Authentic Italian Food – Gusto Giusto Italian Restaurant Shah Alam @ Best Restaurant To Eat

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The sheer mention about Italian Food, the first thing that comes to mind, is Pizza and Pasta. I have the opportunity to try out this no frill little cafe located at 25 Jalan Juruaudit U1/37, 40150 Glenmarie, Shah Alam called Gusto Giusto which simply means the Right Taste in Italian.

 

 

This restaurant is owned by an Italian from Sicily and he was very passionate to share with us the Italian family dining experience and henceforth his setup of this restaurant and its menu.

 

The décor is a simple and family like. The first dish was the appetizer.

Antipasto – Italian appetizer. The cheese that was used here was of a subtle taste and I really enjoyed this Italian appetizer. We were served 2 variants of this antipasto.

The olives was also very crunchy and did not have that funny taste like keeping too long. I found out later that the olives that the chef used is soaked with water compared to some which is soaked in oil.

 

 

The first antipasto was quite like a salad tossed with corn, olive, peas, basil and a few slices of buffalo cheese. It is very refreshing

 

The second one, consists of fried tomatoes, olive and multiple pieces of buffalo cheese. If you are that love cheese then this antipasto will make your day. The cheese does not have the pungent smell and taste.

 

Rating 3 of 5

Nasi Sicily – Arancina

 

 

Nasi Sicily – Arancina literally means - Orange Riceball– unique, fried rice ball coated with breadcrumbs. It takes awhile to getting the use to the flavour of this Arancina.

 

 

 

It was a little crunchy and hard at first, but once you start to bite it, it has that hard crunch (due to the frying) that made it a little different. The filling in the rice ball are mozzarella cheese with tomato sauce and some beef.

This dish is not for everyone. It takes a while to find the taste and you either love it or hate it.

Rating 2 of 5

At Gusto Giusto the pizza based is of home made thin crust. I like the cheese that was used in this restaurant as it does not have a strong and pungent cheesy taste. The cheese used are from Australia.

 

 

Margherita – tomato sauce, mozzarella, basil

The most important criteria of a perfert baked pizza have got to be the right timing, as this will decide the fate of the browning of the cheese. Too much it will burn the cheese. the right timing and heat level used will determine the partially burned cheese has a particular distinct flavor of its own.

 

Siciliana – tomato sauce, mozzarella, olives, anchovies

Everything, from the quality ingredients to the super-swift firing in the oven, giving you an experience as close as possible to that you’d enjoy at a Trattoria table in Sicily.

 

Gusto Giusto Special – tomato, mushroom, anchovies, capsicium, beef

The secret is consistency; the base will be beautifully chewy and the topping charred to loveliness, whether you keep it simple with a Margherita (tomato sauce with mozzarella) or dress things up with, say olives, anchovies (Siciliana) or mushroom, capsicum and beef (Gusto Giusto Special).

Rating 3 of 5

A great pasta in this case – Spaghetti – must be perfectly cooked. The use of the right quality pasta is important, cooked to the right texture, the sauce must not be too overwhelming and not too creamy. All play a critical part to ensure you have a pleasureable experience to enjoy the best pasta possible.

 

 

The spaghetti Bolognese was served which a strong tomato base. I preferred the beef version of it as the beef brings out the best combination of taste to match the tomatoes base.

 

Next is the Spaghetti Frutti Di Mar – which means Fruit from the sea – In Italy they do not call it seafood but fruit from the sea. The ingredient used was very fresh. You could taste the crisp prawn and the springy squid mix blended with rich cheesy sauce makes it extremely tantalizing.

 

 

The final dish was Spaghetti Tarufona (truffle sauce). This dish looks very simple. There is no meat and you could only see some chopped garlic in the dish. Before the waiter laid down this dish, we could smell the fragrant aroma of the truffle sauce. I have never eaten spaghetti with this sauce.

 

Truffle oil used to cook this dish.

The first bite of the spaghetti, I was totally mesmerised by the flavour and the smell of it. I was indeed extremely surprised on how a simple dish with so minimum ingredient can taste so wonderful. You definitely want to go for a second helping or a third helping on this dish. If any dish this is the one that made my day.

Rating 4 of 5

It is a great challenge to cook this dish. How the chicken breast is prepared and the cheesy filling can make or break this dish.

 

 

I find that the chef, have over fried the chicken rolls and due to this, the chicken meat was quite tough. The portion of cheese was also too little. Normally, when you cut into the chicken rolls, the cheese will flow out. I find the cheese lacking and basically this looks like a chicken cutlet instead of Chicken Cordon Bleu.

 

 

Although some efforts were used to present the potatoes in a rounded form, to me it is a little too hard. It would have been great, if the potatoes are serves as smashed potatoes with some brown sauce, it will be a great combination. Overall this dish is just a little too dry. The saving grace was the salad that came along the dish.

Rating 2 of 5

 

Mention about real strong coffee, espresso comes to mind. Here, to finish off our meal we tried the espresso. Apparently, the Italian takes around 4 to 5 shots of espresso per day.

 

 I would say the espresso served here is very strong and you could feel the real coffee bitterness flowing down your throat to your stomach. Not many people can appreciate this bitterness. In fact, after 2 shot, I felt very refreshed due to the sudden burst of caffeine intake.

 

 

It was a truly unique experience having our meal here.

 

The must try food is the Spaghetti Tartufona – a unique gastronomic experience for me today.

 

Date of Visit: 2013-08-24

Jang Gun Korean Buffet - Fahrenheit 88 Kuala Lumpur KL Best Restaurant To Eat

Jang Gun is part of the Shogun/ Saisaki Group of Buffet Restaurant and is located at G1 27 01-04, Ground Floor, Ground Floor, Fahrenheit 88, 179, Jalan Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur, Bukit Bintang.

I had the opportunity to have a food review session with the management of Shogun Group of Companies.

Jang Gun specializes in Korean Buffet restaurant. There are more than 200 dishes of dishes ranging from soups Korean, Japanese, Chinese and local dishes. It is quite similar to buffet at Saisaki and Shogun, in that the main differences is the additional Korean Dishes. Price wise, it is quite similar as those in the chain of restaurant.

One of the main additional dishes in Jang Gun is the offering of soup base which you can add to your poached seafood and other condiments (like mushroom and vegetables).

The soup variety that I have tasted are as follow – Buddha Jump Soup – I suppose it means Buddha Jump Over The Wall – Taste wise – Not too bad and it blended well with the poached fresh seafood like shell fish, crabs, prawns and mussels.

The other soup offering which I tasted was Tom Yam, Ginseng Chicken Soup, Kim Chi Soup and etc. Most of the soup offered is a little bit salty.

Korean Snack Food

According to the management of Jang Gun, they have a Lady Korean chef that whip up Korean dishes. I gave a try on some of the snacks for example Kim Chi, hard Boiled quail eggs, black beans, lotus roots, eggs rolls, Korean noodles and etc.

The advantage of having a buffet is you get to try a lot of varieties of these offering. It gives you to opportunity to taste these foods which you will not dare to order if it was on an ala-carte basis. I am not a real fan of Korean snack/ appetizer, so to me it was just a so-so experience.

Here, we had the opportunity to try out some Korean Pancake too.

As with all the other Saisaki/ Shogun Buffet Restaurant, Sashimi is still my main preference when having a meal at these restaurants. Here, you are able to get fresh seafood especially the Salmon and Tuna offering.

I believe the reason being the restaurant is able to purchase in quantity and as the turnover is fast with the number of restaurant, fresh and new stock is available on a frequent basis ensuring the customer gets the best quality.

Among the sashimi offering are Salmon, Tuna, Butter Tuna, Octopus and Prawns.

On the sushi offering, the rice was just normal, nothing to shout about.

We had a unique experience that night as the management was planning to introduce a new product for their chain of restaurant. They call it squeeze-it – A popular frosty ice product originating from Hokkaido Japan.

It is a cold dessert or rather an ice popsicle but in another form. It looks like a cute little ping pong ball which is frozen. They have to massage the ball. The type of massage, to the ball depends on the preference i.e. whether you want to ice to flush out at a fast rate or slow rate. You can also create an art by controlling the flow of the ice, making a mini mountain or etc depending on your creative style.

The way you eat it, is after cutting a small cut at the tips of the so-called branch. Upon cutting, the frosty ice will shot out continuously. All you do, is continuing sucking the ice from the tip and squeezing the ball as quickly as possible. That is how the name Squeeze it comes from. At the end of the process, you will have a sudden burst of the frosty ice shooting into your mouth. A truly very unique experience.

One of the main selling points is that, this ice flavours are 100% based on the fruits extract not artificial flavouring. There are 11 flavours offering Chocolate, Mango, Strawberry, Wild Berries, Premium Hazelnut Chocolate, Premium Banana, Premium Raspberry, Vanilla, Green Tea, Cherry and Premium Yoghurt.

Apparently, you can try this at Saisaki and Shogun Express. Cost around Rm5.90 or Rm6.90 (premium).

Date of Visit: 2013-08-21

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Shanghainese & Cantonese Cuisine at Xia Mian Guan Sunway Pyramid PJ - Best Restaurant To Eat

Talk about Chinese food, there are many choices in town that serves various types of Chinese food, At Xia Mian Guan located OB.K7, Ground Floor, Oasis Boulevard, Sunway Pyramid Shopping Mall, No. 3, Jalan PJS 11/15, Petaling Jaya, Bandar Sunway, it is a new restaurant that serves its version of Shanghainese and Cantonese Cuisine.

The restaurant opened business for in March 2013 in Sunway Pyramid. The ambience and décor is elegant and service were very prompt and efficient.

We sample a few of their Chef signature dishes which I will be highlighting as below. First on the table were appetiser dishes.

Caesar Salad With Crispy Soft Shell Crab. Normally, you would not expect to be served salad in a Chinese Restaurant, more so the Caesar Salad serves here come with Soft Shell crab. Most others will be served with Roasted Chicken or with Bacon Chips.

The sauce accompanied with the salad is a concoction of the mayonnaise sauce and also a concoction of sesame sauce according to the manager. To my surprise, it is quite refreshing with the mixture of boiled eggs and crunchy fresh garden vegetables that goes into this salad dish. Although a little pricier, it is a refreshing start to a Chinese meal.

Price: RM 48.00
Rating : 3 of 5

This Crispy beancurd skin is a very unique dish. Normally bean curd skin filling is either using pork meat with prawns of just fish paste. At Xia Mian Guan, the chef have a different filling recipe.

My first guess, when I took a bite was they were using radish or turnip but a check with the chef, boy was I in for a great surprised, it was a combination of 3 types of mushroom (Black (shitake) mushroom, Enoki Mushroom and Chicken Thigh Mushroom (Oyster mushroom) cut to very thin strips.

What a pleasant surprise and indeed innovative way to prepare crispy bean curd skin.

Price: RM 12.00/8 pcs
Rating : 4 of 5

Different chef have their secret recipe when preparing pork ribs. There is a tendency that the meat of pork rib will be firm and tough. The challenge is therefore to ensure that the right marinate, flavours and timing becomes critical.

I would say that these Deep Fried Spare Ribs Red Wine Sauce ribs were very well marinated. When the dish was serves to us, we could see the glaring shine of the meat and the well covered marinate around the pork ribs. Taking the first bite, the texture was firm and the taste flavourful.

The ribs tasted even better than it looked. Fried to perfection, with the strong Red Wine sauce glaze wakes up our taste buds. The meat was superbly tender too. Can’t help myself to a second and a third helping.

Price: RM 16.00 per ribs
Rating : 4 of 5

At most restaurant bean curd used are usually the one that are purchased from the market. You can order either the normal ones (white) or the Japanese type (yellow). But, at Xia Mian Guan, the chef goes thru a tedious process to prepare these beancurd. These beancurd are prepared fresh everyday.

From the soya bean, it is blended and strain out the juices. The strained juice are then cooked and then added into the tray which, the chef have put in finely chopped spinach at the bottom. The result is the Imperial BeanCurd.

The Imperial Bean Curd can be cooked with a variety of style, but the one that I am previewing here is the Braised Imperial Bean Curd with Crab Meat. The bean curd was very soft and smooth. Couple with the Crab Meat sauce, it really blended very well with the bean curd. This dish is excellent complimentary to white rice.

Price: RM 20.00
Rating : 3 of 5

Many restaurant serves Farm Chicken as a Poached Style with Kai Lan. Here we had the opportunity to try a specially smoked version i.e. Smoked Farm Chicken with Pu Er Tea Leaves. I had the opportunity to prepare Smoked Eggs with tea leaves during my trip to Taiwan and this dish reminds me of the wonderful taste of those eggs and with that taste lingering over me, it will be the benchmark to compare.

When the dish came, I took the chicken thigh, the first impression was the smoky taste followed by the strong Pu Er leaves taste. It was very much stronger than when I did with the eggs, For those, not a tea lover, you will find it a tad bit of bitter tea. I believe the chef have used quite a lot of tea leaves.

The taste is inclined to a bit of saltiness too and make a pleasant dish eaten with white rice. If you have eaten paper wrap salt chicken, you will find this dish similar to that but with a strong taste to Pu Er Tea.

Price: RM36.00 per half bird
Rating : 3 of 5