Showing posts with label Mont Kiara. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mont Kiara. Show all posts

Monday, March 23, 2015

The Barn - 1 Mont Kiara(MK) - Wine - Small Plates - Firegrill - A Nice Place to Wine and Dine Review By Best Restaurant


There is a new restaurant in Mont Kiara that was opened just a couple of months ago where the concept is to be able to buy a bottle of wine from the New Wine World (Australia and New Zealand), dine in the restaurant while listening to the Live Band Performance while enjoying the delicious food especially the pork dishes served at the restaurant.


Best Restaurant To Eat was invited to review The BARN @ 1 Mont Kiara which is located at Lot G-2, G-3 & G-26, Ground Floor, 1 Mont Kiara No.1, Jalan Kiara, Mont Kiara 50480, Kuala Lumpur.

The concept of The BARN @ 1 Mont Kiara; in that it has its own retail wine room/shop with a wide selection of wine at one side of the restaurant; where customer can either shop for a bottle of wine or choose a bottle to be consumed at the restaurant for their meal.


The ambience of the wine shop gives you a feel of a wine cellar decor. Customer who choose to consume the wine at the restaurant only need to pay for the service charge and not the corkage charges unless you bring your own wine/liquor.


The BARN @ 1 Mont Kiara is section out; into the main dining area,


a cigar corner with soft sofa settee


with a cigar cabinet that is filled Cuban Cigar,


a bar lounge area with live band music


 an al-fresco area outside the main restaurant


and a coffee and desserts counter i.e. DRIP @ The BARN which serves a special blend of coffee from Coffex. DRIP @ The BARN is open in the morning, so you can grab your coffee fix for breakfast over the counter.


Also, the kitchen that serves the Tapas is based on an Open Kitchen Concept where you can watch the food being prepared and served.


Our food review started with the signature Tapas which is the Bacon Wrapped Sausages - the premium sausages have that bouncy, firm texture and was a good pairing


to the Classic Margarita which was concocted with Tequila, Grand Marnier, Cointreau and Lime Syrup.

 

Next, we had the Crackling Skin Crispy Roast Pork Belly, which uses a secret recipe and technique that ensure the skin is as crispy when roasted while the layer of fats and meat was very well balanced.


With the slight salty taste of the roasted pork belly, it was superbly paired with the


Luis Felipe Malbec (Chile) Red Wine which has a smooth texture and taste.


followed by the Garlic Prawns which was firm, succulent and bouncy. The garlic, herbs and butter taste was of the right balance without being too overpowering each other.


One of the nice things about dining in the Barn @ 1 Mont Kiara, is that they serves a wide variety of Tapas which goes well with the wine, beer or liquor drinks that are served here.


The next Tapas that we had was the Belacan Chicken Wings. The marinate of the concoction of belacan was very balanced where you can taste a tinge of it right to the bone. It was fried until light golden brown and has a crisp skin while the meat was still juicy.


The meat within the crispy surface was surprisingly tender as opposed to tough, which is common for most deep-fried items.


The last Tapas for the night is the Skewered Pork Satay. Here, each skewers of the satay contains a layer of fats and then meat and then fats and meat.


We were quite surprised why it was so: after checking with the Chef, it was purposely set in that manner, so that when the skewered are grilled, the juice from the fats layers will flow to the meat thereby making the meat to have a softer texture and covered with the fat juice to make it succulent. The peanuts sauce has a very strong peanut taste which was good as the dip for the Satay.


For the Cold Cut we had the Barcelona Platter which came with an assortment of premium choice cuts of milano salami, gypsy ham, iberico ham served with mix of olives and balsamic vinaigrette and ciabatta bread.


After our tasty Tapas, we then proceeded to have our main dish, the first of which was The BARN Original Pork Ribs. The pork ribs are cooked till tender and grilled with the BARN special fresh BBQ sauce.


The Ribs was grilled enough to be flavourful without tasting the carbon while the meat was tender and came off the ribs without much efforts. The BBQ sauce also has a smoky, tangy and sweet flavours.


Our next main was the Slow Roasted Pork Belly served with asparagus and Spanish salad mix. The Pork Belly is first roasted and then slowly cooked with Chinese herbs and spices. The aroma of the dish was it has this distinctive smoky aroma.


The verdict: the Pork belly was very tender, while the broth which has a very unique smoky taste was very tasty and delicious. Perfect if eaten with some white rice. It was so good that we finish the broth up to the last drop.


For our coffee fix, we had the AFFOGATO with Kapiti ice cream. The espresso has the right kick and the after taste still lingers in the throat which was matched with the super smooth Kapiti ice-cream, it was one of the best Affogato in recent time that I have tasted.


The coffee machine used in DRIP @ The BARN; extracted out the full flavours from the coffee beans is the La Cimbali - one of the premium range of coffee machine.


For desserts, we had 2 cakes the first of which is the Blueberry Cheese cake,


followed by the Red Velvet.


The Barn at 1 MK - Mont Kiara is truly a place to de-stress; where you can dine or chill with your families, friends and business associates having finger food (tapas) while sipping your favourite wine where you can purchase at their wine shop or liquor drinks in a comfortable setting while enjoying the soothing live number belted out by the live performance.  

Sunday, February 15, 2015

OKONOMI SUSHI RESTAURANT @PUBLIKA Mont Kiara – Malaysia First Custom Made Sushi Roll Review


There are many Japanese Sushi Restaurant in Malaysia, Best Restaurant To Eat was invited to review the first to offer; custom made sushi at OKONOMI PUBLIKA located A4-G2-02 Solaris, Dutamas, No.1 Jalan Dutamas, Publika, 50480 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.


OKONOMI which stand for "as you like" in Japanese key selling point is to provide fresh & premium ingredients for you to create your own Sushi rolls.


First you decide on the type of rice i.e. the brown rice or the white rice. For the healthy freaks you might like to try the brown rice which we did. more of that later. 


Then, you decide the type of maki or Uramaki - Inverted maki where seaweed is inside. 


And lastly the type of wrap which is either the seaweed wrap or the soy wrap.


We first started the review with a salad which is the Salmon Salad.


The Salmon is the smoke salmon which; as usually have a tinge of salty taste and was perfect blend to the garden fresh salad and the mayo based dressing.


For our custom made sushi roll it was an Omakase i.e. we let the chef decide as to the best marriage of his ingredients to be used to make a super delicious sushi roll for us. 


The chef uses the brown rice, with soy warp and the filling of fried prawns, lobster meat and asparagus. According to Chef Alex, the best combination of a custom made sushi has to be a right combination of something firm, something crunchy so that, each bite of the sushi will experience the different texture and taste.


Next, we had the Mandarin Sushi Chinese New Year special which was laden with mini mandarin oranges.


Even the sauce is a special blend with the mandarin oranges and this sushi is only available for this 2015 Year Of Golden Goat Chinese New Year. If you like mandarin oranges in a sushi you better try this.


After the sushi, we took a breather and try a few matcha infused drinks which is Matcha Latte with Soft Serve Ice Cream.


and followed by Azuki with Soft Serve Latte.


and the Matcha Float.


We continued with a snack food named Crab Korokke, It is a tempura flour infused with  crab meat and fried to a crisp with a homemade tartar sauce for dipping.


Next, we had some pasta dishes; the first of which is the Spicy Seafood Pasta. The pasta that the chef uses was the Angel Hair pasta; which are of the fine type which looks like Vermicelli. The use of this pasta ensures that the sauce are easily coated to the pasta.


Please remind the chef on your spicy level as the standard is very spicy though even for me but it was very addicted with the fresh and bouncy prawns and scallop.


This is then followed by the soft shell crab pasta with a creamy sesame based sauce. I love the fried soft shell crab, which was very crisp and flavourful.


After a round of food, it is time for our second round of dessert, the first of which is the Matcha Lovers Parfait, which is elegantly decorated with Matcha IceCream, Matcha Chocolate, Azuki Beans, Corn Flakes, Glutinous Rice ball and etc. Very filling dessert.


and followed by the Chocolate Lava Cake; as a chocolate fan, I find the chocolate cake a little lacking in the true bitter cocoa taste which I adores. 


The Chef mention that he has at first uses a higher concentrates of cocoa but due to the strong taste, many customers find it hard to accept it, so he has since tone down the concoction of butter cocoa to make a milder version instead.


and the last of all the dessert is the Matcha Lava Cake – a truly love affair for Matcha Lover. the strong matcha lava essence was so rich, you almost drown in it. So, at OKONOMI @Publika, it is not just about SUSHI, for Matcha lover, this can be your haven for non stop and everything Matcha.


One of the food that I really enjoyed is the ice cream that are served at OKONOMI; which is in-house made and was very soft and creamy with the right level of sweetness. 


Next time, if you yearn for some specialty Sushi or Matcha desserts, head over to OKONOMI @ Publika Mont Kiara for your doses of this lovely dishes.

Drop a Like On our facebook page BestRestaurantToEat for our latest food adventure.