Bunny's Next Step In Life

Another reason why my blog has been neglected is also because Hunny Bunny has tied the knot, planning for the wedding ceremonies, bought a new condo together and changed to new jobs.

Here's a preview of my prewedding photos...

I had a fun time photographing with my close friends at Cameron Highlands :)

Then this one was taken at Frasers Hill...Love the feel there! Wished my Hunny was more cooperative though...

Wedding Dress by Vows nWhite .
Makeup at Cameron Highlands by Grace Wang
Makeup at Frasers Hill by Leric Yap

Jan 2011 Ipoh Trip

I organised an Ipoh Trip by tour van load to Ipoh back in January 2011 and had a blast there. We visited the beansprount farm, Ipoh Old Town, ghost town Papan, Tin Mine Dredge and had yummylicious food at Tg Tualang.

What do you normally do in Ipoh? Eat? Visit old temples? After a few visits of the same things, I got bored and was very lucky to have Winky (an Ipoh hometown outgoing guy) to bring us around. We started by going to his brother's Restoran Kaki Bukit at Menglembu for breakfast. As I forgot to charge my camera, I was conserving battery and didn't take much photos. I really love their homemade kaya...thick, fragrant with pandan, egg n coconut...very delicious with toast!

Next, we went to the beansprout farm in Buntong. It is a cottage industry which runs on a 24 hour schedule as the water soaking the beans/sprouts had to be changed every 3 hours! The mung beans are from Thailand and they are soaked in underground mineral water (I tasted the water and it was clear and had a lightly sweetened taste). During the first stage of soaking till it starts to sprout is very critical and must be handled carefully....no dirty hands must touch it or the beans will not sprout. Once they sprout, the best is found on the top layer and usually each plastic blue tong has 5 to 7 layers (qualities) of beansprouts. Once the sprouts are ready to be harvested, it is sprayed with high volumes of water and then washed to loosen the skin from the beansprouts heads.

Loads of sprouts here...

The biggest and fattest beansprout layer is the 1st layer which is sold to Ipoh's famous chicken rice shops. The 2nd layer is sold to Kuay Teow T'ng and Char Kuay Teow sellers, the 3rd, 4th, 5th layers are to the wet markets and normal customers, the final and last layers will be used as feed to livestocks.

The photo shows what a 2nd layer fatty beansprouts look like...this is to be sold to the kuay teow soup and fried kuay teow hawkers...so nice, so fat, so crunchy, so sweet!!!!

Next, we went to Kong Heng at Ipoh Old Town for lunch and I had my all time favourite Pork Satay and extra special kuay teow soup...

RM0.60/stick...delicious lean pork meat, pork coagulated blood and intestine...super duper yummy fragrant peanut sauce....

Extra ingredients for the Kuay Teow Soup at RM7/bowl....smooth slippery kuay teow noodles, rich tasty prawn and chicken broth with some chives, smooth chicken flesh...really worth the steep price *slurrrps*

After lunch, we adjourned to the Tanjung Tualang Tin Dredge a.k.a. Kapal Korek. I first saw the Tin Dredge was when I read Lat's Kampung Boy comics. To see it in actual life took my breath away. As the Perak Government is poor in promoting their tourist spots, not many people know that the tin dredge is actually available for visitors...We paid RM5/person to enter this historical ship

Although it was sinking but I was in total awe when I entered the ship. Only half of us climbed up this half rusting ship. The others chose to stay on the ground. We had to be super careful climbing up the stairs and walking on the platforms as most were rusty and may not support our weight.

Here are some giant scooping bins that was used to scoop the precious metals along with the soilbed to be processed, sifting out the tin ore....

After a hot and sweaty tour of the Tin Dredge, we continued our journey to the last destination - Tanjung Tualang to enjoy our prawns dinner. We ordered 2 types of freshwater prawns, 1 Guinness Stout spare ribs, 1 Yam Ring, 1 Green Vege and 1 Thai Tofu. All these came to RM25 per person Truly satisfying...

Just done nicely. Sticky, not too oily and Meaty

Tangy, Sweet, Crunchy Thai Style Tofu Salad...a refreshing dish

Delicious Yam Ring with a chockful of fresh vegetables

Dry Fried Prawns...fragrant, tasty and delicious

Loads of delicious Nai Yau Prawns....noms....delicious

Woaah....take a look at this roe rich prawn!!! Super delicious....!

What do you think?? It's well worth the RM25/pax for 9 person!

Bunny Goes to Penang in Aug 2010

It's time to revive my dead blog...*CPRs* the blog....here I am propped up with a badly twisted ankle...can I only settle down to blog.

The Chinese Hungry Ghost Festival or "Phor Tor" happens around the 7th month of the Chinese Calendar and this is when the gates of Hell opens and the ghosts get a month long holiday to roam around. The peak day happens on the 14th day of the Ghost Festival month. If you go around the neighbourhoods, you will Chinese families praying by the roadside or just outside their house gates. By praying, they usually offer food and joss sticks to feed and appease the hungry ghosts passing by and in a way asking them to not disturb the occupants of their house.

I went on a crazy weekend with a few friends to Penang in August for the Chinese Hungry Ghost Festival. It was a 2 day 1 night excursion and the reason being that Penang being a small island and more Chinese-fied is more focused on the dying Chinese arts of celebrating the Hungry Ghost Festival. They have schedules of traditional Chinese operas and puppet shows. The shows in KL and PJ mostly show scantily clad babes performing to appease the more modern ghosts and horny human males.

We stopped at Ipoh's Foh San for brunch but I really have to admit that the dimsum standard has gone downhill. This was my favourite...the Chives Prawn Steamed Dumpling.

We reached Penang just in time for lunch and our guide cum driver took us to Penang Street to have the famous Cendol, Assam Laksa, Prawn Mee (Penang Mee) and Char Kuay Teow. I was pleasantly surprised at how they serve the Prawn Mee. Unlike the reddish broth I get in KL/PJ, this was came in a very tasty clear prawn broth. It was so delicious that we ordered another bowl.

1st Bowl....

2nd bowl

Then we tried the Char Kuay Teow....it was yummy also...

Lastly, we finished off with the Asam Laksa which was served in a clear broth as well...it was very delicious as it was just the right tangy sweet salty taste. What I didn't like was the fish was all minced at the top, I would have prefered some bite-able fish pieces as well.

I can't remember how much exactly they cost but they were expensive for the small servings.

After that, we checked in to Tune Hotel. My recommendation is not to stay there. Although they are clean but their walls are so thin and not soundproof at all. We could hear our next door neighbours talking, the people outside walking on the corridors...u get the idea? Being a no-frills hotel and after all our add-ons, I could just paid an extra RM50 more to enjoy more comfort and privacy at Berjaya Penang Hotel instead.

We rested for a while before meeting some Penang photographers for dinner. They took us to Macallister Lane for delicious Kuay Chap. What is Kuay Chap? They are actually internal spare parts of pig and in this case, duck as well cooked in a broth and served with flat rice noodles...."Kuay" is the flat rice noodle simmilar to Kuay Teow...and "Chap" means mixture of stewed organs or spare parts.

It was like tasting heaven...!!! So delicious and well prepared. You must go around 6.45pm to enjoy this dish and they are usually sold out by 8pm!

Please keep an eye out for this stall and his loads of innards....very delicious...

Such a huge bowl of stewed pork intestines...well cleaned too...

A huge bowl of pig ears and snout....yummy.....

My bowl of kuay chap with duck meat and coagulated duck blood....next time i will just call for chap....I was also suprised that the broth was liquid and not starchy like the ones I ate in Singapore. You cannot find Kuay Chap in KL or PJ...or maybe is because I don't know where to look....

My most favourite dish....a plate of sliced pig ears...non fatty and full of collagen

After such a wonderful dinner, we set off to look for some opera sights. It was my 1st time watching an opera close-up and I was so surprised that it was in Cantonese. Usually, the operas in Penang are in Mandarin or Hokkien. The title of the opera was Golden Phoenix, The Lady Bandit. In short, it tells of a righteous lady bandit who steals from the rich and helps the poor. She meets the incognito Emperor of China who has lost power temporary due to his evil relative. The script was very funny as the performers have inserted modern terms into the script as well.

Here are some scenes from the opera...

We didn't stay for the entire show as we were tired. It was an eye opener experience for most of us.

Next day, we had dimsum in Penang but it was only so-so and cannot be as tasty as Foh San in Ipoh. Here are some of the stuff that was offered from the dimsum trolley.

After Breakfast, we went to Khoo Kongsi. It was a meaningful visit. The Khoo clan house praying place was very meaningful. Each decoration on its wall depicts a moral value story. The paintings of deities on the walls are at least a century old. There were also secret compartments on the staircase for luck and fortune. Too bad I don't own a wide angle lens...it was truly a beautiful sight and I hope to visit there once again.

If you looked properly, there are also Gurkha statues within the walls and surroundings of the clan house. This is because back in those days, they already believe the power of Gurkhas in providing safety to their clan house. There are also carvings of many animals admist the clan house with each character giving a different meaning of luck, prosperity, strength and other good values.

Notice anything different of the picture? There are actually swallow heads embedded in the chinese character

This window has the literal meaning of "Wishing You" .... or in cantonese, "Chuk" - Bamboo; "Fook" - Bat

and next to this window was this carving...which carries the meaning of "Peng Onn" or Peace/Safe Life. "Peng" is depicted by the flower vase and "Onn" means stuck on the wall. So the whole meaning is "Wishing you a safe and peaceful life".

We met Bee Yong and her bf (now fiance) and they took us for very delicious fish head curry and other dishes for lunch at YMCA.

After seeing Bee Yong and Fiance off, we went to Spice Garden and Teluk I-forgot-the-name. After that, we left Penang at 4pm...on the way back, we were hungry and stopped by one of Ipoh's oldest restaurant - Hoong Tho for dinner. The deep fried fish wantans were spectacular as usual and we ate heartily.

Freshwater Prawns Yee Mee. The Yee Mee was delicious as it was deep fried in fresh oil and didn't have that aftertaste of rancid oil. The Prawns were fresh and succulent.

Hoong Tho's signature fish paste dumpilings. Light and crisp and bouncy freshwater fish paste was used.

My favourite "Gui Fa" noodles...I prefer the Yee Mee version more though. This dish was using glass noodles. Full of wok-hei....nice :)

After dinner, we headed back to PJ. It was a nice trip but if I were to do it again, I would opt for at least 3 days 2 nights trip instead of weekend trip.