W Cafe & Dining is located in the business center of Dataran Prima, Petaling Jaya.
W Cafe & Dining is not hard to miss as it is located at the T-junction of Jalan PJU 1/42 and Jalan PJU 1/39.
How to get to W Cafe & Dining?
Being in a business center (Dataran Prima), it may be challenging to get parking during weekdays as the parking bays will be occupied by the office workers. Fret not! There is ample parking in The Tube – the middle commercial building in Dataran Prima. You can park in the basement and walk over to W Cafe & Dining.
On weekends, there are plenty of parking along the road and outside the cafe. And best! Parking is free!
W Cafe & Dining
The front of the shop has a full glass entrance and window, thereby allowing natural lighting to brighten the shop further from outside. In terms of space; though small, the cafe also feels cozy at the same time. There are about 6 to 7 tables which can sit from 2 to 5 pax per table.
There is a special display cabinet for their coffees and cookies. Do explore it!
What started as an inspiration, grew and manifested into our latest outlet. A design developed and constructed from the foundation of Japanese Modernism. In here, you will find the tranquility of contemporary minimalism while enjoying a hot cup of coffee. Life.
Craving for other than the 4th floor Japanese food in Lot 10? Head one level down to Swee Lee Social Club. Swee Lee Social Club is is a signature cafe and experiential space nestled within Swee Lee’s store in Lot 10, Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur.
Swee Lee Social Club is strategically located in Lot 10, Bukit Bintang.
Lot 10 is located at a cross junction. It is the intersection where Jalan Bukit Bintang and Jalan Sultan Ismail meet. Many cars wait at the traffic lights and cross the junction.
Furthermore, the Bukit Bintang MRT and Bukit Bintang Monorial are just outside Lot 10. Parking is not really an issue as customers can also park in Lot 10 or Sungei Wang Plaza, and walk to the cafe in Lot 10.
If you’re coming from Lot 10 parking lot, take the escalator or lift from the 5th, 6th, 7th, or 8th floor down to the 3rd floor. But if you’re coming from the Bukit Bintang MRT or monorial, take the escalator or lift from the ground floor up to the 3rd floor. Swee Lee Social Club is not hard to miss, as it is directly opposite the indoor basketball court in Lot 10.
We walked into a Chinese restaurant. It was full house. The waiters were squeezing through the gaps around the restaurant. The restaurant was noisy as people were eating and talking loudly over the table.
We were seated at the table which we had booked earlier. The waitress took our orders.
We ordered our usual dishes: curry vegetables, sweet potato leaves, steam fish, beancurd, and egg foo young.
While waiting for our food, I can’t help to notice the following.
1. Not not serve garlic & chilli
A good meal is not without the condiments. I’m not talking about the salt and pepper. Not even the ginger. Don’t pass the ketchup. Skip the wasabi.
The drinks – be it hot or cold – have to always be served before the rice.
We don’t want to start our meal with a dry throat. Gulping down the first spoonful of rice on a dry throat is a harsh experience. The rice can be stuck in the throat and we have to force it down to the stomach.
Its healthy to quench our thirsts after waiting a good 15 minutes for the food to be served.
The curry is the one dish which has to be served first after the rice. We don’t want the curry to be served last, when we’ve finished eating the other dishes and the rice.
Even if the curry is served last, there won’t be much space in the stomach. There has to be extra space for desserts.
Hence, the curry has to be served first with the rice. Curry goes well with rice. Without the rice, it is just missing something important.
The spinach is served. A spoon is given to pick the spinach from the dish.
Bear in mind that though spinach is a vegetable, it is not like other vegetables – french beans, tauge, broccoli, cabbage, lettuce, etc. These vegetables are for the picking, whereas spinach is not!
Spinach is an interwoven and interlocking strands of greens. There are a lot of gaps in between.
It is somewhat like noodles and spaghetti. Strings of greens attached to each other with gaps in between. A fork is needed to pick through and up the spinach.
Happy New Year! 2018 is turning out to be a festive and prosperous year.
Here’s why 2018 is a good boss. Gives a day off on the 1st work day of the week. No Monday Blues.
No better way than to start the year the Malaysian way. Nasi Lemak breakfast with Ali, Muthu & Ah Hock. Check out their Facebook in the link.
This kopitiam is located at B-G-01 Block B, Oasis Square, Jalan PJU 1A/7, Oasis Ara Damansara, 47301 Petaling Jaya, Selangor.
In addition to its recommended Nasi Lemak Ayam at RM11.90 which is the most expensive item on the menu; Ali, Muthu & Ah Hock also has Nasi Lemak Biasa, Nasi Goreng, Nasi Kunyit, Roti Bakar, etc.
This only the first meal of 2018. Looking forward to more food in 2018.
Last Sunday, on the way back from Ipoh to Kuala Lumpur, we decided to make a short detour and visit Kellie’s Castle. Kellie’s Castle (Kellie’s Folly) is located near Batu Gajah, Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia. The unfinished, ruined mansion, was built by a Scottish planter called William Kellie Smith. According to differing accounts, it was either a gift for his wife or a home for his sons.
Kellie’s History
William Kellie Smith was from a village in Scotland known as Kellas. In 1890, at the age of 20, he arrived in the then undeveloped Malaya. Here, he met an estate owner called Alma Baker, who had won concessions from the state government to clear 360 hectares of forests in Perak. With the substantial profits made from his business venture with Alma Baker, Smith started planting rubber trees and dabbled in the tin mining industry. In time, he became the owner of Kinta Kellas Estate and the Kinta Kellas Tin Dredging Company.
Now with his fortune made, he returned home to marry his Scottish sweetheart, Agnes, and brought her over to Malaysia in 1903. The following year, the couple was blessed with a daughter whom they named Helen. For many years after that, Agnes tried to conceive, but to no avail. William Smith desperately wanted a son and heir to take over his empire in the Malay Isles. After many years, Agnes finally gave birth to a son, Anthony, in 1915. The birth of his child was the start of even greater success for William Smith. To celebrate Anthony’s birth, William Smith decided to expand on his mansion. Smith started planning for a huge castle which he planned to call Kellas House, after his hometown in Scotland.
Construction Begins
Because of his fascination with the Hindu religion and the Indian culture, Smith’s plan was for this house to share similar architecture to those of Madras, with all its bricks and tiles imported from India. He even employed a big group of Indian labourers to build his dream house, to keep the Kellas House authentically Indian. The mansion is accessible from the main road through a bridge running across a stream.
But it was not only the cost of importing material and labourers from abroad that made the house so fascinating to locals and travellers alike. Among the many amazing things about Kellie’s Castle are an elevator (it was the first in Malaya) which connects right up to the top floor, and the existence of two tunnels that run under the river nearby. One of these tunnels connects to the Hindu temple some distance away from the main house.
On the second floor, Smith planned to build an indoor tennis court – an ambitious project even by today’s standards. On the highest floor, there is a rooftop courtyard for parties. This castle was to be the hub for entertaining wealthy colonial planters who had settled in Malaya. His house was so unique that it was even mentioned in the London Financier newspaper on 15 September 1911.
Construction Difficulties and Smith’s Death
Unfortunately for Smith, tragedies struck soon after the construction of the Kellas House began. A virulent strain of the Spanish flu spread from Europe to soon after World War I ended in Europe, killing many of the workers in the Kellas Estate. Another seventy workers constructing Smith’s dream castle also became victims of the flu. Smith, who had already spent a fortune on his house, lost a lot of money because of this.
In the end, Kellas House, later known as Kellie’s Castle or even Kellie’s Folly to some, was never completed. William Kellie Smith himself died of pneumonia during a short trip to Portugal in 1926. His heartbroken wife decided to pack up and return home to Scotland selling the estate and Kellie’s Castle to a British company called Harrisons and Crossfield.
Today…
All these years faded into memory, the castle has been reconditioned to serve as a visitor spot and enjoy the scenery and breeze at the rooftop. Descendants of the Tamil labourers brought over to Malaya to work on the mansion still live nearby even now. Kellie’s castle is now a popular local tourist attraction and was used as a setting in the 1999 film Anna and the King.
Kellie’s Castle is a beautiful place for graduation, wedding, and romantic photography. Albeit the ruins, its these ruins that provide the backdrop.
Sadly, there was no lift but the lift shaft was visible. We walked our way to the top of this four storey mansion. It was a good exercise. It’s definitely not for the faint hearted, not just from the walking but from the view too. There are no proper fencing and safety feature, so we had to thread extra cautiously and not do anything crazy. Nevertheless, the view was breathtaking. The view overlooked the river, the highway, the plantations, and lush greenery nearby. Its a sight to behold with your own eyes.
Waffle, a dessert that looks like a badminton or tennis racquet, or a round net. It is a pastry that is BEST eaten with jam, syrup, butter, or ice cream.
Growing up, the closest I got to enjoying a waffle was at A&W Restaurants. Till today, A&W waffles do bring back memories.
As the years went by, the art of crafting waffles developed. Waffle World took waffles one step further. I tried their savoury and sweet waffles. More ingredients and flavours were added to the waffles menu. Their Salted Egg Yolk Waffle was uniquely named. Much like the Chocotop, the salted egg yolk was hardened on the ice cream. It’s an interesting, yet weird mash of salty salted egg yolk and sweet ice cream. However, there was still room for improvement in my world of waffles. I held on to the believe that there are better waffles out there.
Fast forward to today, waffles are hipster! Ate waffles at Antipodean Cafe at Atria Shopping Mall. Ate their Blueberry Ice Cream Waffle and Butterscotch and Ice Cream Waffle. Even though they were as simple as before, but these Antipodean waffles were softer and sweeter. Honey overflowed from the waffles!
Then I was introduced to the waffles at Fluffed Cafe & Dessert Bar in Taman Paramount. Deconstructed their Tiramisu Peanut Butter Waffles. Artsy designs, good use of composition, and the mixture of flavours blended very well together. The peanut butter ice cream went really well with the charcoal waffle. I’m Fluffed!
However, I was fluffed from the inside out by Inside Scoop in Damansara Jaya. Their nutella waffle blew me away! Nutella is heaven! Nutella and waffle mixed together is another universe in itself. The nutella waffle was topped with chocolate mint and vanilla flavoured ice creams.
A special mention to my #foodyfanstravel adventure in UK. The UK waffles were a class of their own. This particular waffle was from the site of the first coffee house in England. This site is none other than The Grand Cafe, befitting of its name.
We’re barely a month into 2017 and its already another new year – Chinese New Year (CNY) – life’s second chance. Therefore, I’ve decided that my 2017 starts again on February 1st… January was a trial month. With that being said, 2016 was the Year of Monkey and it’s no more monkey business; time for the real deal.
Being born and raised in Kuala Lumpur (KL) has been quite a privilege. This is because during CNY, I don’t have to be part of the massive crawl back to the hometown – wherever and however far it may be. The roads and highways in KL itself becomes devoid of cars, especially at peak hours. Its a breeze zooming from one end of town to the other. But of course, drive within the speed limits, because the car workshops are closed and the doctors are on leave for holiday.
The town has become a ghost town. Restaurants, shops, and offices have closed for the new year. Even shopping malls have become deserted. Shopping outlets – telecommunication stores, clothing departments, and cafes – have also closed for the new year. The only thing left open are the mamaks restaurants. No dim sum, wantan mee, and teh kecil in the morning but more roti canai, nasi lemak, and mee goreng for the next few days. Huat Ah!!
On the eve of CNY, we gathered together for a reunion dinner at my grandmother’s house (my mother’s mother). We ate poon choi (👈🏻 click the link for more info), which cost a whopping RM500++ per pot, and we ordered 2 pots of poon choi! 😱 So you do the maths.
From Chor Yat (translated as the 1st day of CNY), its the start of the endless reunions, house visitations, greetings, snacking, drinking, loh sangs, and reunion dinners for the next two weeks. I think during CNY, I’ve drank and eaten more sugar and snacks than in my birthday, Christmas, and other auspicious events combined in a year.
Its a joy to visit the family, cousins, long lost relatives and friends at a reunion or a house visitation. After all the CNY greetings and well-wishes; the yearly, awkward, and unavoidable questions pop out:
What are you studying?
Where are you working? What are you working as?
Where is your boyfriend or girlfriend?
When are you getting married?
Because the aunties and uncles want to reduce their annual CNY ang pow output.
When are you getting a baby?
When is your baby getting married? 😱 (Ok, maybe a bit too much…)
QuestionS time is over and when ALL the questions have been answered, time for snacks and drinks to quench the thirst.
*Stares at all the CNY cookies*
Me: “WHOSE YOUR DADDY? COME TO PAPA”
*Munches on all the snacks and forgets about lunch*
After all the makan-makan, we move to the next house and to the next for visitations. The houses may be next door, down the road, or across town, but its worth the journey. The ang pows collected from as little as RM2 to as much as RM100 or more individually, are worth the journey 🤑 . Sometimes secretly eyeing the aunties who give RM2 ang pows in the Year of Monkey, or Year of Goat ang pow packets, when its 2017 and Year of Rooster.😑 😑 #doublekill
Nevertheless, its the festive season. Its the season to celebrate, fei-lo-ship, and be prosperous. Eat, drink, snack, and loh to your heart’s (and stomach’s) content. Happy Chinese New Year. GONG XI FA CAI!!!!
I’ve decided that my 2017 starts again on February 1st… January was a trial month.
I can’t believe another 365+ days have so quickly passed… We’re now in the final minutes of 2016! Before venturing into 2017, let’s do a year in review for 2016. I’ve visited many new cafes and restaurants, and revisited many of those “new” cafes and restaurants. I’ve cafe hopped from cafe to cafe, and dined at various restaurants.
These are the places I’ve eaten and drank in 2016.
Fluffed Cafe and DessertFluffed Cafe and Dessert
Moim Modern Korean Cuisine
Dae Jang Gum
Antipodean CafeAntipodean CafeAntipodean Cafe
Streat Thai
Breakfast ThievesBreakfast Thieves
Inside Scoop
Bubba Gump Shrimp Co
Sid’s Pub
Was very blessed to have the opportunity to travel to London and Oxford in the United Kingdom this year September. Miles away from home for a short period of time. Different culture. Different food. Wholesome experience. The slideshow below is a summary and snapshot of the foods I ate in the UK. Happy sliding!
All in all, it was a fruitful and foodie year. You’ve just tasted the variety of cafes and restaurants I went to in January 2016 to December 2016, from top to bottom here. Visit my Facebook: FoodyFans and Instagram: foodyfans for more foodie pictures! I look forward to MORE and EXCITING cafes and restaurants to hop, visit, taste, drink, and eat. May 2017 be A MORE fruitful and foodie year for FoodyFans!
If you’re reading this, I’ve a confession to make. After much wrangling, countless tossing and turnings in bed at night, and guilt for a week; I’ve decided to own up to my mistake. The Gypsy King stole a Legendary Breakfast at the Breakfast Thieves in Bangsar. BANG!
The breakfast, or rather lunch, was legendary. It was outside of my comfort zone in Petaling Jaya. Last Saturday, my friend and I took a ride down to Bangsar to try the much talked about and newly opened Breakfast Thieves (BT). It was located just beside PULP by Papa Palheta. By design, the cafe is modern and hipster, as it is housed in a glass house. Natural lighting thrives in and around the cafe. Furthermore, with the extensive use of glass panes, the cafe feels spacious and naturally comforting.
It was an hour’s wait for our table as it was full house. Being a new cafe and being new to this cafe, we took some time to choose our food. The problem with most hipster cafes is that the food is often left to the customer’s imaginations. The menu would be filled with beautifully descriptions about the food. There would be no pictures for the customer to salivate the taste visually. Therefore, we resorted to the modern way – Instagram. After much deliberation, we ordered our food by faith and the wait continues…
As people walked into and out of the cafe, I realised that Malaysians have always had an affinity for food.In the past, before the rise of hipsterism, Malaysians would travel anywhere and everywhere for the “best” (subject to individual taste buds) and the latest food craze. PJ-ians would travel as far as Penang (4 hours drive), Malacca (2 hours drive), and Ipoh (1 hour drive) to eat the famous local delicacies. Some people even go to the extent of driving to these places in A day just for the food! #dedication.
That was Then. Now, due to the rise and popularity of hipster cafes, the journey has become more localised. The cafes are all within near driving distance. Malaysian foodies would hop from cafe to cafe, also known as cafe hopping. Malaysian cafe hoppers can hop as much as 7 times a day because Malaysians eat 7 times a day: Breakfast, Brunch, Lunch, Tea, Dinner, Dessert, and Supper.
AND…. Our orders have arrived. Hungry much, but our stomachs can wait. In true #instafood fashion, we whipped out our (I)phones, we instagrammed our food with #filterS, and these are they: The Gypsy King & The Legend.
The Gypsy King is a very unique dish because of its misrepresentation, in a good way. From other foodies’ Instagram, the red cubes looked like tomato cubes, but they were actually smoked salmon sashimi. Also, those fried cubes looked like croutons, but they were actually potatoes. It is a good mixture of sashimi, potatoes, mushrooms, avocado, and poached eggs.
The Legend looked like a tomato-filled dish in a mini wok. However, after going deeper into it, spiciness kicked in. It was a tad bit spicy. In the mini work were beef salamis, ladies fingers, and mushrooms – covered with this spicy tomato-based paste. And the garlic bread is to be dipped into the paste.
This the season for kdramas – Uncontrollably Fond, Doctors Crush, Another Oh Hae Young, and W. With all the craze about the hot actors and beautiful actresses, awesome attractions (Jeju Island), and kdrama love stories; let’s not forget Kfood. Fancy feeling close to Korea? Here are some Korean eateries to check out in Petaling Jaya.
Dae Jang Gum
Dae Jang Gum is a Korean BBQ Restaurant. It is presently located in Seksyen 14, Petaling Jaya. Previously, when we went there for lunch, the restaurant was at SS4D, Kelana Jaya.
One Sunday afternoon, after church, my friends and I went for lunch at SS4D. Albeit being a Korean BBQ Restaurant, we were intrigued by its set lunch menu FOR RM14 & RM17. We ordered their pattaya fried rice set, bulgogi set, and dak dulgogi set.
At the sound of RM17, it sounds somewhat hefty and pricey on hindsight. However, they were definitely worthwhile, because of their quality and quantity. Quality was Korean standard. Quantity was due to their humongously many side dishes. On top of that, rice and soup were also provided.
We left with a Korean tastebud, a satisfied stomach, and a lighter wallet.
Fancy some Korean food for dinner? There’s a Korean Food stall in the East Wing of the Neighbourhood Food Court in Kota Damansara. Going by its name, it only and literally served Korean food. It focuses mainly on ala carte dishes. It’s Kimchi Jigae and Pork Bulgogi were delicious, satisfying, and fulfilling. The Kimchi Jigae was spicily cold. There were a lot of pork in the Pork Bulgogi.
Moim Modern Korean Cuisine
Want to eat your Korean food in a little bit more comfort? Then, head on over to Moim Modern Korean Cuisine in Atria Shopping Centre. There’s air-con and more comfy chairs. Of the 3 Restaurants listed in this post, THIS Korean restaurant is #1 in terms of originality. “Originality” here is by way of the amount of variety of dishes listed on the menu. There were a variety of Korean food which I’ve not seen or heard before… This is what makes this particular restaurant the most unique.
All in all, despite it being commonly termed as Korean food, I only consider it “true” Korean food when it has met this ONLY criteria. The chef has to be a Korean. This adds more flavour, meaning, and attachment to the Korean food. Therefore, this brings me closer to Korea. Annyeong!!
