Showing posts with label Nyonya Cuisine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nyonya Cuisine. Show all posts

Friday, 31 July 2009

Invited Review ~ Ivy's Kitchen @ Jalan Chow Thye, Penang

Would you like to have some Nyonya Cuisine? Steamboat dinner? Penang hawker delights? If you are undecided what you want to have, perhaps, you can drop by to Ivy's Kitchen.
Ivy's Kitchen is located @
58 Jalan Chow Thye, 102520 Penang
(It is situated next to ISARIBI Japanese Restaurant and near to 127 Food Court Centre)
Tel: 013-4337878 (Tan) and 0164337130 (Ivy)
Business Hours: 9.00am - 9.00pm
(except Saturday from 12 noon onwards)
A wide range of menu and free newspaper for reading while waiting for your foods being served. Currently, Ivy's kitchen is installing air condition for the interior dinning. For the outside dining, there are fans too!
Wide ranges of fruit juices such as Honey Dew Juice, Ambala Sour Plum, Watermelon Juice, Cucumber Mint Juice, Orange Juice, Apple with Lime (New) and Carrot with Milk Juice.
Criz asked Tan to make us wide range of juices as we are undecided what to have except for Allen. So, Tan came out with the wide range of juices for us to choose from. ^-^
Tan new invention is Apple with Lime. Cynthia have this and she feels that it has too much lime in there for her personal liking. Chan took the cucumber mint and he reckon that there are more cucumber in there than mint. ^-^ All the drinks cost RM2.20 each.
Tofu Seaweed Soup ~ RM8 (S), RM10 (M) and RM14 (L)
I start off by writing the soup first as my gal kept telling me that her teacher told them that they should finished the soup first before start with the other dishes. So prevent her from nagging me, I better write this first. ^-^
There are lots of ingredients in the soup such as seaweed, vegetables, tofu, fish balls, prawn, hand made chicken balls and........ The soup are very tasty although it is an simple soup. I guess my gal will loves it very much.
White Rice
Sweet and sour flower crab ~ RM30 per 600g
Ah.... this is one of their signature dishes. Since it is sweet and sour flower crab, it does not taste spicy at all. But I think my gal will find it a hint of spicyness. But if you want to have more spicy crab, you can always tell them when you placed your order. Or the other way round when you have kids dinning with you, you can always asked them to reduce the spicyness. I think most of us love the sauces very much to go with the rice. The crab is very fresh and nice. We were thinking that if there are mantou to go with that will be GREAT. But according to Tan, it needs lots of preparing for the mantou. So they did not served it with mantou at the time being.
Joo Hu Char ~ RM10
One thing that I should mention here is that Ivy's Kitchen is a Pork Free Traditional Nyonya Cuisine. So, there are no pork being served here. All the ingredients use are mainly chicken. So as the Joo Hu Char, although it did not used pork, it still tastes good and juicy. I love Joo Hu Char but I never prepared it by myself. Most of the time, I saw my MIL and hubby aunt prepared this dish as it needs plenty of time to cut all the ingredients into small tiny slices. You can always have Joo Hu Char with the rice or even with the vegetables provided.
Lor Bak ~ RM6
Ah.... another one of my favorite food - lor bak. Please reminded again this is chicken lor bak. I like the lor bak that wrap very tightly and firm. And this shop serves the lor bak that I like. It is very crispy in the outer part.
Assam Prawn ~ RM4-5
Prawn....... that's my favorite food. I eat lots of prawn since I am young. I recall that I had whole plate of prawn by myself when I am small. ^-^ Assam Prawn is one of the finger licking food. Why I said that it's finger licking food? As because all the assam flavor is inact with the prawn shells. And when you suck the prawn, all the flavour is there. Some prefer their assam a bit wet but this shop Assam Prawn is a dry version. I enjoyed having this. ^-^
Gulai Tumis Ikan ~ RM9 Per 100gm
Next, we had some gulai tumis ikan. I think everyone enjoy it very much. The fish is very fresh. There are lots of herbs used in this gulai tumis ikan. For me, the curry is not very spicy. I guessed my gal might like to try this when she wants some curry fish next time. This is one of the recipes that passed down by Tan's mother. Give it a try!
Sambak Kailan ~ RM8 (Small), RM10 (Medium), RM14 (Large)
I loves this dish very much. The kailan use is very "young". And the sambal is very nicely blend and delicious. Next time, I will order a large plate for my next visit. ^-^
Beef Rendang
This is a complimentary dish for us to try. Since, I did not take beef, I did not try it. But Cheryl and Alan, love it very much.
Dessert - Red Bean Longan ~ RM2 each
Last but not least, here comes the dessert. It is Red Bean Longan dessert. I personally love the red bean longan dessert as it is not very sweet. And the red bean cooked to the perfect timing. I don't mind to have many bowl of this dessert. ^-^
I would like to thanks Criz for organising this review for us as I missed the last review. And also Tan and Ivy for inviting us to try their delicious foods. Apart from the chu char they serves, they also serve some set meal. Give it a try! and let me know what you think about this place. I am going back to try their Cincaru. ^-^
Ivy's Kitchen is also running some promotion where each RM5 you spent, you are entitled for one stamp. Once you accumulate 10 stamps in one card, you entitle for a free set meal, or RM7.50 discount on total bill. But for bill discount on total bill, maximum 2 cards are allowed per visit.
*******Please note that they also offer catering services********
You can pop by to other attendee review:
Attendees:
And many thanks to Mr. Tan, Ivy and Criz for this invited review.

Thursday, 11 June 2009

Invited Review - Hot Wok Nonya & Local Cuisine @ Burmah Road, Penang

There are several Nonya restaurants around in Penang. And today I am going to blog about "Hot Wok Nonya & Local Cuisine". I think most of you should have known this restaurant as it was located at Tanjung Tokong and Gurney Plaza before but now has move to a two adjoining double storey pre-war houses along Burmah Road, Penang.
Some overseas reader might not understand what is Peranakan or Baba- Nonya(峇峇娘惹). You can click here for more information. And also here for more write up. If you are in Penang, may be you would like to visit Pinang Peranakan Mansion @ Church Street, Penang to learn more about Peranakan or Baba - Nyonya.
If you run out of time and would like to see some of the baba-nyonya photos and others, you can always drop by Hot Wok Nyonya & Local Cuisine to savour some of the foods and look around at their collections.
Hot Wok Main Entrance
Some of the interiors.......
More interiors photos and HOT WOK has been awarded as the Best Restaurant by Malaysian Tatler Magazine in 1998 and 2004. Furthermore, it was featured in TVB Hong Kong food channel in 2007. You can see photo of Ella Kung (Hong Kong actress), Hugo Man (well knowned Chef from Hong Kong) and Kelyvn Yeoh (Director and Chef of HOT WOK) taken on 9 December 2008.

Some photos..... Hot Wok menu........
After some introduction to the interiors, let come back to the foods.......
Loh Bak
This is our first dish being served for the night. There are several different types of loh bak around in Malaysia as the ingredients use are differ from one to another. And the way where they wrap the loh bak is also another important thing. Some tend to wrap it to loosely while I like the firm type. And the Loh Bak that being serves in Hot Wok suites my taste buds. And find that it tastes very delicious.
Choon Pheah
This is another appetizer that we savour for the night. Some might wonder what is "Choon Pheah"? Well, it is basically spring rolls. If you want something juicy and crispy. This would be your choice.
Hokkien Prawn Mee
When you are around Hot Wok, you will definitely smell this fragrant hokkien prawn mee aroma. Once I was around that area, I can smell the aroma........ And this time round, I have the chance to savour it. ^-^ Well..... I think my gal will love this since it is not spicy at all. Will bring her there one day and try this. While I am doing this blog, she keeps asking me whether this hokkien mee is spicy or not. See..... she is so eager to try. ^-^
Kiam Chai Ark
While we were busy capturing the photos, some of us are eyeing on this soup. As the smell is unbeatable. If you like something that is not too sour you will certainly love this dish. By the way Kiam Chai Ark is Salted Vegetables Duck Soup. For me, I would wish that a bit more sourness will make the soup more perfect for my taste buds. However, I still enjoy this soup too.
Curry Kapitam Chicken and Tau Eu Bak
These two are my all time favourites. ^-^ I personally think that the curry kapitam chicken is not spicy. But it has many varieties of herbs in the curry. The chicken is very tender and succulent. The tau eu bak and the eggs are equally taste nice. Especially the hard boiled egg white. It is very firm. It's just like the way my MIL cook.
Curry Tumis Fish and Pork Cincalok
If you don't like lemak type of curry, then you can opt for curry tumis fish as this curry tumis is more towards the sweet, sour and spicy taste. The curry is served in a claypot which would help to sustain the heat of the curry tumis fish.
Next is the Pork Cincalok. Cincalok? what is that? Some might wonder. Well, it is one of the products of Malaysia. It is basically fermented tiny small shrimps. More details can be obtained from here. The pork is very tender and a bit salty. It is best to go with some white rice.
Or Kuih
Which is also known as steamed yam cake. It is served with sweet chillies, dried shallots, sliced chillies and spring onions. If you love the soft and tender type of yam cake, then this would be your choice.
Jiu Hoo Char and Assam Prawn
I always find that this dish is very hard to prepare since you have to grate all the ingredients into very thinly slice. It is very time consuming. (As I am a very lazy mummy) Many ingredients involve here such as turnips, dried squids, carrots, mushrooms....... It is nice to wrap it with vegetables. It is also nice to go with some rice too.
Next..... the assam prawn....assam means tamarind. So it is basically prawn cooked with tamarind and soya sauce. Although this sound easy but in order to get the right tastes, it is not easily done.
Desserts
What else should we have to wrap up the review? Off course.... the desserts. We are so fortunate to taste not only one dessert but 6 desserts. The desserts that we try are Ice Kacang, Sago Gula Melaka Sago Honeydew, Cendol, Mango Cendol and Sago Nangka. So I am sure that there are some desserts that suit you.
If you would like to try out Hot Wok Nonya & Local Cuisine, please visit them @
124-E & F Burmah Road, Penang
Tel : +604- 2273368
Business Hour : 11.00am - 3.00pm & 6.00pm - 11.00pm
As for Penang Hawker Delights it start from 11.00am to 1.00am
(Closed on Tuesday)
For more details, you can visit their website : http://www.hotwok.com.my/
I personally would like to thank Sally, Kelyvn and the waiter and waitress for serving us for the night and invitation. And I also would like to thank CK Lam for inviting us (food floggers) for attending this event.
You can pop over to other attendee review: Criz from Criz Bon Appetite , Steven Goh, Bee from Buzzing with Food, Allen from Yummy Station, Lingzie from Lingzie's Tummy Treats, Carrie from Cariso Delicacies Corner, Jason and Gill from Gourmet Garden, Alan Choong from All about Penang Food, Penang Tua Pui and Allie from Allie Food Talk.
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