Kampachi Lunch Buffet, Equatorial Hotel, Penang

For Kampachi dinner buffet, see here.

Konnichiwa! Japanese cuisine is nothing new to Penang as the business is blooming rapidly these few years in Penang. You can see a lot of Japanese restaurants down the streets and sometimes, you have no idea which one to choose. One of the important things about Japanese food is freshness and hygienic. The food must be fresh because most of them are raw food and cleanliness is very important too. Yesterday, I had my lunch at Kampachi, located inside Equatorial Hotel, Penang. This restaurant is quite famous because whenever I mentioned Kampachi, everyone is going crazy and crazily praising how nice is the food.

Kampachi, Equatorial Hotel, Penang

I had the chance to try them out myself and here is my review. Besides, if you wish to park inside the hotel's car park, the parking fee is RM5 per entry at the multi-story car park BUT if you dine in any restaurants in the hotel, you can claim the RM5 parking fee from the respective restaurant. The claim is not in term of cash but discount another RM5 from your bill.

Entrance to Kampachi

Table setting

The restaurant is located at the Ground Floor of the hotel. The restaurant is divided into 2 parts, the main part is where most of the food is and the other part, Sake Bar, is the place full of desserts, wines and beers. Let me start with the appetizers. 

Appetizers

Sushi Bar

Tamago, Unagi, Beancurd Skin, Smoked Salmon and fish skin

Salmon and etc

Sashimi

Interesting about Japanese cuisine is the appetizers. When I first walked in, I am looking for salad bar but in the end, I found out the 4 dishes above which include octopus are actually the Japanese appetizers. I believed this is Japanase-style of appetizers. 

Left: Japanese-style fried vegetable
Right: Fried rice (sushi rice)

Left: Beef
Right: Teriyaki Chicken

Left: Mussel
Right: Teriyaki fish

Fried items

Left: Tempura
Middle, Right: Fried vegetables

Variety of sauces

Left: Chicken Soup
Right: Beef soup

Left: Chicken Soup
Right: Beef soup

Beside the appetizers, you can find a variety of "main course" at the other room. For the chicken soup and beef soup, I can't really remember their real name but the chef will ask if you would like add an egg into the soup before serve. Just a raw egg in the bowl and mix with soup. My friend said it is nice but I didn't try it because the egg is still raw.

Left: Salmon Right: Fish

Left: Vegetable Right: Beef

Left: BBQ Chicken
Right: Japanese Pizza

Seafood soup

The BBQ chicken is nice. Normally, the chicken is served with fats and oil but this one is nice. Surprisingly, the seafood soup is rather clear. Sometimes, when you had seafood soup especially with scallops the soup is dirty because they might not clean the shell thoroughly. This one, clean!

Cawan mushi

Udon and soba

Ingredients for udon and soba

Besides, you get to cook your own soba or udon. There are 2 pots of hot water beside the udon and soba for you cook the noodles.

Jelly

Pudding

Pancakes

Cake

Desserts

Cheese cake and cream puff

Ais kacang

From left; Coffee, yam, green tea, sweet corn, strawberry and chocolate ripper

Basically, all the pictures above are the food available at Kampachi but I think I left out a few because at the sushi bar, the chef does not allow me to take pictures. If you ask me, I would say this is rather an authentic kind of Japanese cuisines. The taste is good and the food is not very oily. But, I think improvement can be made on food variety. I think maybe is due to the size of the restaurant, so the food variety is less. But of course, they still serve a lot of food. The different between lunch and dinner is (if I'm not mistaken) I think there are oysters and lobsters during dinner time. But, to confirm, please call Kampachi to ask. 

Update 16 Dec 2012: 

I just had the dinner buffet. See my review here.

Venue

Kampachi, Equatorial Hotel, Penang (Ground Floor) 
(Lunch Buffet)

Price

Saturday and Sunday Buffet Lunch

Time: 11.30AM - 2.30PM

Price: RM68++ Adult, RM37++ Children

Saturday Buffet Dinner

Time: 6.30PM - 10.00PM

Price: RM92++ Adult, RM49++ Children

Service charge: 10%

Government tax: 6%

Reservation

04-632 7000

P/S: This is my birthday lunch and thanks for treating me!

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Chicago Rib House, Gurney Plaza, Penang

Oink! Oink! For pork lovers, you had just landed on the right place! Today's lunch I went to Chicago Rib House at Gurney Plaza, Penang. It is located outside the plaza, in between G Hotel and Gurney Plaza. I don't see chicken, beef (I think I see beef; wagyu in the menu) or lamb on the menu but you can find lots and lots of pork here. So unfortunately, it is a non-halal restaurant for our Muslim friends here. 

Chicago Rib House
The City of Steaks & Ribs

Once you enter the restaurant, you will a big picture of a pig, hanging on the wall, describing each part of the pig.

A cut above the rest

Number 1 is the pig head, then ears, shoulder, ribs, tenderloins, rump, tail, leg and finally the belly. Interesting about the pig, you can eat every inch of it, from the inside out, including the intestine. Some sayings that pig is categorized in Top 10 as one of the most intelligent animals. So, be proud when someone calls you a pig. 

Soup of the day

Soup of the day

My set of meal comes with the soup of the day. It has no name because it is the soup of the day!!! I thought it would be mushroom soup or creamy soup but instead this is how it looks like and it costs RM5.90! But, never mind, soup is never the main character in a house selling ribs!

Honey Garlic Half Rack Chicago Pork Rib with french fries and fragrant rice

Honey Garlic Half Rack Chicago Pork Rib

I really love this pork rib! It is one of the best pork ribs I ever had. Normally, the meat will stick with the ribs/bones but for this, the meat is soft and juicy. The taste of the pork is still there! No wonder pork rib is their signature dish. It comes in 2 sizes; half rack and full rack and you choose from 5 different flavours; original BBQ, honey garlic, black pepper, Flaming Kansas City and Bourbon Sauce.

8oz Pork Tenderloins with grilled vegetables and french fries

8oz Pork Tenderloins

Tenderloins is great too! Unlike the breast meat of a chicken, the meat is juicy and nice! I am not sure how big or how heavy is 8oz but I am sure it is good enough to lift your taste bud! Again, what is half rack? But it doesn't matter because it is really a great rib, pork rib!

I would strongly recommend to give it a try. However, the price is a slightly high but with the food quality and taste, it just worth every penny you forked out from your wallet. Good food is not cheap. Great porky time at Chicago Rib House!

Finger licking good!

Venue:

Chicago Rib House, Ground Floor, Gurney Plaza, Penang
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/CRHMalaysia

Price:

Honey Garlic Half Rack Chicago Pork Rib (with 2 side dishes) : RM32.90

Honey Garlic Full Rack Chicago Pork Rib (with 2 side dishes) : RM53.90

8oz Pork Tenderloins : RM32.90

Soup of the day: RM5.90

Bottomless Soft drinks : RM6.90

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Duck Drumstick Mee Sua, Jalan Sungai Pinang, Penang

Mee Sua! Mee Sua! A kind of very thin white Chinese noodles made from wheat flour. "Mee" means noodle in Hokkien and "Sua" means thread (for cloths) in Hokkien, so it means the noodle is as thin as thread. A bit info about the mee sua, it is also known as longevity noodle because it is actually very long. So for kids, it is better to cut the noodle to avoid choking. The noodle is put outside to dry under the sun and they keep pulling the noodle to a few meters long and thin. It is believed that by eating the noodle, you will have a long life, like the length of the mee, so it is known as longevity mee. Normally, we had them together with herbal chicken soup, a kind of Chinese-style cuisine. Today, I had it for lunch at Jalan Sungai Pinang, in front of the Honda showroom. It is a road-side stall, please expect sweat and heat but its tastiness is worth the sweat and heat. 

Ong Swee Hoe Mee Sua

Actually the name of the stall is called Ong Swee Hoe but there is no point to know the name because you can hardly see it from the road as it is just a road-side stall with part of its name was covered by the price, see above. They are selling Duck Drumstick, Chicken Drumstick, Duck Meat, Duck Wing, Pork Rib, Pork Intestine and Pork Knuckle with the choice of mee sua or "Maggi" mee. As far as I know, there are 2 types of noodles to choose from and I think they are selling Chicken Meat as well. But their famous one is Duck Drumstick Mee Sua (Ak Thui Mee Sua in Hokkien dialect).

Duck Meat Mee Sua

Chicken Drumstick Mee Sua

If you wish to try out their Duck Drumstick Mee Sua, I would advise you to go in the morning during breakfast time because normally, the Duck Drumstick is sold out during lunch time. But during the breakfast, please a bit longer waiting time because you will see that the whole place is packed with customers. I did not manage to try the Duck Drumstick Mee Sua today but I had them a few times before during breakfast.

If you are worry the Duck Meat is hard, rest assured that the meat is very soft and smooth after hours of steaming, yeah, I think is steam. I think it is recommended to try if you can accept the taste of the herbs. But be reminded, the soup is a bit oily but the sweat and heat are good enough to burn the fat down. :)

Venue: 

Ong Swee Hoe Duck Drumstick Mee Sua, Jalan Sungai Pinang, Penang 

(Go straight from Sungai Pinang Food Court and it is in front of Honda Showroom)

Price:

Duck Drumstick : RM5.50

Chicken Drumstick : RM5.00

Duck Meat : RM5.00

Duck Wing : RM4.50

Pork Rib with Intestine : RM5.00

Pork Knuckle with Intestine : RM4.50 

(I think Pork Rib and Pork Knuckle can be ordered separately without Intestine)

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TGI Friday's, Queensbay Mall, Penang

Thanks God It's Friday (TGIF)! Opsss... no, today is Wednesday. Congratulation to Chaswood for its 50th store opening! They are having this promotion of 50% discounts on food (food only, not for drinks and alcoholic beverages) on 21 November 2012, Wednesday. Yes, ONE day ONLY! The promotion goes to food items under ALL Chaswood brands. 

Chaswood

The brands below are listed under Chaswood.

MALAYSIA

The Apartment

BACI Malaysia

Bulgogi Brothers Malaysia

Bedroom

Watami Malaysia

Italiannies (Check my review here)

Malones

Laundry

Republic Bar

TGI Friday's Malaysia

SINGAPORE

BACI Singapore

Malone's Singapore

TGIF Singapore

TGI Friday's

I went to TGIF At Queensbay Mall, Penang today for lunch. By the time I reached at 11.30AM, only 3-4 tables were seen occupied but by the time I sat down, customers started to walk in. I had Championship BBQ Chicken. It is quite nice actually. It comes with cheesy mashed potato which is one of the best mashed potatoes I ever had. It is served with this BBQ sauce.

Championship BBQ Chicken

Then, my friend had Tennessee Burger with crispy fries and slices of bacon. It is a beef burger. The meat is thick and juicy.

Tennessee Burger

Thick juicy beef patty

A meal is never complete without a nice dessert. Normally, a dessert is cold, but at TGIF, the dessert is hot, as if just coming out from the oven. I tried out the new dessert, Blondie Fudge Crunch. It is like Brownies with ice cream as topping. But for this one, the topping is a whipped cream but the cake is hot and has a crunchy top with caramel sauce.

Blondie Fudge Crunch

I would say that the 50% discounts is really a huge offer. All the meals above costed us RM41.60 (after tax and 50% off). We had plain water though. I saw a few comments in the Facebook saying that the customers were disappointed and etc. And yes, I admit that the duration for the food serving is a bit longer with a little mess up in the order, where my order did come late than expected and I was one of the few first customers to come but I was one of the last to leave. However, as far as I know, no reservation is needed.

Overall I would say, nice food, nice environment but still hope to see improvements in the next promotion in terms of food ordering (do not mess up the order, first in first out) and the serving time.

Venue: 

TGI Friday's, Queensbay Mall, Penang (Ground Level North Zone)

Price:

Championship BBQ Chicken : RM14.95 (Original price RM29.90)
Tennessee Burger : RM13.95 (Original price RM27.90)
Blondie Fudge Crunch : RM6.95 (Original price RM13.90)

Government Tax : 6%

Service Tax : 10%

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G.P. Soon Rojak, Gurney Drive, Penang

Rojak! Rojak! One of the famous food in Penang and Malaysia. You can see there is a lot of stalls selling rojak in Penang. Rojak basically is a mixture of variety of fruits, cucumber and squid and all of them are mixed with specially made paste. The paste or sauce is mixed with prawn paste, so if you are allergy to prawn, be aware! However, since it is a specially made paste, so, not all of them are nice. But there is a stall at Gurney Drive, GP Soon, is selling one of the best rojak in Penang! Normally they open during weekends because I went there a few times during weekdays and they were closed.

G.P. Soon Rojak

See the long queue? I went there at 11.10PM and I queued until 11.40PM to reach my turn. Normally, there is a long queue waiting to buy the rojak, Surprisingly, I see a lot Muslims queuing too and I noticed it wrote "Ditanggung Halal" at the stall.

Best Street Food 2011

The rojak is rated as one of the Best Street Food in 2011 by this famous Celebrity Chef, Chen Hong.

Empty containers storing rojak paste

They start their business at the evening and by the time I reached there, they already sold 7 big containers of rojak paste! During my turn, he opened the 8th container.

Fruits

Since they are expecting a lot of customers, they pre-prepared the rojak ingredients first.

G.P. Soon Rojak

The dark paste/sauce is the Rojak paste. The crispy thing is actually fried You Tiao.

Venue: G.P. Soon Rojak, Gurney Drive, Penang (Next to Public Toilet but not near, quite a distance, don't worry! :) )

Price: Ranging from RM3 to RM7 but for take away, minimum order is RM4

** Normally they open during weekends because I went there a few times during weekdays and they were closed. **

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