Birthday girl…

Basically, we went to KL recently for a short break and to attend the wedding reception on the 18th but since my dear friend, Mandy, would be celebrating her birthday the following day on the 19th, I extended our stay till the 20th so that we would be able to go out and celebrate together.

I told her I would prefer some place simple, not far from the hotel as I would not want to be caught for ages in the horrendous KL traffic…and suggested that we could go to the Muar Restaurant at Tengkat Tong Shin…

…that we had gone to before for some delightful home-cooked cuisine. I understand from a cousin of mine who lives in KL that it is very popular and she also likes the food there…and Mandy herself had been there another time after the first time, bringing her friend from Holland and the friend certainly enjoyed everything there.

Of course, dinner could not begin until I had said grace – “Grace!” Ok…done! LOL!!!

*Mandy’s photo*

The restaurant is well-known for its golden crispy fried egg, the way mum used to do it in the old days…

…and I love their sambal prawns and sotong (squid) with petai (stink beans)…

…which was simply out of this world. Even Melissa who would not touch petai with a 10-foot pole loved it!

I also love their Muar-style otak-otak (fish cake)…

…which is different from the Penang nyonya-style ones.

What the assam (tamarind) fish lacked in appearance…

…it certainly made up for it in taste. It was good and the soup went well with the rice.

Everyone loved the kangkong (water spinach) fried with belacan (dried prawn paste)…

…but not me. It was good but I felt there was a problem with the belacan used – it tasted…well, let’s just say it was different and not as nice and fragrant/smelly as the Bintulu ones that we have in Sarawak so personally I would think that one can have much nicer vegetable dishes fried with the belacan here. Come on over and try if you don’t believe me…or ask my friend in New Zealand. She had that with the midin at Ruby and they literally licked the plate clean.

We also had the butter seafood dish…

…which was nice but it did not get me jumping up and down in ecstasy.

And of course, we had the RM1 cendol for dessert…

– diners who opt for the set dinners would be entitled to have that at that ridiculously-low price.

We certainly had a wonderful time that night – dinner was superb and the company was awesome – the three of us with Mandy and our good friend, Zee. I think the bill came up to RM102.70, if I remember correctly, for the five of us inclusive of rice (6 altogether as Zee had an extra bowl) and drinks – I think that is very reasonable considering that the food was good, service was prompt and things do not come cheap in KL, that’s for sure.

After dinner, Mandy drove us to this place called the Look Out Point at Ampang for the captivating bird’s eye view of Kuala Lumpur by night…

The rest of them scrambled up the stairs to the viewing tower at the peak…

…but I think I will wait till they fix an escalator at the place first. Hehehehehehe!!!!

This certainly was a fitting end to our most delightful break recently in KL – good friends, good food and all. We all had a really great time.