Dynamic Kitty Food & Places

Dine-in Date: 14th June 2015 The concept of ecology and idea of trying to save & "rescue" more natural resources is getting stronger these days. Not only that some of the places practice the concept of no plastic bag day at Saturday, restaurants or places that focus on promoting a green environment and concept are increasing. As the trend and name imply, Green House by Muir is one obvious place that goes with the greeny concepts.

Suggested by my sister who interested in these type of special idea instead of just plain and ordinary method for an early father's day celebration, my family and I had chosen Green House by Muir as our ideal celebration place for this year's father day.

About Green House by Muir

Many sources suggested that "Green House by Muir" named after the late John Muir, who is a Scottish-American naturalist, author environmental philosopher and a person who inspire and act to preserve some of the national park and forests in that time. I couldn't confirm on the idea that the concept of Green House comes from Muir because Muir could be their founder or designer name, or they can just name it "Green House by John Muir" instead.

As you walk right into the place, you'll see a florist corner on your left and a cafe section on your right. Walk further as you pass by the cafe section, you will see the route map of the place on your right. The creativity part of this place is that it combine multiple different element into different parts. Unlike most of the conventional restaurant that they only have one counter and whatever you need to order, it's all at that one counter. In Green House, the sashimi section, hot section, and bakery rely on one counter. Not sure about the florist, but the cafe counter is different from other section.

Sometimes, it good because the queue is divided to different counter, so the queue won't be too long. The troublesome thing is you need to take out your wallet many times when you purchase different things from different section.

As all of the sections have some gap between them, it feels like you are visiting a new place as you move between each different section. This is basically the seating place for everyone in the inside. It basically kind of like primary school canteen where everyone sit together like a big family annual dinner. It's quite noisy as people talk and the gap between each seat is quite near. You can also choose to sit at the outside. I think the environment is much better out there but it will be bad when the weather is hot out there.

Kuroshio Market - Sashimi Section

Going straight into the restaurant as you passed by the florist and café section, you will see the seating place on your left and the sashimi section on your right.

Sashimi section is divided into sashimi and sushi. The staff will prepare the sashimi for you immediately as you request.

I’m not sure if the seafood above is just for display only or this the amount of stocks they have. I think the display is not really attractive. If only they would place it a little nicer in terms of the position and angle, and try not to make it looks like each seafood so isolated and covered in too much of ice, that would be better.

I don’t plan to try their sashimi for now, and I think the price is a little too over.

The other side of the sashimi contain of well-prepared sushi in plastic box. There is also sashimi in plastic box. If you don’t want to wait for the sashimi and don’t mind about the freshness, you can also grab it from here.
The sushi choices are quite ordinary, and I don’t really see any special type of sushi here. You probably don't really see anything in this Duck Salad. While beneath the bunch of veggie, there aren't really a lot of duck slices. I probably should not complain too much since we have 5 person sharing one thing, but each of us only manage to taste one slice of duck meat, and the rest is veggie. The veggie just taste alright, not too fresh as it look. But good thing is they don't add sauce or anything, so the taste is quite original.

Kuroshio Market - Hot Section

The hot section is just few steps away from the sashimi section and it's just the opposite of the payment counter. This is where you able to get some rice, warm and fried foods to fill up your stomach.

First, you gotta get into the queue and you are free to get some rice and miso soup into the paper box, and then grab some fried food from the available option.

And again, there isn't really any fried foods that attract me. The fried foods are just ordinary type of fried stuff that you can get in any type of Japanese restaurant.

There is nothing I really want to try... so I just grab some foods for the sake of filling up our empty stomach. My apologize for the almost-half-gone Chicken Terriyaki (RM10+ for one fillet), my dad grab huge part of it before I manage to capture a good pic of it.

But well, I don't really have much to comment about this Chicken Terriyaki. The chicken meat is nothing great, not too tough and not too soft, contain a bit of taste because of the sauce but a little dry because it should have more sauce. The needs of sauce is just so that the chicken is not too dry, the sauce itself is nothing great. The portion should be alright if it's for one person. This croquette (RM1+ for each) has thin layer of frying flour on the outer skin, and it filling is quite a lot. Still, it's too ordinary in terms of taste and you can get it from Aeon Big or any other places. The only reason that I would recall this croquette is because it cost RM1 for one tiny piece. Shishamo (RM2+ each) is quite tasty thou. Can taste a bit of salt over it but not too much. And it's quite crunchy from the inside-out. But overall, the price is quite over.... I'm getting 5 pieces of shishamo for 5 person and that costs me RM10+ already.

Evendough Bakery

At the very corner of the restaurant, located behind a small section of selling variety of products behind the cash counter, here is where the Evendough Bakery located. If you didn't look carefully or did not read the route map properly, you might totally miss this section.

Compare to other section, Evendough Bakery is quite small but placement of all the breads are quite well done. All the breads are placed in a wooden box covered with plastic lid. The overall design give a simple and classic feel in a small village bakery shop.

Other than the display look and feel, the bakery has wide range of unique and special bread choices. Upon grabbing the breads you want, the staff will help you to slice the breads into bite size if you choose to eat here. The next thing you need to do before you enjoy your food is to pay at the counter located right after you out from Evendough Bakery.

They actually mix the bread into a plastic box after slicing into bite sizes. And the way they slice it into the average size for each bread pieces is quite well done.

Although it's a little costly compare to the bread out there, but their bread also taste quite soft and delicious. The fruit danish looks tastier than it looks. Topped with some fresh and sweet fruits with some cream in the middle layer of the bread give a nice chewing feeling and taste. Just that the bread crunch is a little too tough.

Evendough Cafe

Apart of sashimi and hot food session, you get to choose breads or cakes and coffee/tea as your snack or dessert. Evendough Cafe is one good option to fill your food craving in case you don't get enough from the main meals and breads, although I don't think you wouldn't feel enough after you consume the main meals and bread.

Comparing with other section, Evendough Cafe is the one that attracting me the most and gave me better impression. Not only because I'm a person who enjoy cafe with nice dessert and good coffee/tea, Evendough Cafe have the standard tools and equipment for coffee and tea making, and they also have their cake and dessert placed at the right place and right way to attract people eyes and seduce the appetite of those who look at their desserts.

Evendough cafe focus more on healthy tea and there is very limited amount of coffee on their menu. The range of tea is pretty attractive as there are many stuff that you couldn't find out there. You can always ask for the staff recommendation if you not sure what to order. Below the name of the drinks, there are short description of what made up the drinks anyway, so you don't need to worry too much.

Due to the cough, I think it's safer for me to go for some green tea drinks. This Mimacha (RM12) is basically matcha with frothed milk. But I can only taste the milk. And it's quite sweet for me. I was expecting some green tea but sadly, there is none of it in terms of flavor and aroma. It's more like a milky cup of drinks. The Cappuccino is pretty plain. Can't say it's good but not that bad. However, I think this Cappuccino is quite failed as it lack of the taste of espresso and milk, the aroma, and the texture that a Cappuccino suppose to have.

Putting All Together

In overall, my suggestion is, if you are going for main meal, either hot food or sashimi, choose either the Evendough Bakery or Cafe as your side, don't take both of them. Otherwise, take only Evendough Bakery and Cafe. Taking both breads and the cafe after main meal could be overkill for your stomach.

Green House...?

I'm just an ordinary citizen who learn the idea of ecology through the public views so I don't know too much about ecology. I might be lacking of the knowledge in this but I actually don't see too much of ecology or greeny idea in this place.

I notice the following that doesn't relate Green House to greeny environment or to be more specific, natural resources friendly, in their practice and place:

1. Paper box for rice, soup, bread, and others. Paper is definitely one of the important natural resources that the people trying to save. The use of paper box for food and soup could be handy for recycle. Although I'm not sure if it's a good idea to recycle paper box (if they are going to recycle it later) that had been used for food and meal purpose, but creating large amount of paper box definitely consume more papers in the long run. Unless they done some good research to prove that using paper box in the long run save more natural resources compare to the conventional method of using silverware.
   
   
2. Wooden spoon & fork. Similar to above. I have no clue on their idea of using wooden spoon & fork for meal. My perception is that silverware is easier to clean with water and water is much more easier to recycle, and in many ways.
   
   
3. Air-con is too cold. Air-con should not be a problem since its really hot out there. But if we are talking about eco-green, air-con contribute into the increase environmental heats which contribute to the higher rises of global warming. To avoid further into the scientific topic, I'm feeling cold from the moment I got to the seating place, and almost got frozen when I'm about to leave. If we are talking about go green, the use of air-con should be controlled. It's hot out there, so it's reasonable that they need to make sure their customers are comfortable in this environment. But it go against the idea of going green with such air-con environment.
   
   
4. Plastic box for sushi. Same concept as Jusco/Aeon that store their sushi and salad in the sashimi section. Since sushi and salad is easier to clean, are they going to recycle it after use? From the surface, this does not seems to be an appropriate go green method.

In summary, I really don't see much green thing in this place other than the table and some of the furniture plus decorations, which seems to be produced using recycle stuff. Talking about places to with go green theme, I would expect a place that able to raise the awareness of people and understand the importance of ecology even more. But unfortunately, Green House by Muir just look like any ordinary restaurant with a name that sounds "green".

Contact & Location

Open Daily:

Kuroshio Market: 11am - 10pm
Evendough Bakery: 11am - 10pm
Evendough Cafe: 10am - 10pm

1, Jalan Nipah, Kampung Berembang
55000 Kuala Lumpur
Green House by Muir's Website: Click Here
Phone Number: 03-2630 6728

Rating

Quality

Kuroshio Sashimi & Hot Section - Average. It's really plain and nothing special. I am, honestly, finding it hard to comment about their foods because everything is just too ordinary in terms of selection and taste.

Evendough Bakery - Good. Some of the breads are quite unique and tasty. For those who are bored of ordinary bread, here could be a good choice to try out new things.

Evendough Cafe - Good. The desserts are really appealing and looks good. What's more, the taste is actually quite good too. Some of the desserts are quite special which make me want to try again. But I guess they need to improve on their coffee.

Portion

Kuroshio Market Sashimi & Hot Section - Average. For the hot section, the portion of rice with some meat, and a miso soup can fill up your stomach but if you intended to try out other sections, you need to eat much lesser on this section, best without the rice and miso soup.

Evendough Bakery - Good. Not the ordinary tiny piece of bread like out there, most of the breads are quite big with nice filling. Much recommended to take it for breakfast or tea time. As taking it after some heavy meal will be quite over.

Evendough Cafe - Good. Again, if it's for sweet delights or light meal, the portion will be good. But taking it after main meal is quite over as the desserts are quite sweet, and the coffee & tea is quite full and sweet as well. Dessert and the drinks is more than enough to make you feel stuffy. So you really have to know when you suppose to enjoy this sweet delights and when not.

Cost

Kuroshio Market Sashimi & Hot Section - Not Worthy. Most of the food is quite over priced especially the sushi and some fried stuff while the quality is not meeting the cost expectation. Many other places have better taste than the fried foods while the prices are lower.

Evendough Bakery - Worthy. Although most of the breads are quite costly but looking at the perspective of portion and specialty, you may consider it a special treats once in awhile.

Evendough Cafe - Worthy. For desserts in overall, prices are consider average, Same goes for the drinks. It's the average type of cafe that you can expect.

Environment

Average. It will be great if the environment match their name, but expecting something out from their name and then visiting the place to experience how the place really is kind of bringing down lots of expectations. That said, name of the business and how it convey the invisible message to the customers has a strong impact to how well people feel about the business.

Back to the layout of the place, having multiple sections in one place is kind of new but it still boil down to variety of problems: customers need to go to different places to put their order and pay at different places. It won't be a problem if you don't mind walking to different direction at one time to take the food, pay at the designated counter, walk back to your seats to put down your food, and repeat it for another section. Furthermore, the location of the seats kind of forcing you to go different directions instead of getting your main meal, bread, dessert & drinks at one go. This type of layout can be really creative but doesn't seems to cater for several issues for the comfort of the customers.

As for the seats, it's either you sit down together with a large group of people in the air-con place, or sit together with few of your friends out there in a hot or not-so-cooling environment. How bout a little bit of own space for couple in a slightly comfortable and cooling place? Nope, there isn't any.

Service

Average. There isn't much staffs around other than staffs at the payment counter and cleaning staff. The staffs at the payment counter is quite polite. Just that they need some improvement on English speaking. The cleaning staffs only do their work when they see people done with their food. Other than that, I only see them walking around and looks pretty bored.

By the way, I was away from the table for awhile and when I'm back, my mom said that the cleaning staffs cleaned our finished food including my hafl-finished Mimacha.... that's pretty bad.

Next Visit?

Distance is a huge issue, plus I don't really have much business around Ampang area. Anyhow, the only thing that giving me the reason to go back is their desserts and teas. I might think about it when I have convenient time and transport for that.

Dine-in Date: 27th May 2015

About Olive Garden

Olive garden originally started as a restaurant in Orlando, located in Florida, United State. The business started operation in year 1982, and gone through a lot of changes and refinement after getting years of feedback from their customers worldwide, as well as replacing their chiefs to produce meals that has better quality and give much high customer's satisfaction.

The specialties of this restaurant is Italian style. As usual, spaghetti is the main core that keep the Italian's business "Italian". Apart of that, they are proud of their risotto, chicken....and so much more that have good reviews over the internet. You can have it as breakfast as they offer soup, salad, and coffee; have it for lunch or dinner as they offer spaghetti and steak; or have it as tea time or dessert with some mouth watering cakes.

Olive garden is not really suitable for ordinary dine-in mainly because of the price, comparable to other classy restaurant like Italiannies. The first Olive Garden in Malaysia don't have excellent & high class environment as seen from the outside & inside (subjective to personal thinking, somehow) and the location is at pretty "corner" place that not many people passing by, not sure if this is considered as their strategic location but apparently, their food quality is undeniably a main factor that could attract the customers, as long as customers tasted it & love it afterwards, and affordable for the prices for any special dining purpose.

Savory experience begins...

After uncountable months of waiting for some new things to taste for in Mid Valley or The Gardens, finally our long wait is over and the Mid Valley's Olive Garden started operating in 25th May 2015, Monday. But due to work issue, I can only get to dine in at 27th May 2015, Wednesday.

Not sure if it's just me, I'm quite surprise that I don't see many people dining in this new restaurant.

Arriving at the restaurant, the staffs greet us with a warm welcome to introduce us their menu. They have some smaller menu in case you want to bring back to examine and decide what to have next time.

The staffs are extremely friendly. They bring us to our seats, give us the menu, and recommend something to us knowing that we are not familiar with the food there. They also tell us their all time offer of ordering a main meal, you get a free refill soup or salad. Repeat: FREE REFILL SOUP.

Their menu don't have too much of varieties. It's basically appetizer, spaghetti, steak, dessert, and beverage. The special thing about the beverage is they have mocktails.

Upon decided what we want to order, the waiter was waiting beside us so we could quickly make our order. Again, the way the waiter treat us is really polite when taking our order and repeat our orders with a thank you.

The first thing that arrive in our table is the soup with the bread sticks. I order Pasta e Fegioli which taste like Borsch soup, or in Cantonese we call it ABC soup, but this is has much salty taste and some pasta with other stuff inside. You are free to add more cheese into the soup if you want. I added a little, not sure if that's the thing that cause it's saltiness.

My darling order this Chicken & Gnocchi which taste like mushroom creamy soup. This one is not too creamy and taste just good. Not too thick, not too creamy or milky, taste good with some chicken and potato inside.

This bread stick is one of their signature and served to us along with the soup. The bread sticks is extremely good! The bread itself is a little hard, but the taste in the inside is really nice and you can feel the great taste in every single bite. With some cheese or salt on top of the bread, the bread is a little salty but it's really great while eating with the soup. I prefer the Chiken & Gnocchi soup with the bread.

Not long after the soup and bread sticks are served, my Cappuccino (RM8.90) has finally arrived. It's a little unexpected because I didn't encounter Cappuccino with so much cream on top. It's just taste fine, not a cup of Cappuccino that taste that great.

And finally, our main meal is served after some wait. My darling did a bit of of research so this is what she decided to order before she step into Olive Garden: Shrimp Aglio Olio (RM28.90). The overall taste is quite... spicy. The shrimp has a lot of taste from salty, spicy, herbs.... and keep going here and there for every single bite. In short the shrimp really has lots of taste. The spaghetti taste good. Nice texture, not too thick or hard, not too oily, taste just great. Just that the whole thing is quite spicy. The Chicken & Shrimp Carbonara (RM35.90) is perhaps the best meal we had this time. The chicken meat is really soft and tender, while mixing with taste of some herbs or some of their ingredient. The chicken meat pieces is not that much, but also not that little, and it's quite big. Next up, the shrimp is also really big! And it's really fresh, crunchy and well done. So it's really nice to bite and taste great mixing with other ingredients.

Dine-in Date: 3rd September 2015

Both of us got a taste of how "cheesy" their meal could be. So we are going to get something lighter hoping to get another savory pleasure again.

The appetizers in the menu has been calling for us since our first visit. Well, we decided to give this a try and we got Shrimp Fritta (RM 16.90) with butter sauce. Its portion is really small but the taste is awesome! The shrimp itself is really soft and chewy. The outer skin is lightly fried and added more biting taste for the shrimp. When mixing with the sauce, it create lovely sour and salty taste. But despite it's awesome taste, I think it's worth less than RM16.90. Seeing so many people ordering for their house salad, I'm wondering if it's because their house salad is really nice or their soups are not preferred choice of the customer. Since we tasted their soup before, we decided to get a taste of their house salad this time. We order for a main meal, so this house salad is free.

The portion is really light but you can ask for a refill if you want more. The veggie taste nice and really fresh, just lacking of varieties like any ordinary salad you could find out there. I'm not sure what type of dressing it has. I couldn't taste much of the dressing especially after we asked for some shredded cheese on the salad.

As a comparison between soup and salad.... I would say both has its own pros and cons. But I think it's mainly depend if you want to take hot or cooling stuff. For their main, I picked Smoked Mozzarella Chicken (RM 28.90) because I know their chicken dishes are really good. And honestly, I miss the Chicken & Shrimp Carbonara a lot.

The spaghetti is quite soft and chewy. As expected for a good quality spaghetti in Olive Garden. The mozzarella sauce taste good but feel slightly watery. Perhaps this is how the sauce suppose to be. But I prefer it to be less watery, maybe a little creamy, and with more taste. The chicken meat did not failed our expectation. Really soft and tender for every bite, it's not something that you can easily find out there. If you are looking for tender chicken meat, I would recommend this one.

I know I shouldn't but..... I wish to have more chicken meats on this dish....

For the dessert that we wish to taste since our first visit, we order Almond Tiramisu (RM 6.80) which is a Dolcini, literally means small cakes or dessert in Italian.

Nothing better than this little dessert after some main meals to finish your meal with sweet delights. Topped with crunchy almond bits on the top of sweet & creamy Tiramisu, the combination give a superb mixture to create great sinful taste. With its espresso-dipped biscuit on the bottom of the dessert, you can still taste the sweetness of the espresso and add great aroma into the sinful taste when you sink your teaspoon further down.

If you enjoy sweet dessert a lot, this is a must try. I think the price is quite reasonable for its portion and taste, as many other places would charge more than this price.

Contact & Location:

Monday to Sunday: 10am - 10pm

Olive Garden's Website: Click Here
Olive Garden's Facebook Page: Click Here
F-051, First Floor,
Mid Valley Megamall,
Lingkaran Syed Putra,
Kuala Lumpur, 59200

From first floor of center court, walk towards the direction where you can see Krispy Kreme or the escalator to ground floor. To reach Olive Garden, walk pass Pancake House and Watson. You will see Olive Garden as you past Watson.

Rating

Quality

Good. For a classy Italian cuisine, most of the foods are quite good and well done. Perhaps the drinks need a little improvement.

Portion

Nice. The cheese and stuff ca be quite stuffy. You might fall into the trap of cheese overload when they ask if you want extra cheese in your meal. That's up to you anyway. Other than that, their portion is quite big and quite full. You just need to be careful for the extra cheese.

Cost

Worthy. Typical Italian cuisine with great taste, and typical price like you can find out there. At least the foods taste good.

Environment

Nice. Classy type of Italian restaurant with some foreign taste. There are also some sofa if you prefer. But overall there's nothing too great about the environment.

Service

Excellent. Serving the food takes some time. But the staffs are really friendly and well mannered. You can ask for recommendation or if there is any food you are not familiar with, they will explain to you really well.

Next Visit?

Good for a classy and great Italian cuisine, just that the pricing is an issue. Can try out for their snack and dessert during the afternoon thou.

Dine-in Date: 25th March 2015

Pick from the third cafe in my first batch of cafe hunting list, Acme Bar & Coffee (I will refer as Acme on below), or ABC cafe, is my second favorite place to go. It would be my first if it's nearer and not that far away, plus the cost is a little higher compare to average cafe out there, but everything is quite worth it once you know why.

About Acme Bar & Coffee

Acme Bar & Coffee is an extraordinary place that doesn't seems to belong to KL city once you step inside, because it's just too special like some really high class place inside while the surrounding of the cafe is just plain ordinary street in KL.

One obvious thing that the founder of Acme put unspeakable amount of efforts in this cafe is the environment, design, atmosphere, and feeling in the cafe. It's like you are stepping into a house constructed with elegant decoration and everything is so well arrange that you wanted to spend at least half a day there, no joke. This is, after all, the outcome of the founder traveling to many different countries and places in Pacific Northwest to visit absorb varieties of design in the cafe.

The high end glass wall is one very trendy design for those who want to have a feel that they could see the world out there, and Acme has it. Although the outer side of the cafe is just plain KL road, but some trees and the outer part of Acme (which is also available if you want to sit outside, but not so recommended because it's quite hot during day time and it's near to the road) block most of the KL road view, so all you could see is some trees and sunlight.

Acme serve a wide range of food which you might thought that they are probably western style.

Apart of serving ordinary cakes and coffee, Acme also serve variety of wine which is one of their specialty. Unfortunately, wine is not covered here because I'm not opt for wine at the moment. Although the wine looks pretty attractive on the menu.

You can read the full background story of Acme Bar & Coffee here

Dining in the Elegant Acme Bar & Coffee

It was a hot day, really really hot... I sweat a lot just because of less than 10 minutes walk from Ampang LRT station to The Troika.

As I got into Acme, the waiter pleasantly greed me with a smile and show me the seats. He also suggested that it's quite hot (probably he saw me sweating too much) so I should sit inside, where the air cooler is. So I sat down on one part of the cafe and were so amazed of the environment of Acme. It's so great that I almost forgotten that I need to make my order.

The design of the food menu is nothing fancy, but it's consist of special food that you have a hard time to find out, as well as some food that you familiar with so that you can at least something you are okay with.

When I'm still studying on the menu, I got served with a cup of cold water with ice. That really save my life and, again, I'm quite impressed of how caring the waiters are.

So here come my dessert, Raspberry Tiramisu (RM19). The mascarpone is quite creamy, and the taste is quite smooth and not too over. The only thing is, it get watery really soon before I manage to finish it. The chocolate stick and icing sugar is nothing fancy but make the tiramisu not too dull. The raspberry on the top and also inside the mascarpone quantity is just right and not too much, else it might cover most of the mascarpone. The cocoa powder is a little too much, but overall it has great taste and nice appearance.

This Ice Granita (RM15) is the only beverage that caught my attention due to the extremely hot weather out there. It's listed as Fruit & Ice Granita, it has variety of fruits for you to choose from which are watermelon, lychee, mango, raspberry, mix of tropical fruits, & melon berry. You can only pick one of the listed choices.

Initially I thought it’s a mix of every fruits type listed there.

Well, it's basically an ice blended drinks with your chosen fruits.

It’s really refreshing especially surviving through a fiery hot weather, but not so worthy for the price because it’s just a cup of ice blended fruit juice. Another nice and smooth Cappuccino (RM13) I had tasted so far. Two pieces of biscuit and cubes of brown & white sugar are served along with the Cappuccino. I didn’t use any of the sugar cube so I not sure how sweet it would be if adding extra sugar, but in this way I could taste the original Cappuccino flavour, which prepared really well between the coffee & milky taste.

Contact & Location:

Mon - Thu: 11:00 am - 12:00 am
Fri: 11:00 am - 1:00 am
Sat: 9:30 am - 1:00 am
Sun: 9:30 am - 12:00 am

Ground Floor, The Troika,
Persiaran KLCC,
50450 Kuala Lumpur.
Acme's Website: Click Here
Acme's Facebook: Click Here
Phone Number: 03-2162 2288
E-mail: mailbox@acmebarcoffee.com

1) Public Transport

Ampang LRT station – After exit from Ampang platform, head to the right escalator which will lead you to the opposite side of Ampang Mall. When you exit from the LRT station, you will see Alliance bank opposite the road. Walk to the left and turn right at the first road on your right, Walk for approximately 5 minutes until you see The Troika building on your right. At this point, you are The Troika Block B. You have to walk straight and turn right when you see a small sign to The Troika Block A. Walk straight a little further and you will see Acme.

From KLCC – Look for Melur & Thyme restaurant and exit from the entrance right beside it. Cross the road to reach the opposite side, you see a route to go straight. Walk for approximately 10 minutes, at the end of road, you will a mosque on your right, follow the road and keep walking on the left side. After passing by a building that look like a condominium, you will see Acme soon on your left.

Other Facility

Payment type: Cash and Credit Card
Wifi: Not sure
Power Cable Availability: Not available
Smoking Area: Yes

Rating:

Quality

Good. Although it’s not top grade when comes to taste, but the ingredient used in the food is really fresh and great. Mixing them together also create a great taste.

Portion

Good. This is only for their dessert, and I could say it’s quite good and you don’t feel too stuffy after a proper meal.

Cost

Worthy. Some of the foods or drinks don’t really worth the price, but some others do consider quite worthy.

Environment

Excellent. I wish I could rate something far more than excellent.

Service

Excellent. The moment you enter the café, you will be served. The waiters/waitress are also really friendly when leading you to your seats. Food arrival time is really short too.

Next Visit?

Whenever there's a need to enjoy some savory meal in an excellent environment, especially in any special events or occasions.

Dine-in Date: 6th May 2015

It had been months since the opening of first Malaysia Tim Ho Wan at The Gardens, and it has been such a long queue for a long time that it's almost impossible to queue up to eat there. Anyway, today me and my dear dear decided to try it out and there isn't any queue at all during dinner time. The queue was ridiculously long in the beginning but nowadays, you basically don't need to worry about the queue at all.

About Tim Ho Wan

"Tim Ho Wan" is a direct translation from Cantonese which literally means "Giving good luck". It's originally started as a small dim sum shop in Hong Kong and expand to oversea at year 2013. Obviously, Tim Ho Wan's specialty is dim sum, but they are famous for the pork bun and many more.

Tim Ho Wan is also the cheapest michelin star restaurant you afford to eat although it's more to dessert in Chinese style.

The Food

So here goes the menu:

There's no need to flip back, this is all the available list of food. As you can see, it's quite limited and nothing much to make us full. That's what we thought before we order (and we were so wrong).

You have to write down which food you want in an order list and give it to the waiter/waitress. And we realize there are few more food not listed in the menu above which is "hor fun" (some type of white noodle), egg tart, and another one that I don't really remember. But basically that's all they have.

So we proceed to order the few things we want to try and thinking to order again later if not feeling full.

First item to arrive at our table is their specialty pork bun which is very different like any pork bun out there. The outer skin is crispy but after you take a bite, you can taste the softness in the inner skin. And it has a great taste of butter on the skin. The pork meat is really fresh, juicy and tasty. The only thing is, the center of the bun consist about 80% nothingness.

Next thing to arrive is the egg tart, not listed in the menu but recommended by chef. The skin is very soft and nice to bite, and the egg filling is so nice. But I prefer it to be more sweet.

This beef ball is a bit tasteless, but the beef is really soft and juicy. The only thing I could taste as I bite on this is the green color veggie or leaf, but I'm not sure what is that.

I'm a big eater, so I still need some rice to call it a proper meal. This is one of the three meals that has rice, and it's quite special because I never had beef wrap with egg before. But when it was served, the egg is just on top of the beef, with about a cup of steam rice on the bottom. It's actually nothing really special, just steaming the rice, then adding the mince beef on top, follow by the egg.

The waiter add quite a lot of soy sauce on top of the egg, but it's not as salty as I thought because the egg and beef is actually tasteless. Despite adding lots of soy sauce, I don't really taste anything for the egg. I can taste the soy sauce in the beef, and the rest of the soy sauce is all in the rice.

When I'm half way finishing the rice, I can feel that I'm quite "jelak" or stuffy, not sure what's the word. And my dear dear taken two of the beef ball, one and half of the pork bun, and one egg tart, and she's actually really stuffy.... have a hard time finishing the rest of the food.

And lastly, this is one dessert that is quite nice in many places but quite hard to find (or I just not sure where to find). It's like jelly but has slightly harder texture. The name is "Tonic Medlar & Osmanthus", it's basically osmanthus with goji berry. Osmanthus is a famous flower in China and has good meaning behind it, you can read more about it here. The taste is a little sweet, with the fragrant of osmanthus flower and taste of goji berry. It's acutally quite good for the eyes.

In Summary....

In the end, my dear dear only had two beef ball, one and half pork bun, one egg tart, few spoon of the egg & beef rice, and one & half osmanthus dessert, and she felt really stuffy. Same goes to me as I finish the rice and the rest. Not to mention that we don't need to order additional food, it's actually just enough to make us feel stuffy, but not full.

In overall, I think the food are nice, but there are much more nicer one out there that doesn't cost this much.

Contact & Location

Monday to Friday: 11am - 9pm
Saturday to Sunday: 10am - 9pm

27-G, The Boulevard,
Mid Valley City,
59200 Kuala Lumpur

Tim Ho Wan's Website: Click Here
Tim Ho Wan's Main Facebook: Click Here
Tim Ho Wan's Malaysia Facebook: Click Here

Tim Ho Wan is located in the center of Mid Valley and The Gardens, right in front of The Gardens water fountain that located in front of The Gardens center entrance.

If you are going from inside of Mid Valley, go to the center court at ground floor and walk towards the entrance The Garden. Go straight, walk pass starbuck on your left, cross a small road and you will see the fountain and Tim Ho Wan on the left.

If you are going from inside of The Gardens, go to the center part at ground floor and walk towards Coffee Bean, the opposite of Hans Room, to get outside. Cross a small road and you will see the fountain in front of you and Tim Ho Wan on your right.

Rating

Quality:

Nice. In overall, despite Tim Ho Wan is a restaurant with Michelin Star, we think that the food is just fine, not the type that we would consider them to be too grand or luxury. The main thing is, we know that there are a lot of better options out there compare to this one around Kuchai Lama or Sri Sentosa. Furthermore, certain dishes is a little tasteless and not meeting expectation.

Portion:

Nice. Good for dessert time after some not-so full meal. But for the food to be so stuffy, you have to make sure you don't take it after a full meal.

Service:

Good. Food served without waiting too long, refilling Chinese tea is quick. In overall it's good service.

Cost:

Less-Worthy. Most of the dishes are quite expensive comparing despite their portion and taste. And if you compare with the same type of dishes out there (couldn't help comparing with other places, there are too many good options out there), Tim Ho Wan is that cost worthy.

Environment:

Good. Typical Chinese restaurant with better & comfortable environment.

Next Visit?

....Nope.