A Japanese High Tea Affair @ Kissaten, Jaya One

After months of full-force preparation for my examination, I can finally be back to writing about the things I love - food & eating!

To celebrate that, KS brought me to a Japanese-style high tea at Kissaten @ Jaya One.  I always know Kissaten for its Teriyaki Pork Burger and Char Siew Pizza, but never did I know they do serve high tea too.  So, being a fan of all things called high tea, I had to try it, which turned out to be a worthy experience.

For only RM 58++, this entitles two person to a variety of Japanese-infused sweet and savoury treats, accompanied by a choice of two beverages (coffee, tea or milk-based drink).  For this price, it seems pretty reasonable.

The bottom tray (clockwise):  Tamago Sushi Sandwich, Salmon Sushi Sandwich, Smoked Duck with Bacon, Pork Belly Bruschetta, Tsukune Meat Balls with Teriyaki Sauce & Tuna Tart.

The upper tray:  Poppy Passion Jelly, Rosella Jelly, Mocha Butter Cupcake, Japanese Cheese Cake, Coffee Panna Cotta, Green Tea Parfait & Eggmushi.

Time to taste!

I started off with the mini Tuna Tart.  The buttery tart shell is filled with a lot of tuna mayonnaise, which is very light in taste.  What I liked about the tuna mayonnaise is that although it has been mashed and combined, you can still feel some chunkiness in the tuna mix and hence, the natural sweetness & juiciness of the tuna meat.  It just makes you feel like you're eating some real, fresh food.

While I was eating the Salmon Sushi Sandwich, which I find has nothing much to shout about, I was distracted by KS who keeps telling me how nice the Tsukune Meat Balls are.  Tried it myself and I totally agree - it was really good.  Looked ordinary and a little unappealingly dry, these handmade meat balls are very juicy with a lovely, crispy crust on the outside.  Drizzled with their sweet BBQ-like teriyaki sauce, they make a lovely yummy snack.

The Tamago Sushi Sandwich, like the salmon sandwich, was also mediocre.  I think it could be partly because we started off with the more flavourful treats first, which sort of spoiled our expectations for the remaining ones.

For the Smoked Duck with Melon, unfortunately, we have a pretty weird feeling to it - not because it tasted bad.  Something seems to be missing, but we just can't pinpoint what it is.  Somehow, the smoked duck just didn't really blend well with the sweet honeydew and the overall combination was a bit too wet.  They are good on its own though, but definitely not as a pair.  

Then comes the Pork Belly Bruschetta - thinly sliced pork belly dressed with a fragrant sesame-based sauce topped on a toasted sliced baguette.  Oh, I love the complexity of the flavours in the sauce - a bit of saltiness and acidity, with a final kick of the nuttiness.

I think the most interesting piece of the whole afternoon tea set that will catch almost anyone's attention would be these cute and adorable savoury egg custard served in eggshells.  Eggmushi, they call it - well, technically, you can't call them chawanmushi when they are not steamed in a tea bowl.  They may be tiny and have very simple ingredients (only egg and mushrooms) but they are bursting with flavours.  Although the texture was far from silky, every spoon of the juicy egg custard was so good.  Wish there were more of it.

After finishing a series of savoury treats, we started off the sweet treats with the refreshing Poppy Passion Jellies and Rosella Jellies.  Served on mini cupcake cases, these tiny jellies generally are not very sweet while the fragrance of the ingredients they have put into (the passion fruit and rose petals) gave a nice palate cleansing effect.  For me, between the two, that hint of tanginess in the passion fruit jelly was my favourite.

Green Tea Butter Cupcake - I love this piece of dessert the most.  From the top, it looks like any ordinary butter cake, but as you eat into the cupcake, you'll discover the hidden green-coloured portion, which has been combined with green tea.  A good butter cupcake, I must say.

If you're a big fan of green tea, then you should not miss the Green Tea Parfait.  This smooth, creamy dessert is heavily flavoured with a lot of green tea powder and hence, there is a slight hint of bitterness.  But I liked it, very much.  It's like a concentrated dose of green tea essence, spoon after spoon.

Another dessert is the Coffee Panna Cotta topped with some crumbles.  As opposed to the intense flavour of the green tea parfait, this is slightly less outstanding due to the mild coffee flavour.  It is still nice, though.

Then, lastly is the Japanese Cheese Cake.  I'm not sure if it was because I was already full to the brim, but the taste of the cheese in my mouth somehow turned me off completely.  However, judging from KS expression after he had his first bite of the cheesecake, I was pretty sure it was good.  Definitely very cheesy.

For drinks, I went with a hot cup of Matcha Au Lait - a light milk flavoured with green tea powder.  I quite love this green tea milk as it is not too creamy or powdery and very gentle on the taste-buds (and my digestion).  Plus, there is a hint of sweetness that is just not too overbearing.  Some may find it a bit diluted, but for me, it was just nice.

KS ordered coffee instead.  I barely had much of the drink as KS was very quick in finishing the coffee.  Based on just one sip, the coffee is not too bad - quite bitter at first sip but soon leaves, in my opinion, a nice nutty aftertaste.

Overall, I will give my thumbs up for this Japanese high tea at Kissaten because they looked fantastically appealing and tasted great.  Well, at least, they did a real good job in brushing away my post-exam blues.

Kissaten

L12A-1-1, Palm Square

Jaya One

Jalan Universiti 

46200 Petaling Jaya

Tea with a View @ David Brown's Sky Terrace, Penang Hill

It's been years since I last stepped foot on Bukit Bendera (more commonly known as Penang Hill), that I could barely recall how Penang Hill looked like.  Although I come to Penang on an annual basis for Qing Ming Festival, but we hardly could find time to take a ride up given the tight schedule.  This year, however, we decided to extend the annual visit a little longer so that we could re-visit Penang's golden gem again.

I must say, for the very first time, I realized how nicely managed Penang Hill is.  Totally impressed with the smooth ride on the nice air-conditioned train coaches.  I actually thought this was something I could not find in Malaysia - well, Penang has proven me wrong.

Anyway, back to the topic.  Right after alighting at the upper station of Penang Hill's funicular railway, I was feeling a bit hungry.  Since it was also time to feed my hungry, little niece, I suggested to find a spot to have some snacks.

So, just a few minutes' walk away from the upper station, there is a stairway that leads you up to Strawberry Hill.  Founded by the very same person who made Smokehouse a popular landmark in Cameron Highlands, David Brown's Sky Terrace @ Strawberry Hill is a great spot to enjoy the panoramic views of the Penang island while having a drink and delicious, light snacks.

Since scones are the talk of the house for Smokehouse, I couldn't resist but to order the Devonshire Cream Tea (RM 24).  This tea set comes with two freshly-baked scones with fresh homemade strawberry jam, Devon clotted cream and fresh butter, served with a pot of green tea.

I love the warm scones as they are very fluffy and buttery, very different from the ones I have tried before.  With each bite, you can feel the fragrance bursting in your mouth.  On top of that, the scones are quite moist and so, it is good to eat on its own.  Definitely live up to its reputation.  I barely touched the butter as I felt the scones didn't need more of it.  In fact, I kept spreading strawberry jam, which I quite like it as it was not too sweet but yet have a nice strawberry fragrance (you know it's the real thing).

A book to go with the scones would be absolutely perfect.

As snacks, I decided to order the Chicken Finger Nuggets (RM 20) as they sounded as though it would be kid-friendly.  I was initially expecting some processed frozen nuggets but surprisingly, they turned out to be made from real chicken meat pieces.  To put in another way, it was deep-fried boneless chicken strips.

The deep-fried nuggets are coated with a nicely seasoned breadcrumbs, which looked visually appetizing and tasted fantastic. The nuggets were crispy on the outside, but inside, the meat is so juicy.  As they were piping hot inside, it was mind-blowing given the cold windy breeze up at the hill.  For dipping,  it came with homemade tartar sauce and chilli sauce.  The chilled tartar sauce was alright and not too creamy but I felt that there was not enough pickles for that extra kick.  Nevertheless, it still goes well with the nuggets, more than the chilli sauce.

My brother also went to the cake display and ordered a cute Chocolate Mini Mousse (RM 15).  Despite the name, no, I don't feel it was mini at all.  This cold dessert was very smooth and creamy with a rich chocolate flavour.  This layered mousse is topped with dark chocolate ganache, followed by dark chocolate mousse and right at the bottom is a sweet white chocolate mousse.  Would could resist such chocolate dessert!

For drinks, my brother ordered the cappuccino (RM 12) which I didn't try but the coffee art was quite good.  According to him, the coffee was nothing outstanding.

Towards the end of the meal, I realized the food served in the Sky Terrace are actually prepared in David Brown's Restaurant & Tea House (which is an old bungalow located at the top of Strawberry Hill), before bringing down to serve.  The only difference is the casual setting at Sky Terrace.  If you prefer a more quiet and quaint environment, it would be better to head straight up to the restaurant as it has a beautiful garden setting.

Overall, the experience was fantastic.  Even before leaving Penang Hill, I told myself that I have to come back to Sky Terrace another time.  I must stress how beautiful the view is, and it is sort of Penang's version of Victoria Peak.  Especially given the cold, windy weather that day.

I already miss it.

David Brown's Sky Terrace

Strawberry Hill @ Penang Hill

11300 Ayer Itam

Penang

GPS:  5.424035,100.269787

High Tea Set @ Cafe Vienna, KLCC

When I saw this high tea set at Cafe Vienna @ KLCC being sold at a discount coupon website, I was very tempted to purchase it since the picture made it looked extremely appetizing   So, right after work, we went to redeem it as part of our pre-dinner snacks.

Unfortunately, our expectations was hit almost to the lowest when we finally saw the set being served to us.  

First, it was the size.  As opposed to what is being served in the next table (which was on a 3-tiered), we quickly concluded that the portion has definitely been down-sized for the discount deal.  Well, I should have read the terms closely next time as it did state "Served as illustrated" Ish!

That aside, the food was, on average, just alright as some manage to impress us while some are just ordinary sweet treats.

The one thing that impressed us the most were the tiny open-faced sandwiches.  They were three types:  smoked salmon with capers, ham & cheese and mayonnaise egg served on toasted slices of baguettes.  They were quite delicious and fragrant, with just the right balance of moisture and flavour.  For me, I loved the mayonnaise egg toast as they did a good job in combinung the ingredients.  Unfortunately, they were just too tiny.  One bite and it's gone.  Wished there were more of them.

Next up, are the scones served with strawberries jam.  The scones were pretty disappointing and probably the worst I have ever tasted.  They are too dry and floury, and without the jam, it was almost too difficult to swallow them as they are quite tasteless.  Thankfully, the waiter was very nice to let us get extra jam.

The mini fruit-tarts were nothing fantastic.  With two thin slices of strawberry, it barely pass off as fruit tarts.  The tart shell was also quite dry and lacking flavour, but the custard cream manage to save it.

Lastly are the cakes.  The chocolate cake, which was not very pretty and looked as though it was prepared by some amateur baker, was quite dry and didn't have much chocolate taste.  The orange-flavoured cream cake was not too bad as it was spongy and moist, with a very strong orange flavour.  Somehow, for the first two cakes, the level of sweetness was just a bit lacking.  Nevertheless, the Opera cake was the best - moist and has a nice coffee flavour, with just the right level of sweetness.

The set also comes with refillable tea and coffee.

Overall, this high tea set definitely failed to impress us - they were some good points but just too many misses.  If we had actually paid the original price for this, then I think it is not worth it.  There are better places for a nice high tea experience.


Cafe Vienna
Lot 305, 3rd Floor,
Suria KLCC
50088 Kuala Lumpur
Tel:  03-21618268

High Tea @ House, G Tower

We started our first afternoon tea experience for 2013 at House @ G Tower, Jalan Tun Razak.  Having seen the nice, cosy environment that House presents, we headed there for a late high tea set (or should I say, early dinner).

First, we started with the open-face sandwiches, of which looked superbly beautiful and appetizing.  There were two choices:  Chunky Tuna Mayonnaise with sliced hard boiled eggs on a multi-grain bread and Smoked Chicken Ham with sun-dried tomatoes and avocado on focaccia bread.

Both choices were equally nice.  As the name suggests, the tuna were quite chunky, with generous amount of mayonnaise and seasoned with pepper.  On the other hand, the sun-dried tomatoes added a little surprise to the taste with some buttery texture from the avocado.  Topped with lots of vegetables, they are very delicious, especially the toasted multi-grain bread.  For me, the tuna sandwich was my favourite while KS preferred the chicken sandwich.

The highlight of any high tea is nonetheless the scones.  For House, they were raisin scones.  Although a bit small in size, the scones are very good as they are warm, moist and quite fluffy.  The thing about raisins are that they burn easily, leaving them bitter and unpleasant to eat, but here at House, the raisins are still sweet.  Eaten together with butter and jam, it was heavenly.  Did I mention that they provide four different flavours of Heinz jam - marmalade, raspberry, strawberry and apricot?  Endless mix-and-match.

Next up, their crunchy Macadamia & Chocolate Chip cookies (5 pieces) were super delicious.  If you taste hard enough, you’ll be able to taste a hint of the sweet, fragrant honey.

The Chocolate Almond Praline with sesame seeds was also another crunchy  addictive treat.  It’s almost finger licking good when the chocolate melts on your fingers.  The almond and the sesame seeds have been lightly roasted, so it smells so good.

As for the chocolate-coated strawberries, they were slightly too sour for my liking.

We selected the Marble Cheesecake to go with our high tea set.  About the cake, it's a mixture of the original cheese with chocolate cheese.  The original cheesecake part is not very spectacular, but it is the chocolate cheese part that makes the cake, overall, so delicious.  The chocolate cheese was so rich and gooey like fudge.  Luckily, the chocolate cheese took more than 50% of the cake slice!

Overall, it was a very good experience as the quality and taste of the food is good.  In my opinion, this could be even better than Delicious’ afternoon tea (maybe not in entirety, especially given their chocolate brownie).  Definitely will visit House again for another high tea treat.

House offers two options of high tea set for 2 person – without (RM 49.90) or with (RM 70) with unlimited refill of Americano coffee or tea.

Personally, I felt the unlimited refill is a bit expensive, but hey, if you’re going to be there for the whole high tea period (2.30 - 6 pm), then probably the extra RM 20 is worth every cent.  Otherwise, in my opinion, it may be better off to order the drinks from the menu if you needed more.

The place is pretty quiet on a Saturday evening and so, it was very peaceful and relaxing.  In fact, it was so quiet that it can pretty hard to find any waitress to get our coffee/tea refilled.  Otherwise, love this place.


House @ G Tower
G02 & LG02-04
G Tower
No 199, Jalan Tun Razak
50400 Kuala Lumpur
Tel:  03-21644424

Open daily except Sunday
11am - 1 am

Afternoon Tea @ Ten28ight Boutique Cafe, Desa Sri Hartamas

The craze for afternoon tea is back again.  This time, we came across this lovely cafe, Ten28ight @ Desa Sri Hartamas, which, serves really delicious afternoon tea.  While the portion is not large, each piece of treats is carefully handcrafted with lots of love.


When we arrived around 4.30 pm, the small cafe was already packed to the max.  So, we were ushered to the 2nd floor instead.  Although managed by the same owner, the one upstairs was more for private parties and functions, and is rarely open for walk-ins.

This place, which is very cosy and homey, was decorated with cute, stylish little items (mostly for sale).  Plus, their tables are made with recycled wooden crates - vintage feel to it.  To add, it was very quiet.  KS joked that it feels like having the whole place to ourselves – so much privacy.

Back to the topic.  The afternoon tea was beautifully laid out on a nice old-fashioned European tableware and boy, did they look fantastic and smell good.

First to sample are the mushroom cheese quiches slices.  The pastry base was a bit soggy but the cheese topping was good.  The egg mixture was just slightly lacking some flavour, but there were a lot of mushrooms and onions.

Then, my two favourite, the curry puffs and samosas.  At each bite, you can feel the flavours and spices bursting in your mouth.  Filled with spiced potatoes, they are not hot and not oily.

KS, in particular, liked the crispy samosa very much.  As for me, I loved both but I do agree the samosas have a more intense, memorable flavour then the curry puffs.  Pity there were only one piece each per person.

The butter cake slices were just normal, although I find it quite dry.

Then, there are the blueberry cheese tart and fruit custard tart.  Between the two, I less preferred the cheese tart as the texture of the cheese was not very creamy and the cheese taste was too strong.  The fruit tart, on the other hand, is more balanced with the smooth custard and the chocolate-based tart.

Finally on the plate are the mixed fruits parfaits in pastry puffs.  The parfaits, a kind of creamy frozen dessert made from whipping cream, were quite fluffy and cold.  Topped with a combination of cut blueberries, raspberries and kiwi, it was very delicious.  Not too sweet or too creamy.  However, eating this parfait puff can a bit difficult and messy as the pastry keeps falling apart.

The tea set also comes with a slice of cake, of which we selected the chilled blueberry cheesecake, which was just freshly made.  The cheesecake has a very smooth, fluffy and rich texture, and right in the middle of it are the huge chunks of sweet blueberries.  I love the cheesecake base, which I think is made from Digestive biscuits.  Overall, the cake was good.

To finish, we have a cup of Cappuccino and Earl Grey tea.  Nothing fantastic about the coffee/tea.

A good place to spend the afternoon chatting away about almost anything over a cup of tea or coffee while slowly munching the sweet and savoury treats (before heading off to the nearest gym :P)

Trying to figure out where this place was quite difficult because somehow, Google Maps couldn't find it based on the given address.  Luckily, I managed to pull out the map from one of the blogs and searched for the nearest street, which turned out to be the row of shops facing the Sprint highway, where True Fitness is.

Ten28ight Boutique Cafe

10, Ground Floor

Crystal Villa 2, Desa Sri Hartamas

Jalan 22B/70A

50480 Kuala Lumpur

GPS:  3.162166,101.652074

(same row as True Fitness)

The Tea Cosy @ The Rocks, Sydney

It's been a while since I stepped back onto the soils of Australia.  Right after I landed in Sydney, I decided to stroll around The Rocks looking for somewhere decent to have brunch.

Almost to the end of George Street, I stumbled across this tiny little souvenir shop called the Irish Design Shop.  Tucked deep inside the rear courtyard of the Irish Design Shop, lies a cute cafe, The Tea Cosy @ The Rocks.  Previously known as the "Tara Tea Room", it serves really nice Grandma-style scones.

As you enter the 180-year old heritage building, you will slowly be greeted by the wonderful smells of freshly-baked scones (not to mention, the beautiful decorations of Irish themes all over the place).  I was pretty lucky as I came just in time for the tray of scones to come right out from the oven.

The Devonshire Tea (AUD 12 per person) consists of two freshly-baked scones with all natural double thickened cream and gourmet fruit jam, served with any choice of drinks.  As I was too early, there were only limited choices.  I went for the Apricot scone and Raisins scone.

The scones, they are really huge!  I must admit, they definitely tasted slightly different from the ones I had before - more crumbly.  I love the Apricot scone as it is sweet and has slices of apricot in it.  However, I was not very fascinated with the Raisins scone as the raisins were a little bitter (or maybe I was just too bloated to have another bite).

Their jam are all homemade with fresh ingredients.  With so many choices available, I went straight for the Staff's Pick of Pear & Vanilla jam.  It was definitely a wise decision as the jam is really good, although on the sweeter side.  I just couldn't help licking off every bit of the jam off the knife.  You know it was made from the real thing as you can feel little bits of the pear.  Pairing up with that double cream and jam on the scones, it is just so wonderfully tasty.  Yum yum.

For drinks, I ordered the Barry's Imported Irish black tea.  Served loose in a pot dressed in handmade tea cosies, it was a pretty sight.  Unfortunately, I didn't really like the tea as much as I wanted as it sort of gave me quite a numb feeling after a drink or two.  I shouldn't have been so adventurous and stick to the usual English Breakfast or coffee.  Well, at least I know what Irish tea tasted like.

Enjoying tea by the sidewalks was definitely a very relaxing and enjoyable treat, while getting some sun to warm the body.  But if you come here during the weekends, it would be more lively as you can enjoy the sights and sounds of the famous weekend "Rocks Markets".

The good thing about The Tea Cosy is that they put up a sign right outside the store to let you know when the next freshly baked scones will be out, so that you will know when to come back and get your hands on those scones.

I will definitely return here again for the scones and jam.  Word of advice, the portion can be quite big for a small eater (I couldn't finish it myself), so do bring along a partner to share.

The Tea Cosy @ Irish Design Shop

33 George Street

Sydney

Australia

Open Thursday & Friday (10am - 4pm) and Saturday & Sunday (10am - 5pm)

Afternoon High Tea

There are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea -- Henry James

The idea of an afternoon tea was first introduced in England by Anna, the 7th Duchess of Bedford.  Back in those days, when there were only breakfast and dinner, the long hours in between was too hard to go by without ever feeling hungry.  Tired of feeling down & hungry, it was then that the Duchess got a briliant idea to have a light snack in the middle of the afternoon, accompanied by a pot of freshly brewed tea to stem the hunger.

Initially started off as her own private enjoyment, this idea quickly became a fashionable hit among other socialites to hold events in the afternoon to sit around, sip tea and nibble sandwiches.  

Until today, this old British tradition still stays as one of the popular afternoon activities.  Whether it is a simple afternoon tea or a luxurious spread, everyone will find something to indulge in.

Afternoon tea usually consists of finger sandwiches, scones with cream and jam, sweet pastries and cakes.  Then, there is a choice of coffee or tea to go with it.  It may or may not be served in tiered trays, but if it does, it is a wonderful feast to the eyes.

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Ever since both KS and I started to go crazy over the idea of afternoon tea, we are now making a point to try out different places serving these wonderful creations.  While some qualify as a traditional afternoon tea, there are also some that are just variations of the more traditional setup.

1)  A lovely, highly recommended afternoon tea @ Delicious, 1 Utama & Marc Residence

(yet to be published)

2)  A traditional afternoon tea @ Grand Dorsett, Subang Jaya

Click here to read more on the afternoon tea @ Grand Dorsett, Subang Jaya

3)  A gourmet high tea @ Ettora, Solaris Dutamas

Click here to read more on the gourmet high tea @ Ettora, Solaris Dutamas

4)  One of the best high tea @ House, G Tower

Click here to read more on House's high tea


5)  Warm, cosy high tea @ Ten28ight Boutique Cafe, Desa Sri Hartamas

Click here to read more on Ten28ight Boutique Cafe

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A must yet to try..The traditional afternoon tea at Carcosa Seri Negara, Kuala Lumpur - a must-try for the true experience of a traditional afternoon tea within the grounds of a historical heritage mansion.