Invited Review - Haven Delights @ Penang Times Square

Last Saturday, I was invited to attend the review of Haven Delights @ Penang Times Square by Criz Lai. First of all, I would like to thanks Criz Lai and Mr. Ng Boon Tong (Chairman and Managing Director of Haven Delights) for their invitation. And also to all the Chefs and staff of Haven Delights. We are very well take care by them.

Location: Penang Times Square, 77-L1-34, Jalan Dato Keramat, 10150 Penang, Malaysia.
Tel: 604-210 8855, 604-210 8856
Business Hours: 10.30am -11.00pm

I did not took any of the interior photos for this visit as I already took that on my previous visit. My previous visit can be viewed from here. Apart from the  A la Carte dishes, Haven Delights  also serves buffet lunch and dinner.  It cost RM49.90++ per person and whereas for kid is 50% off. You can order from the buffet menu section as many as you could within the time frame of 2 hours from the time you step into the restaurant. Buffet would be open from 10.30am - 11pm daily.

You must be wonder what is this right? Well, it is a questionnaire prepared by Criz for us (Food Floggers) who attend this review. We have to tick on the appropriate box from bad to superb about the tastes and food presentation. Apart from that we can write our remarks (if any) and also overall rating of the restaurant ambience's, customer service, food choices, pricing........

Hotzz Abalone and Unagi Tofu

We started of by having the cold cuts. And we are honoured to try two types of cold cuts ~ Hotzzz Abalone and Unagi Tofu. Hotzz Abalone is basically abalone slices with home made spicy paste and eel sauce. For this dish, it is a bit spicy for kids. However, I find it very appetising.

For Unagi Tofu, the tofu is very silky, like Tau Fu Fah but it is firmer and cold. It is topped with grilled eel and garnished with sweet sauce. Which I found that it tastes nice.

Chicken Ban Ban ~ Rm10

Next, we had Chicken Ban Ban. Chicken Ban Ban is Fusion Japanese fried chicken with egg in chef's special mayo sauce. The Chicken texture is like chicken nuggets texture. It is a bit hard. I prefer the chicken to be more tender. Regarding this dish there are 2 other specialties which are the deep fried egg and the chef's special mayo sauce. The deep fried egg is very crunchy and nice. The sauces are actually mayonnaise, wasabi mayonnaise and Japanese special sweet sauce.

Tip: You should combine all the sauces together with the egg and chicken , that would be fabulous. ^o^

Red Dragon Prawn with Jammy Sauce ~ RM20

When I look at the menu list provided by Criz, I already spotted this dish as Criz blog about this dish before. This dish consists of deep fried prawns, white dragon fruit and jammy sauce. I found that this dish is very appetising as the sweet and sour is well blend together.

Motoyaki Scallop ~ RM14

Grilled scallop with home made spicy mayo sauce. It is a bit spicy for those who cannot take spicy food like my gal as I think the chef put some chili flakes, Tabasco sauce and mayonnaise on top of the scallop. ^o^

Korean Beef Kimchi ~ RM16

Basically the chef fry the home made kimchi with beef slices. The kimchi is very appetising.

Lamb Terriyaki ~ RM18

Grilled lamb with herbs in homemade sweet sauce. Well, I personally enjoyed this dish. As the grilled lamb is very tender, juicy and succulent.

Homemade Spicy Chicken ~ RM15

This is another nice dish that I enjoyed. It is deep fried chicken with home made spicy sauce. From the pictures you can see that they use fermented black bean, curry leaves, garlic, pepper.....

The chicken is very tender and succulent. Love it after the first bite. ^o^ And it is a bit spicy for those who cannot take spicy foods.

Shanghai Honey Spare Ribs ~ RM 18

Basically it is fried spare ribs with honey sauce. However, it is too salty towards my liking.

Chicken Bomb

This dish is not in the menu, it is a surprise dish by the executive chef.Basically the outer part is chicken and the inside of the chicken bomb is grilled salmon with onion, lots of herbs.........

The name is quite creative.......^o^

Tempura Cheese Maki

Hong Kong Special Wan Tan Noodle ~ RM22

The noodle is same as the noodle that I ordered previously ~ Silky Lau Mee. The textures of the noodles is very QQ. Their wantan is is very big. And the taste vice is nice. The soup base is very sweet.

Japanese Yaki Udon ~ RM12

It is basically a stir fry Japanese rice noodles with bonito flakes.

Next...... desserts time.........

We try their home made desserts - Kuru Goma Ice cream (RM8) and Macha Ice Cream (RM8). I have tried both of the desserts on my first visit but without the toppings.

Kuru Goma Ice Cream is black sesame ice cream. It is top with crushed peanuts. It has a strong aroma of black sesame and it tastes sweet. Whereas Macha Ice Cream is a bit bitter with a strong green tea aroma top with red bean paste and mochi. I find that it tastes better with red bean instead of the green tea ice-cream alone. As it balance up the bitterness from the green tea ice-cream.

You can drop by to other attended food floggers website to check out their review and they are:

Criz Lai from http://crizfood.com/

CK Lam from http://what2seeonline.com

Huat Koay and Albert Yap from http://penangtuapui.com/

Steven Goh from http://stevengoh.com/
Nicholas Chan from http://nickchan.net/
Jason and Gill from http://gourmetgarden.com.my/
Lingzie from http://www.lingzie.com/

Allen Ooi from http://yummy-station.com/
Allie Sun from http://alliefoodtalk.com/

Carrie Soon fromhttp://cariso-food.blogspot.com/
Bee from http://buzzingbee.blogsome.com/
Ken Chan from http://www.foodpoi.com/
Rebecca Saw from http://thenomadgourmand.blogspot.com/
Sidney, Sunny and Alex from http://www.bigboysoven.com/

Haven Delights @ Penang Times Square

On Sunday night, hubby bought a Chinese newspaper. While he is reading his newspaper, he saw a new place opening in Penang Times Square and he is so excited and comes and tell me all about this restaurant. And after reading the newspaper, we just realised that they have open since 2 weeks ago and the grand opening is just last Saturday. And since Monday is a public holiday, hubby is so eager to go and try the new outlet.

Haven Delights Interior and main entrance

Menu

Basically the restaurant serves cuisine from Shanghai, Japan, Hong Kong and Korea.

After we were seated, we were served with two menu and plain water. Then we have time to browse through the menu. After browsing through we decided to ask them the section where they indicate the "Buffet Menu". We wonder what is that as it is quite similar to the main menu. Then we were told that the buffet will only start on 20March 2009.

Dear readers,

Please take note that the buffet will start on 20 March 2009 and it cost RM49.90 ++ per person. Their buffet is like "Tao Cuisine" style. You can order from the buffet menu section as many as you could within the time frame of 2 hours from the time you step into the restaurant. Buffet would be open from 10.30am - 11pm daily. ~ Updated 20.04.2009 courtesy of Criz. ^o^ 

***And my advise to my reader is to wait till 20 March 2009 and go for their buffet. ***

We order the following dishes to try:

Endamame

That's my gal "must have" item when she saw it in the menu. However the endamame serve in this restaurant is some what different. As usually they steam and season it with some salt and from my gal, she told me that they season with butter.

Nabeyaki Udon

The next serving arrive is the Nabeyaki Udon. The textures of the udon is ok and soup tastes nice.

3 Cup Chicken

Hubby saw 3 cup chicken in the menu and he asked whether I would like to try it out. I told him, yes...... please go ahead. The 3 cup chicken is very different with the other 3 cup chicken we had before. I find that it lack of the basil aroma for 3 cup chicken. However, the chicken is very tender and yet tastes ok.

Chay Heong Tofu

This is one of the dish that is recommended by the waitress that took our order. I am asking her to suggest some of the "popular" foods that being serve in Haven Delights.

Well...... the Chay Heong tofu tastes not bad...... it is a bit salty if you take it directly. However, it would be nice if it taken with some rice.

Japanese Gyoza

This is another dish that recommended by the waitress too. And it turns out to be quite nice. However, I would prefer them to pan fried them a bit longer so that the outer part of the gyoza would tastes more crunchy.

Scallop Yaki

This is hubby order. He cannot resist to order this. There are only 2 pieces of scallop yaki in a plate. But the scallops are big. It is sprinkle with Japanese dried chillies powder and it tastes the combination of spicy and sweetness. I don't mind to order few plates of this if it is available in the buffet menu. ^o^

Silky Lau Mee

This is another recommended dish by the waitress. It is a very big plate of "mee". And the textures of the noodles is very QQ (may be some might call it silky since it's silky lau mee after all). But it tastes a bit salty for our liking. My gal loves the texture of the noodles and so do we.

Then after finished ordering the foods, I am looking for the deserts section. They have quite number of choices of dessert to choose from. But this time it's another waitress came and do our ordering as the previous one need to do some other stuff so this waitress kept telling me about the ice-cream and also coconut jelly. Then I asked hubby if he want "Mocha" ice-cream since he is the green tea fans. And he said yes and I opt for guru gama ice-cream.

Mocha Ice Cream

When the ice-cream is being serves, our eyes turn "BIG" as it is 2 big scoops of ice-cream. While I ordered the mocha ice cream I was told that they did not have the red bean to topped with the ice-cream for the time being but hubby still want to try.

The verdict is....... hubby don't like it as it is too bitter for him. May be if they topped with the red bean it would be nicer.

Kuru Gama Ice Cream

Well..... I decided to try this as I did not get the chance to try the black sesame ice-cream in ISARIBI Japanese Restaurant. So this is my first time to try the black sesame ice-cream and it has a very strong black sesame aroma.

*** One thing I would like to comment here about the ice-cream. The ice-cream is being served when we about to start our last dish. It would be nice that they serve when we finished our meals. ^o^ ***