Calcutta's Charm

.... is largely found in its cuisine. To be brutally honest, Calcutta is not one of my favourite cities to roam or wander in, but the food here certainly makes it up. A bustling city, it appears to be forever warm and humid, filled with dust and coated in grime. Don't let that put you off, of course. Let the journey be the experience, the destination a means to the journey etc etc.

So.

It was also mango season! Oh my, I've never had mangoes as sweet and flavorful as the Alphonso mangoes. These are mostly grown in Bombay. When extracted to create something different - mango ice-cream, anyone? - what a match made in heaven! We got a bunch of different types of mangoes to try but it was an easy win. Deep, rich orange in colour, the texture and fragrance of the mangoes are unbeatable!

Another of my absolute favourite and must-have in Kolkata - biryani! I am head over heels in love with mutton biryani. Most of the time we will take away a couple of greasy versions of them at the airport, stuff our faces and crash.

This one is takeaway from Biryani Express. Spiced rice cooked in a covered pot with chicken/mutton and potatoes - it is most blissfully eaten with hands and a generous heaping of coriander yoghurt. Wallop with hands, of course. A more popular version of the biryani is at the Indian Muslim community called Arsalan - next time will head back there for a shot (and to stuff our faces, secondary).

Blissfully tantalising...

***

Vinnie escorts me for some Kolkatan street food. The famous Kathi Roll @ Kusum.

Likely my first street food in mainland India. One cooks at the stove, two others help to assemble the rolls and the taukeh guards the cashier.

The rolls are paratha-like (our version of roti canai). Vinnie ordered ours the special one, with egg and mutton and chicken. Some pickled onions are added, along with piping hot spiced chicken and mutton with vegetables - served on top of the paratha with a squeeze of lime. 

I definitely approve. There's something satisfying about stuffing your face in an alley with freshly made kathi roll and sipping carbonated Thums Up.

A sweet dessert prepared by Aunty.

That's pretty much all I have for Kolkata - there are more but I always neglect my camera on food excursions. Hope to fix that one of these days.

A Stroke of Yangonese Gold

Goodness me, what a month it has been! Back one day on a flight then out on another flight the next day. But been busy in a good way, I must say.

 First stop, Yangon!

This trip was only planned a week before it actually happened. A friend was working in the city and I decided to visit. Got an early flight in and arrived at the airport just before noon. Around here, things work with Myanmar Kyat (pronounced Chyat) or in USD. Now, if you decide to pay in US Dollars, things get a little bit more complicated. Well, kind of. You just need to make sure that the USD notes you bring are new; without any fold marks, scribbles, or any form of defacement. The Burmese will reject your money if they do not like the condition of the notes. Which can be quite a pain if you need to get somewhere in a jiffy.

Got into a cab at the airport for almost a 30-minute ride to the Kandawgyi Hotel in town (only USD10!). Nice cabbie tried talking to me, explaining how to get to some of the temples from my hotel. He also taught me some words in Burmese (complicated words!!), his English wasn't very good but it's nice that he tried to be hospitable in his own way .

On a side note... Been going mad with the photo editing tool that I just discovered. Love how easy and beautiful pictures look now, exactly how I wanted them to look like. Tell me what you think!

Yangon International Airport... fancy schmancy hor...

I was so starved that I put off checking into the room and instead, dragged my luggage to the hotel restaurant straight away.

First meal upon touching down on Yangon. Ordered a dish of pork curry with rice and some vegetables of carrots, cabbage, celery. Oh. My. God. The curry. was. absolutely. divine!!! It has got to be on my list of one of the best curries I've ever had. I couldn't get enough of it! Tons of fried shallots add a beautiful crunch. Pork wasn't the most tender of meats I've had but the gravy more than makes it up for it. Completely out of this world. Needless to say, I wiped the plates clean.

A quick shower later and I am out within the hour. Not very lucky with the weather as it started drizzling softly. Anyway, first stop to the main Yangon attraction, the Shwedagon Pagoda!

I must admit that I was most impressed and quite taken aback by this beautiful structure at first sight... Even with the overcast skies, the sheen of the gold is not diminished... The very top of the stupa is a wealth of treasure. Gold rings, rubies, jades, emeralds, diamonds adorn the topmost tip. There are a few binoculars placed around the pagoda so you can try and spot them but I couldn't tell!

Usual rules comply for entry into the temples, no short shorts and no shoes. But the tiles were really clean and probably washed quite often!

The skies seemed really kacau back then but I like to think they bring out the gold of the stupas nicely. If the sky had been a clear, vivid blue then the gold colours wouldn't stand out as pretty, eh?

Devout ladies

As a friend rightly said, the display of wealth is at odds with the economy and its citizens. Some people barely making a living and all. But I like it that the people here are not pushy about selling their items or services to you. I've been to Vietnam where this is a major headache. They put the pressure on you to purchase their goods and if you say no, they linger on and wait till you break.

The Burmese believe that the days which we are born determine our fate and horoscopes. I was born on a Friday and thus, that makes me a guinea pig..... As it was also a Friday when I was there, many other 'guinea pigs' are out at the temple praying and making offerings...

So that's how they kept the tiles clean.... Tile by tile...

As I was trying to get my 100th shot of the main stupa, a dark Burmese tour guide told me to stand at another corner to capture a better image. Then he started going on about the temple and how he used to live in Japan (he speaks fluent Japanese!); married a Japanese; but eventually got a divorce. He (Myo Aung, but can opt to call him Chris) went on lamenting about how local Burmese women are not interested in him any more, as he is a divorcee. I told him to get a girlfriend instead of a wife and he gave me an earful hehehe

He then dragged me to the guinea pig altar and taught me how to perform a prayer.

He also told me that female 'guinea pigs' generally have many boyfriends and are quite a player. I vehemently denied all such accusations, lol.

Seen anything interesting in this line of crafted statues? hehehe... I'll give you a hint, balls!!! 

This row of little imps are high up on the roof and it obviously wasn't me who spotted them... Chris did! He's the funny tour guide who eventually nicknamed me 'Sweetie' (suka hati give nickname... Such a casanova!). He fed me with all sorts of stories of the temple, Yangon and Burmese in general. A charismatic person to talk to. I casually mentioned to him that I intend to visit the Bogyoke (pronounced Bo-jowk) Aung San market. He was keen to bring me there and managed to persuade me to take a local bus and visit another temple (because he hasn't got any customers at the moment).

And into a bus we got into. My, my...

Most Yangonese (quite a mouthful, this) take the bus (a tad obvious from the top picture, I guess) and I was eventually pushed into a corner but managed to get a seat when the previous tenant got out. As I made myself comfortable, more people started inching in until this lady, who was standing right in front of me, had her crotch pushed against my knees! I'm just glad that that part of her is covered and I am furthermore wearing long pants.... Literally too close for comfort!

Saw this roadside stall selling pancakes. I was definitely keen to try.

The pancakes were delicious - crispy and sweet. Anyway, shopping time!! I went straight to a jewellery stall to look for a jade bracelet - one caught my fancy but I cannot reveal how much it costs; way too much .

Betel leaves/nut chewing (a quick search revealed that it is the very same as the daun kaduk!) is very common here. It used to be pretty common back home as well. I remember Ah Kong would chew them sometimes, for his nicotine fix. Road stalls are set up like a convenience store where you can get your supply of cigarette, nuts or betel leaves.

The leaves are slathered in limestone juice and some pieces of betel nut (areca nut) are added. The nut is red and gives off a black/red stain, evident among the dark-enameled smiles of the locals here. 

After the impulsive shopping, Chris brought me to one of the highest viewing point in Yangon city, a building called Hitachi tower, lol.

View from top of the tower (inside a cafe). See if you can spot the famous landmark! It's just strange for me that the tallest building is a corporate tower, here in Yangon.

Next temple.....

Look closely and you might just be able to spot the single strand of hair from Buddha! This is by far the most luxurious temple I have ever stepped foot into.

Filled with treasures; gold, antiques from thousands of years ago, diamonds, rubies, some notes and coins from the olden days, jaw dropping stuff!

Chris requested I put my arm over his shoulders for this photo. After the lone tourist who was randomly targeted to take this photo handed back my camera, Chris explained the significance of the casually rested hands on shoulders means a satisfied customer. Erm.... okay.

Chris insists that I put my hands together in a prayer and to shove my forehead to the statue's pointing index finger. I felt silly doing it while he took a picture but nevertheless started furiously wishing for a number of things 

By then, Chris has started confessing his love for me and that I must, must call him by tomorrow hahahaha, what a strategy to pull off on your customers! But if you are ever keen to visit Myanmar, this guy here is the person you want to go to!

Day 2 - Breakfast and walk to the Kandawgyi Park. We realize that there are just too many couples hanging out at the park - even though the weather is less than ideal (small shower); and umbrellas start popping all over while we left it to imagination as to what was going on under the guise of the umbrellas.

On a hindsight, the park looks really appealing from the photo. But lake is green and gross in reality... :/

Lunch of roast pork with stir fry vegetables. Roast pork is a bit like our version of char siew - I liked it.

Tea time at this cosy French-influenced place and I ordered some crepes of which I forgotten to take photos of!!! They were absolutely divine - banana with chocolate crepes. 

And last photo...

Finally dinner at Monsoon. Vinnie & I were contemplating where to go, and finally settled on Monsoon after having read some good reviews of the place. Ordered a 'Tea Salad' which is something very different - I've never had anything like it before. Made with tea leaves and a combination of peanuts, dried prawns, shallots, (not spicy, despite the daunting green chillis poking out of it- decorative purposes) and some unknown ingredients. It's bitter and slightly sweet. Quite nice but couldn't finish it!

And just like that went my day and a half in Yangon, wish I had more time to explore other places - Old Bagan, Inle Lake and the Mandalay - legendary Myanmar destinations...

A December Food Trail

Continuing where I left off previously...Traveled south towards KL and Mei Ying was already hurrying me to reach her place and start decorating her Christmas tree in time for the house-warming/pre-Xmas party, lol. Arrived at her place 5ish, and immediately started taking out the faux tree from the box and got to work with her on my case :P She's gotten all the ornaments and baubles and whatnot EXCEPT!! The tree-topper! So I told her, it's ok, I'm pretty sure we can improvise and looked around her 'office' and spotted this teddy bear hahaha. Like what they say, the rest is history.

I must say, pretty impressed myself with the results ;)

Excuse the very pinkish faces, low lighting hor.

 Creative director and the marvelous, joy-filled Christmas tree ;)

 Can't remember which night it was and Mei Ying wasn't feeling very well so she asked if it's okay if we have salad. Anything high fibre and healthy, I'm a direct convert! (we were initially supposed to get bakuteh). But after a couple of weeks back home and gorging myself on good food almost daily, this is a great step back of mild detox.. lol. She also introduced me to quinoa, which I think complements the salad nicely and kinda rounds it up! I think I'll be having more of these in the future... :)

Too soon I speak of a detox, the next morning we visited the much hyped about Village Park for their so-called famous nasi lemak and even more famous deep fried chicken. It was, most unfortunately, my idea to visit the place after hearing much hype from my old colleagues back in KLCC about its crunchy and out-of-this-world fried chicken and sambal..........

The queue was really long, even though it was on a working day, but then again, it was Xmas Eve, so I guess most people are taking the day off. What's also bad about the place is the fact that their system is annoyingly inefficient. There was only one entrance/exit and on both sides of the already narrow corridor were two long queues, one for ordering and one for payment. There were waiters but they only seem able to take orders for drinks when they could also have included meal orders as well. Oh well, Malaysia Boleh and anyhow no matter how bad their system is, there's still a long line of nasi lemak-deprived people so willingly to push and shove their way for that plate of nasi lemak.

Verdict on Village Park nasi lemak: chicken looks nice, succulent but the taste just doesn't quite make the cut for me. I'd still take the Lucky Plaza deliciously mouth-watering ayam penyet any other day. Sambal was not bad, but it's more on the mild/sweet side. Me, I love my sambal burning hot :D

Had a lot of fun preparing our Xmas dinner. Cranked up the music, karaoke-ed to the songs, and started with the multiple chopping, peeling and cooking. Don't know whether you should be drinking and cooking but Evan then made this refreshing Italian soda, alcoholic no doubt lol.

Bombarding the chicken in the tray before it gets shoved into the oven. No turkey this time, but a whole chicken. Still, not complaining...

Stuffed with cooked, chopped onions, minced meat and garlic along with other miscellaneous herbs and spices, roasting with a tray full of other wholesome ingredients: carrots, capsicums, taters, onions, cucumber, basil leaves, whole garlic, the works. All with a dash of olive oil, salt, and pepper. Yum, yum, yum. (Please excuse the remnants of the chicken feet on the corner).

Slowly baking for an-hour-and-a-half...

.

.

.

.

Ta-dah!

Are you drooling already, or are you drooling already?? The chicken carcass deliciously browned and succulent, the meat just falling off the bones. And the vegs! Fully caramelised, and just melting in the mouth! And the garlic! Steamed in its own clove skin..... so soft and bursting with flavour. Bon Appetit!

The chicken and its other complementing friends... The others made fun of me as I prepared my classic Christmas ceviche (thanks again Su Jen for the recipe, lol, been making it every so often). They claimed I took too long at my own sweet time to chop the ingredients for the recipe, lol. That's called preparation with love, y'all ;) Even Evan who has done preparing a couple of dishes was insulted when he came beside me, frying onions, garlic and minced meat for the second time and I taunted him 'ko chai cha' (frying again) that got him fired up hahaha.

Initially thought that with the roasted chicken and ceviche would be too much, but considering the size of the chicken, it was good that we also have pasta as well! Wiped everything clean that night :) Brussel sprouts was a huge mistake on its appearance in the Xmas dinner. A colleague calls it whistle berries, and rightly so! Whole night after dinner my stomach felt full of wind, not a comfortable feeling, I assure you :/

Dinner did not end on a flat note, no way that's going to happen. After another round of drinks, our sweet palate came in the form of a beautiful pine-nut-and-walnut-covered carrot cake, inspired by the curvaceous Nigella Lawson. The cake contains all the necessary ingredients for the makings of my favourite carrot cake: rum, raisin and walnuts. It was heavenly, needless to say.

Please take a moment to admire the beauty of this flawless cake :D

We didn't do much that night, just drank, karaoke-ed some more and fooling around with the camera lol. All good fun.

Topped cake with lemon zest mascarporne cheese cream... mmmmm..............

I don't know what's with me and this new job that I am taking up, but I realize that I've been slacking off so much more than usual. Sleeping for longer hours (I used to wake up when the sunlight hits me), do things at a relatively slow pace.... Maybe I'm just more laid back now? Not sure if it's a good or bad thing... yet...

Boxing Day.. A little ex-LGs reunion. Visited this nice little designer coffee place @ Typica in KL.

Typica sells expensive 'designer' coffee. I tried this iced coffee drink that was served in a martini glass. That little heart-shaped thing in it is in fact frozen gula Malacca! The barista then poured my cold coffee over it and each sip taken will give you a different taste experience as the iced gula Malacca slowly melts! Genius.

And on the way down south.... towards Malacca.

And what else can you do in Malacca besides eating? More eating!

Chicken rice balls are a must... Kenneth brought us to this place which is further from town so we can avoid the massive jams that is so infamous in Malacca's central.

Chicken, oh so tender! It's seriously just as good as the one in Jonker Street, minus all that long queues. Way too much hassle. In any case, even the garlicky, chilli sauce is also pretty good in my opinion (which may have turn out to be a generous compliment now that my taste standard has seriously deteriorated after serving time in Singapore and on the vessel...). Blogging about this now is a serious mistake..... On the vessel now and devoid of real, good food :(

Sigh...........

Next stop is the must-go-place while in Malacca. Nadeje. Kenneth again brought us to another branch of Nadeje where we can avoid the horrendous traffic. 

Mille crepe, or thousand layer cakes :3

I only ever fancy the original flavour, the other flavours don't quite cut it. Plus, these crepes have cream in between their thousand layers or so, and after a few mouthfuls, you just can't go on anymore! Fills you up real easily. But of course, being Lifeguards (ex), it's only a matter of minutes before all nine pieces of mille crepes are annihilated...

Proceed with our drive down south and detoured over to Segamat, Johor for some stinking fruits that Segamat is so famous for.

Been a while since I'd been in Segamat, Wei Inn's hometown. 

Now, I'm not a big fan of durians but this round of durian feast is really something! I particularly enjoyed this breed of durian which has a tinge of orange to its flesh. Creamy and rich.... super! I may have just turned into a durian convert!

Complete with mangosteen for the non-durian eaters. It's really more fun to eat durians! At least when you burp, you can guiltlessly burp with the other durian eaters :D