Taste Enclave Classic@Pavilion - Tasting Best KL Hawker Street Food in Pavilion Review

Eating hawker street food have never been more comfortable to me than this. For once, I get to enjoyed some of the few best hawker street food of Kuala Lumpur in a posh and comfortable dining place.

Now you can enjoy all this tasty KL hawker street food without the sweat at Taste Enclave Classic@Pavilion located at located a Lot 2.65.00, 2.67.00 & 2.74.00, Level 2, Pavilion Kuala Lumpur, No. 168, Jalan Bukit Bintang, 55100 Kuala Lumpur.

The dining concept here is a simple modern design, which is brightly lit unlike those hawker place where it is dim and most of the time you don't get to see what you eat. Also at Taste Enclave Classic, it is super clean compared to the dingy places where these local favourites are served.

Taste Enclave Classic @Pavilion brings some of KL favourites and nostalgic hawker fare like Nasi Ayam Singapura, Heun Kee Claypot Rice, Jalan Kayu Prata, Ah Hui Bak Kut Teh, Tong's Roast, Sentul Ah Yap Hokkien Mee, Xi Min Mini Wok and Big Tap & Fruit Juice Bar with an OPEN KITCHEN concept - which you can see the cooking process taken, to cook your favourite hawker fare right before your eyes.

I ordered a very special drink called the Avocado with Gula Melaka. It is a very interesting mix of blended Avocado with the distinctive sweet taste of the Gula Melaka. It is not too sweet and was quite refreshing start for the night.

For dinner, we had the Nasi Ayam Singapura set, which consists of a plate of Steamed Chicken. The steamed chicken was very fleshy and have a firm texture which too me is the most basic requirement for a nice Chicken rice meal.

This is because at Taste Enclave Classic@Pavilion, they use the Choi Yuen (Village) Chicken which, its meat are of a much better quality compared with the normal chicken (farmed and cage chicken) which usually are quite plain taste and soft texture.

Teochew Braised Eggs - this is the Singapore style braised eggs which has its root link back to the teochew style that Singapore is popular for. This is part of the Nasi Ayam Singapura set.

and lastly the Oyster sauce vegetable to complete the Nasi Ayam Singapura.

Then we tried the Roast Duck From Tong's Roast, the skin was crisp and meat was tender yet succulent to every bite. This set is served with White Rice.

This was then followed by Claypot Rice from Heun Kee - The Claypot was filled with Waxed Chinese Sausages, Chicken meat and the Salted fish which is a must for this dish. My suggestion is to mix and eat this rice as quickly as possible, as any delay might cause some dryness to the entire dish.

Next, we had the special Bak Kut Teh from Ah Hui Bak Kut Teh. This is a KL style Bak Kut Teh, meaning it is of a clear soup type, which unlike the Klang cousin, which is of the thick gravy type. For KL version of Bak Kut Teh, it has to be having, a strong herbalish aroma. For my kick of Bak Kut Teh, I usually frequent  a place in Pudu for my fix of this dish and always used that as my benchmark for any other Bak Kut Teh. The version here, although still quite aromatic and flavourful, still lack the total fire power of my favourite BKT.

Lastly, we had the Murtabak from Jalan Kayu Prata. It was a Chicken Murtabak that was nicely done and tasted delicious, when eaten with the curry and dhall that came with it. It was as expected from the outlet although the filling is much more at Taste Enclave Classic @Pavilion compared to the original shop which I had.

Taste wise most of the offering of hawker street food from Taste Enclave Classic @Pavilion are as close as what you get from visiting the individual outlet, but as mention, you dine in a comfortable and classy ambience, that will delight your senses and taste buds at a small premium price.

Read our other review of

Taste Enclave @ Sunway Pyramid Hotel - Bringing Popular Famous Street Food In A Comfortable Ambience

KONTIKI Restaurant FEDERAL HOTEL Bukit Bintang Official Opening and International BBQ Buffet Review

Many of us, probably remembered KONTIKI Pool Side Restaurant in FEDERAL HOTEL which is, strategically located at 35, Jalan Bukit Bintang 55100 Kuala Lumpur in the middle of bustling Bukit Bintang. 

Recently, KONTIKI Pool Side RESTAURANT has a modern contemporary design offering an extensive and specially selected buffet spread with open kitchen concept where you can literally watch the team of chefs preparing your lip-smacking meals right before your eyes.

It has the charms of New Zealand by putting up 2 giant Tiki at the entrance to greet guests to the restaurant with more indoor décor to enhance this theme.

The stylish setting offers a relaxing and refreshing view of the outdoor pool with a lush tropical garden setting. Guest can either dine outdoor beside the pool terrace or indoor.

The interior décor offers a minimalist design which gives plenty of space for guest to move freely without bumping in one another during your frequent trip to the buffet spread.

One of the key interesting furniture is the rattan “love seats” which set the tones for couples to dine in a carefree romantic setting environment. 

One of Its kind - The cylindrical BBQ station 

churning out perfectly grilled succulent meat and seafood.

Under the meat section there are limitless of marinated lamb shoulder, wagyu beef steak, chicken wings and satay to satiate the meat lovers.

While the seafood section for BBQ offers an abundance of Fresh Prawns, Squid, Clams and etc which is a haven by itself for seafood lovers.

Under the BBQ section, there is also pre-roasted/grill meat which includes the Roast Prime Beef, Roasted Lamb Racks With Herbs, Baked Whole Fish Salmon, Roast Chicken With Herbs and etc.

Next, is the Cold meat section which offers a variety of smoked salmon, smoked duck, chicken meat and prawns.

While the Seafood on Ice is a paradise for seafood lovers like me, which includes multi-layers of fresh poached flower crabs.

Mini Lobsters

Crayfish

Mussels

and a mountain of poached prawns is really awesome, all eaten with Thousand Island dressing or a tinge of Tabasco sauce with freshly squeeze lemon juice or just as it is.

Then, in the Japanese Food section which has a sizeable selection of sushi, fresh salmon and tuna sashimi for Japanese Food diners.

This is followed by the Chinese Food section, which serves the delicious General Tso Chicken. 

Fresh from a specially made brick oven, is the BBQ PeiPa Duck, Peking Duck which are grilled to perfect crispy skin and juicy tender duck meat by its Chinese Chef. from the Special Roast Duck Brick Oven.

For the local dish, the KONTIKI Pool Side Restaurant Federal Hotel Bukit Bintang also serves the Tunku’s Abdul Rahman (Malaysia First Prime Minister) favourite dish.

which is Udang Rebus Pucuk Asam.

As there were just too many dishes that are served in this buffet, we did not manage to try out all the other Continental and Asian buffet spreads which includes the likes of Piperade, Potatoes Cheese, Emice of Beef With Wild Trumpettes, Jingha Masala, Palak Paneer, Dal Malani – Black Lentil With Cream, Beef Rendang, Ikan Masak Asam Pedas and more.

For desserts, there were also too many choices to choose from i.e. cakes, puddings, jelly and etc which unfortunately we did not have the stomach to fill it up anymore.

Overall the KONTIKI Pool Side Restaurant Federal Hotel Bukit Bintang new setting offers a pleasurable and cozy dining environment.

So, if you are geared for an evening of abundant of food galore, you can make a trip to enjoy this specially cook dishes. But, make sure you have an empty stomach to fill up all this food.

HOUZ WARMING CAFE @ PUCHONG – Melaka Home Cook Nyonya Food Comes to Puchong Review

What is the first food you think of when it comes to Melaka Food, to many it has to be the Nyonya Food. Well they are many version of Nyonya Food which have gone thru many changes i.e the true blue Nyonya and the improvised version.

We had the opportunity to try out a real home cooked Nyonya Melaka food, which have recently started to operate in Puchong which is HOUZ WARMING CAFE @ PUCHONG located at 5G, Jalan Puteri 1/6, Bandar Puteri Puchong, PUCHONG, Selangor

By the way, the owner cum chef is not a Baba Nyonya, as one might expect but she has mastered the skills of cooking Nyonya Melaka food ever since she was a very young teenager and cooked many simple yet appetizing Melaka specialities. 

The design of the café is a very straight forward, no-frill café that caters mostly to office workers and families around the area. 

One of the Melaka Specialities at HOUZ WARMING CAFE @ PUCHONG is the ASSAM NENAS PRAWN. Served in a clay pot, the entire dish was cooked with plentiful of quality mixed spices, some of which comes from Melaka itself. The use of salted fish adds a new dimension to this dish. 

The pineapple was cooked, until it was very soft and you can taste the pineapple juices which blended to give it a natural sourish and sweet taste. The end effect, the gravy had a strong and distinctive flavour that complemented very well with the Prawns.

This is one of the daily specials from HOUZ WARMING @PUCHONG i.e. this dish is not served everyday on its standard menu. To be able to savour this dish, you probably have to drop by on the days that this dish is being offered only as a daily special set. With a generous serving of 4 medium size prawn and if you are a small eater, this serving can be eaten by 2 person. 

The daily special sets come with a rice, a fried egg and a glass of honey jasmine tea for only RM13.90. Check out what is their daily special as we understand that there are more than 20 dishes on a rotating basis.

Another of the specialty dishes on the daily specials is PATONG CHICKEN CHOP. This dish is a Thai inspired dish. The chicken chop is first fried. The Thai sauce are then cooked and layered on the fried chicken chop.

This sauce is sweet, sour & spicy all at the same time but blended harmoniously. If you are familiar with the Masak 3 Rasa, it is somewhat similar but the use of the condiment here is obvious and gives you a satisfied taste. 

The last daily special we tried was the BUTTERED CHICKEN CHOP, this chicken chop is first coated with batter and then deep fried. The buttery sauce which has strong curry powder and leaves fragrant are cooked with butter and cheese to give you that extra creamy sauce, which is then layered at the bottom of the chicken chop.

Taste wise, it is quite similar to the Butter Prawns taste, which we are familiar with, but with a scent of cheese flavours, and the sauce was thicker and very much more creamier.

After sampling the daily special, we had some ala-carte dishes namely the HOUSE SPECIAL SAMBAL FRIED FISH.

It is a CENCARU fish, which have been deep fried and laden with a generous amount of sambal topping. Although, I find the sambal a little too subtle and light for me, as I am used to the sambal type, which has a very strong distinctive belacan taste with a lot of dried shrimp, for this kind of sambal fish.

Next, we had the ASSAM BANDUNG SEAFOOD – this is quite similar to the Assam seafood or the Assam fish which Melaka is famous for. The differences here, is the chef had added in coconut milk to cook this dish and henceforth the dish is called with BANDUNG – remember our sirap bandung. 

The use of the coconut milk makes this dish more flavourful and a little sweeter and creamier than the pure assam fish dish. You can taste the strong aroma and flavours of the seafood which have been infused into the gravy in every spoonful.

Another one of the special dishes, you can hardly find it anywhere else, is the HAKKA VINEGAR PORK. We KL people are used to the black type of VINEGAR PORK cooked with ginger, which are usually found at Bak Kut Teh stall or during confinement period of the new mothers’. 

But, here is the surprise, instead of the very sourish taste; the vinegar pork is of a sweet type with a hint of spice, as we were told that, they uses a small amount of Assam and dried chillies. Once again, this dish has a light sweet taste from the raddish, a tinge of sourish and a very light spicy taste.

On top of that it uses the white vinegar instead of the black vinegar. It will take a number of spoonful to start to like this dish, as our chain of taste for this dish is the black sourish type, which we are normally associated with.

All, the above dishes are usually found in home cooking and are suitable to be eaten with white rice.

For the noodles, we had their signature PRAWN MEE, the soup was very rich broth of prawns taste. The sharpness of soup was strong, and has the oomph factor. 

Lastly, we were offered the PORK NOODLES SOUP, but we just had the soup instead i.e. minus the noodles. The soup based was of the clear type. The soup was a recipe of over 30 years. They had a shop in IPOH selling pork noodles with this recipe. 

So, if you have a craving for some nice Melaka food, head over to HOUZ WARMING @PUCHONG to give it a try and leave us a comment or two after your visit.