

Finally, the dessert. It was not really dessert, but we both wanted to end the meal with something sweet. So we ordered the sesame big bun, which turned out to be not so big. Still it tasted very good.

The brunch was so good! In Hong Kong we had one Din Tai Fung in Tsim Sha Tsui. Even the quality was nearly the same (to me it is, but some said no), the price tags are all different. We spent US$35 for everything we just ate, but in Hong Kong with the same amount of money you could only get two noodles with the dumplings (not 10 but only 6!), and one more appetitzer!
We then went shopping in the biggest bookstore in town, the Eslite Bookstore. In Taiwan, reading is like one of the hobbies that most people would have, and people may spend the whole day just reading in the bookstores. With the lower prices, some people come over to buy books. Even better, Taiwanese use traditional Chinese like we Hong Kong do, and so we can share books without any translation.
After walking in the stores and boutiques for 4 hours, we had a break at Starbucks. I ordered a grande mocha with a warm chocolate pudding cake! This cake is pretty famous too in Taiwan, having a name called "soft heart", and you know why.

We finally needed to pack up and went back home. But before going to the airport we forgot the famous Taiwan dish, rice with minced meat!!! We went to Tu Hsiao Yueh again. They also had this rice and it was so cheap! Only US$1!

And then we left, taking a plane back home at 8:20pm. With quite some time still in the airport, we shopped again for books and magazines, and you can't imagine how heavy my bags were!
Now you have a glance of the famous Taiwanese food, and so remember to try these first when you go to Taipei. However, this is only like 30% of all the good Taiwanese cuisine! I will post more when I have a chance to explore this cool place again!

Taipei Food Rush 01 ... by Night Angel

Mon, 22 Dec 2008 04:23:05 GMT

A week ago me and my sister went to Taipei, and it was a crazy rush to Taipei for just food and books. During the 50-hour trip we ate the most famous dishes and street snacks in the region, and the price for me was a sore throat after that weekend.

We stayed at the Grand Hyatt Taipei hotel, and it was "notorious" for being haunted as some people claimed that it was built upon a graveyard used by the Japanese army during the WWII. Anyway, nothing happened at all and the stay was actually pretty comfortable.
Grand Hyatt Taipei is right opposite of the famous Taipei 101, the tallest building in Taiwan. We of course went there, and we went up to the top and look at the whole city. But, the food is the key point of this whole trip. View? Not this time, haha XD

The above is the wind damper of the building, which weighs more than 660 metric tons and further stabilize the building during strong wind or earthquake.
Before the visit we went to a local restaurant for a quick meal. Probably our brain hadn't started working, we just ordered a burger as breakfast. Surprisingly this burger was not bad at all! Soft bun with fresh veggie made this burger one of the best I have tried!

Our real food feast started at Tu Hsiao Yueh 度小月, one of the oldest noodle shops here. Famous for its dan-tsu noodle, this place also has some traditional Taiwanese food, including the deep-fried small oysters.

Delicious, isn't it? Without any break, we went to another noodle shop straight ahead, which you can find the best Taiwanese beef soup noodle!

We first had a dish of steamed pig guts (I think it was pig as usually it is), but it was actually pretty chilly! Then the noodle came, and I couldn't help it but swallowed the whole in minutes!

The first bowl of noodle was the traditional beef noodle 紅燒牛肉麵 while the second one was my sister, a beef noodle with cow tender 牛筋麵. They were so good but even that we ordered small size, the bowls were so big that we already got very full. To no avail we had to take a break before swallowing other good stuff on the same street!
We then went to Ximending, a place where all the hip culture and fashion are located. It is just like Mongkok in Hong Kong. After wandering around and shopping for 3 hours, we resumed the noodle series again. We went to the Goose Place (鴨肉扁 or Yah Rou Bien) which is very famous for its goose dishes! Yes, the Chinese name means duck but it actually sells goose meat.

Tasty isn't it? Let's talk about the name of the shop. The owner actually opened a restaurant selling duck meat, but the sale wasn't good and so he introduced geese as well. Then more and more people came and eventually those people came only for the goose dishes because they were more delicious. Finally, the owner just sold geese till today, but keeping the same name. That's why.
Walking further, we went to another place which was a bit weird. This noodle place had no seats, and all the people just stood there and ate, and therefore it was very easy to locate this place, called Ay-Chung Flour-Rice Noodle 阿宗麵線.

The noodle was so thin that this whole bowl was like soup, and I guess you couldn't even use chopsticks and that's why they gave you a spoon. Some people really like this thing, but I am not really a fan of it. However, it is interesting to stand in the street slurping a bowl of noodle.
After all the noodle, we headed to the night market! Let's continue in the next blog!

Best Wonton in Hong Kong ... by Night Angel

Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:05:40 GMT

This little shop in Central is a famous wonton place for many years, and its recent acquisition of one Michelin Star is definitley the icing on a cake. Mak An Kee 麥奀記 is not a big restaurant, but you can be sure it is always occupied by different people from local people to tourists to rich guys.
I today had lunch there, and had their two famous dishes. First is the egg noodle with shrimp eggs served with soup. We just ate it without the soup, but drank it later, while some people like to add the soup onto the noodle. No matter how you eat it, you can still taste the great flavour of the noodle. You can feel the sponginess and the taste of egg in your mouth! That is good egg noodle!

Then we had a bowl of wonton, and this was once a very controversial dish. Some people claimed that this was the original because it was the original small size, with little pork mixed inside. Others however said that good wonton should be bigger with more pork inside, like half pork half shrimp. For me, I think this is pretty good. Perhaps to me, with little pork you can then taste the fresh shrimp meat inside. The wonton skin was very delicious too!

Some people said eating here was expensive and not worth it, but I would say it was not bad at all. I have no say on whether it is traditional or not, original or not, but still it is apparently part of Hong Kong culture. I hope that we can keep all these great dishes despite the fast development of Hong Kong, just as how we try to keep our heritage in the city. :)

Render me undecisive ... by crays

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 14:24:25 GMT

I'm not in such a good mood now. As you all know about the economy crisis. I feel like screaming, but silently.
I don't know what to do now. I am currently doing my form 6 which is a A-levels by the government, free of course. My mother wanted to think and make sure of my career path, where my interest really lies. That is why form 6 exist, it is like a free A-level (Tho much harder) for people to make sure the path they want to take is what they want. Not like some people who would go for a diploma course for something and then halfway through, they don't like it and switch. I'll cost a bomb.
While my father, have a really high hope for me due to his own experience, he was left with nothing at the age of 17. He survive the harsh moment alone until now, thus he don't want me to take the same path. He want me to have my own foundation and everything set at the age of 20-ish. Start to pay for a house or a car. Like what the chinese would say, "When you're used to suffer, you still survive if you got a better life and falls back again." He don't want me to take the same path as he does.
I also know how much he wanted me to take over his company (a watch company). But yet, I have no interest dealing with watches. I can pretty much tell i'm not a buisness man. But i'm his son, I should be the one who take over my father's sweat and blood. I feel so weak now, don't know where i should start to seek my path...

Westwood's Life in Fashion ... by Night Angel

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 11:36:26 GMT

I thought I was more interested in architecture, but I didn't go to the architect master Tadao Ando's talk last week. Instead I went to Vivienne Westwood's exhibition to get some fashion inspiration.
I believe most of us know about Westwood from the products in her shops, namely the handbags, wallets, belts and clothes. Most of you will remember her trademark symbol, which is a planet thing with a cross at the time. Actually, Westwood's creativity and styles are more than those things that you can buy, and her design attitude is very much inspiring.

Right at the entrance of the exhibition, she already posted this line up, and she is the rebel type. Perhaps, all designers are born or trained to be like a rebel, defying everything in life and searching for the roads that nobody has walked on before.
However, she didn't just aim high. She started with all the basics on how to make clothes and on histories of fashion. She read and tried to understand all the bits of fashion in our life, from past to present. Only in that way, can she seek the new ideas from what she knows.
She also said that creativity came from technique, and that is very true. Too many people these days fail to understand this and just go design. Without the basics, you won't be able to realize the dreams in a fine and detailed way.
Now let's talk a look at her works which once shocked her countries and the whole world, and some of them still shock our mind.

Then after some crazy ideas and exaggerating colors and patterns, she also tried something more played-down, but still having a striking look and style.

And she is not afraid of anything, being a complete just-do-it lady...a peacock on the head!

In shoes, she also tried very different things, refining our usual perceptions of shoes...

You may think that many of these things cannot be worn, or that if you wear them you won't go out onto the streets without being looked at. However, that is what design is all about. Sometimes you just need to push boundary. Maybe the outcome is not practical, but at least you try and do it or even finish it. It is the inspiration for others that matters, not just practicality. I believe that if everyone is just thinking about typical shirts and trousers in fashion, then there will be no new things for us to see and to choose from. If these great designers didn't impress us with all these beautiful and jaw-dropping works, we won't have the inspiration or be stimulated to try more in other fields of design.
I admire her, for she is the real designer. She said, "Fashion is a baby I picked up and never put down." Such passion is exactly what drives her, and also the world, to achieve more and more. It is not just her fahsion that changes the world, but also her determination and way of design that continue to shock and inspire all of us.

Birthday Surprise Party of Mine ... by crays

Sat, 22 Nov 2008 14:51:53 GMT

Well my classmates organized a surprise party for me 2 days before my birthday, it was awesome. But obviously without pictures its hard to imagine. They invite everyone over for a BBQ party, i did not suspect anything since they invite quite a huge sum of people. So let the picture begins :-
You know the "take the candle out with your mouth" kinda trick, here is mine.(noooooo, i thought there's no one behind?!)
Then the cake itself which have my nose figure on it XD. It looks like a model of my nose, inverted.(awesome!)Classmates(Don't ask why our lips looks like we have lipstick on it)

Guess who i am XP.
Was fun of course~

Birthday Finale ... by Night Angel

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:28:39 GMT

Yesterday was my birthday, and certainly work took most of my time (from 9 to 6 man!). After work, I took control my life again and spent the night with my lady. We went to the Golden Bull for some nice Vietnamese food, and it was all good.
This time there won't be many shots, since we had something typical and common. I wanted quality not special fancy dishes. We had flat rice noodles and the famous Roasted Chicken in Preserved Bean Curd Sauce. We ordered this interesting dessert, and we didn't know that it was in heart shape!

The top black layer is black glutinous rice, while the second yellow layer is green bean paste. I forgot what the white layer was but it seems to be coconut jelly thing. It was very delicious and it was served with coconut sauce.
These days I had a really good time, and I guess more food is coming since some of my friends have to celebrate my birthday later due to their own schedules, haha...thanks everyone who wished me Happy Birthday, and finally I am 27! Yay!

Spring Deer and the lost dish ... by Night Angel

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:56:21 GMT

Spring Deer is one of the very famous and old Chinese restaurants. It is famous because nearly all the travel books talk about it, and so most of the customers inside are actually foreigners and tourists. That's why you will see a lot of coaches waiting outside the restaurants, making it like a sight-seeing spot.

I had my birthday dinner with my family at this restaurant last night, and I always wanted to try its food. In this restaurant, you can find all the different kinds of Beijing food, including the lost ones. Those are the traditional food that you may not find in Beijing, but you can find and eat them here. Let the dinner begin now (I mean, rewind, haha)

That is slices of jelly sheets (雞絲粉皮), which are used for dumplings. They mixed it with chicken slices, some vegetable and a little peanut butter, and it tasted very good. Then the main courses came. This one is the lost Beijing food, deep-fried stewed pork trotter (酥炸元蹄).

Usually you prepare this dish in brown sauce, but this one actually is deep-fried after being stewed, and so you have this really crisy surface and juicy pork underneath.

Then we have the mixed vegetable in earthern pot (雜錦沙鍋). It is like vegetable soup inside, and you can find Tianjin cabbage (津白), shiitake (or winter mushroom 冬菇) and rice noodle.

And if you know Chinese cuisine, then you should know that this kind of pot is very famous. They can make good dishes!
Now the famous barbequed Peking duck arrived! Nothing special actually, because it is a roasted duck and its meat was sliced out. You use the pizza-like bread to roll the meat and Beijing scallion together, and eat.

We wanted to get the famous Beijing-type mutton with scallion but we were too full! The food was so good and that was like one of the best Chinese food in the town! The environment was old like 1980 Chinese restaurant, but at least the place was clean and it fits the food it provides!
Delicious! The trotter was so wonderful but we couldn't finish the whole thing, and so we took the rest home for the next meal. That's the old tradition in Chinese culture, that sometimes they take the remaining food back home, tyring not to waste any good food. Anyway, it was a great dinner!

Butagumi Tonkatsu ... by Night Angel

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 09:40:45 GMT

My first birthday dinner started last night, and it started big. One of my best friends was treating me in this newly opened Japanese restaurant, featuring all these special "tonkatsu" food (deep-fried food0.
We went to Butagumi Tonkatsu located in a commerical tower in Causeway Bay. Remember some time ago I went to that famous Tonkichi Japanese Restaurant? That one has really exceptional food, and this one we just went to seem to pick up the same style, and we will see how good they can be.

After fiddling with the table objects, the side dish came. Yeah, I thought the main course would come first. The side dish is a Japanese-curry-flavoured potato cake, and it was yummy and very curry.

Then, the main course came. It was HUGE. Mine was pork cutlet (of course in tonkachi style) with deep-fried oysters.

Saw the big tiger prawn too? That was free as every customer would get on during this special promotion period. That added much more to my already-very-big dish. My friend loves prawns, and hers was prawns (originally 3 and adding the free one making 4 in total) with pork mini-cutlet.

And now, a close-up shot of the cutlet, and see how it was like...

The meat actually didn't look very soft, but interestingly it was actually soft and good. Also, the surface was not oily at all. It was very crispy, and the texture of the pork was nice. The prawns were good too, and really huge (7 inches long!) while the oysters were the best, crispy outside and juicy inside. Very good!
Compared to the famous Tonkichi one, this one can only scores 2/3 of their competitor. The salad in Tonkichi was so good that you can just eat it without the cutlets, while the sauce there was exceptional. Here, Butagumi was not bad, but it lacks the details and the sauces could be a bit better. However, you have much more choices in this restaurant, from the basic cutlets and oysters to prawns to potato cakes to some fancy egg rolls. That makes eating a bit more fun when the quality still has some room for improvement. Also the prices are a bit lower, making this place another good choice for tonkachi stuff.
The final comment from me is that the dinner sets are too big! If you are not the big eater type, I suggest you not ordering any side dishes because it will be impossible to swallow them all! The environment is nice, but some chairs are higher than normal, making my back ache after dinner...anyway, have a try when you feel like some deep-fried Japanese food!

Shanghai Crab 2 ... by Night Angel

Sat, 01 Nov 2008 15:41:10 GMT

Alright, last week we had this famous crab meal as dinner. Every autumn is actually the period of eating the Shanghai Crab, and this has long become a tradition.
You probably have read my previous entry on the Shanghai Crab which was a year ago nearly, and we didn't do any exception for 2008, though the set dinner was a little bit different from last year's menu.

Instead of a tart as the final course, we had boneless fish slices instead. The vegetable also changed, and if you go compare with last year's menu, you may see that there is a decrease in crab meat, haha! But then we realized that this combination was actually good because now the veggie was pure without crab meat, it went well with the fish which was indeed very heavy. Perhaps they put all the crab meat and stuff into one dish instead of spreading them between the tart and vegetable.
Anyway I didn't take any photos because you can already see them in the previous post. It is a very good meal again, but some of you may know that these crabs are very heavy in cholesterol. Fortunately I only ate one a year (didn't eat any between these two blog posts!) and so I guess it is fine.
Still, I need a little more exercise as my belly is...ouch! You know what I mean!

Playing my role ... by crays

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 11:05:25 GMT

Hello guys, my exam is finished!!!Being myself, who would only care about exam results when the result is out even thought I think I have done badly this term.Well today, all of my results are back, unbelievably all my subject improved! Except for English, where I have no idea why I got such low marks.Let's start out with my subjects :-
Biology - The exam was hard, especially the last part where I have no idea how to do, a question that worth 15 marks. When I saw that, I told myself "Shit, you're dead asshole". 15 marks means alot in our exam. Yet when the paper came back today, to my suprise, my score was pretty high and satisfying and I got only 1 wrong for my objective (which is really annoying because you're not totally perfect but close to it).______________________________________
Physics - What a killer,this is the subject that I wanted to drop because I can understand how it works, but the formula and stuff is just messed up. I thought I might fail this term because the stuff just didn't stay still in my mind, I was worried. Yet again to my suprise, I score better than my last term. ______________________________________Chemistry - Well overall I didn't do really well for this, but still managed to score better than my last term. Was satisfying. Like a good meal XD.______________________________________
Maths - this is a really scary subject for me, but atleast I did well in this one, except for some stewpid careless mistakes, all was well done. Even better, i got on par with one of my friend who's really good in maths.Above all that exciment, I really feel like starting my career as a designer now. Like do some freelancing, but my country's bank doesn't support or recognize paypal. See that? Dammit. I don't know how i should start, since most of the freelance online are paypal based. Geez. Any help from you guys out there =D ?

Bah. Yet another new stage? ... by Cyberworker AMG

Wed, 29 Oct 2008 02:28:29 GMT

I don't seem to ever write on this blog until I stumbled hard in my life.

Yes. It's another new stage?

I am not working at NVIDIA anymore. If you have noticed, NVDA fell from USD 39 to 7. I have to hold my shares for a PRETTY DAMN LONG time.

So, WTF am I doing by losing a job? I'm in school again! Loser!

This time, I'm in another university across the San Francisco bay. The school has a long history with Berkeley. Yes. That's the school you are thinking. Damn school.

Congratz on me getting in! Yea. It's a program for the school to earn money. Congratulations to the school! Somebody claims they are special so they got admitted. Maybe they are. I simply ain't.

Shit. I gotta shut up.

more time pls. ... by wintergal

Tue, 14 Oct 2008 09:01:22 GMT

XD Yeahhh, I need more time. Assignments and examss... Blehh. This next few weeks before semester ends, I'll be doing assignments. I was just thinking just now while on the train that this semester went by so freaking fast; like a blink of an eye. o_O I expect it to go by fast, but not this fast. Gonna be exam time again. :(
Other than that, nothing much really. Just visiting LiveJournal more than usual, and chatting with my friends. XD

I am not racist but its too much. ... by crays

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 23:26:47 GMT

Oh dammit, I just gotta rant about this. Currently, its the malay's new year called "hari raya". I'm not racist but this incident is just too much.
My neighbour, illegally bought firecrackers (its banned in our country), they bought so much that I have no idea how much did they buy. I've never seen people so inconsiderate, they play their firecrackers at 9PM, fine. 10PM, still fine, but WTF, at 12 mid night?!
That was fine, UNTIL they friggin woke up at 6 something and started making those annoying, noise polluting noises. I tried to speak to them in a very calm and good manner..
Me : "Bang boleh tak jangan main kejap, nak tidur ni..."Me : "Hey bro, can you stop playing for awhile, we need to sleep"Him : "Sekarang raya ma~~"Him : "Its raya now~~"
They kept on playing. Worst, they like to keep accelerating their motorbikes so that they make those "vroom vroom" sounds and emits alot of smoke. My country. Lovely.