Whole Fish for a Person and the Soothing Cendol

When I was in K.L. on my recent trip, my friend told me that he wanted to bring me to a place for a fish meal. There is only one type of preparation for the fish - steamed. You can't order the fished cooked in other ways. Furthermore, one fish is for one-person serving, you can't share the fish. You also can't ask for a non-spicy version. I was quite curious about this place when my friend told me about it and I was more than willing to check it out.

When the fish was served, it was actually tilapia steamed in soy sauce with diced garlic, ground ginger and sliced chili. The Chinese signboard mentioned that the fish is African fish, and it is actually the nickname of tilapia in K.L. The fish was very fresh and steamed to perfection. The garlic, ginger and chili got rid of the fishiness and what's left was the sweetness and smoothness of the flesh. The one I had was a regular one which was already having strong spicy aftertaste. I can't imagine the one with extra spiciness which you can specify when putting down order!

After the meal, my friend suggested for some dessert and he brought me to a nearby petrol station. There is an Indian food stall on a truck which is parked at this petrol station almost everyday. You can have a meal here with the Indian rojak and a bowl of cendol to wash the meal down.

The cendol here was quite nice, it wasn't too sweet that suits my taste. However, the ice was coarsely shaved and it took me some time to chew the ice. It would have been better if the ice was finer. Well, probably that's too much to ask from a roadside stall.

Chinese New Year 2013

Today is already the 7^th day of Chinese New Year (CNY) and I still feel like it was only yesterday that CNY started. As a family tradition, we always have reunion dinner on CNY eve. We used to have steamboat at home but we have moved on to restaurant dinner since about ten years ago. This year we had out CNY eve dinner at a restaurant called Sin Lung Sheng Fu Tiao Qiang Restaurant (新龙盛佛跳墙大酒楼) which was new to me. All the dishes were quite good except that most of them were just lukewarm.

After the CNY eve dinner, my Dad called for all family members to my house for a family photo. As my 2^nd brother's family was back in Kuching, so it was the best time for a family photo with all family members. I was obligingly the photographer.

My 2^nd brother brought back some peach blossom branches from Singapore and there became the main CNY decor at my house. There were very few flowers blossoming but I still managed to capture some images of the better blossoms.

As I am still eligible to collect ang pao from my elder family members, they would not forget to give me ang pao so that I have good luck for the year of snake.

Similar to the previous years, my eldest sister-in-law baked the cakes and cookies for treating the guests visiting our house during CNY. Even though most of our usual guests have visited us already, there are still plenty of supply left.

The day before my 2^nd brother's family left for Singapore, I went to tapao the best kolo mee in Kuching to have a feast of the local food. Surprisingly there was no price hike even though it was on the 2^nd day of CNY. However, I waited for one hour for my turn to collect the kolo mee.

Last night, I was invited by one of my photography buddies for her CNY open house. We were the last group of people to leave as it was great time with good company until we had forgotten it was nearly midnight.

Tomorrow will be the last day of my CNY holidays and the coming Monday I will be full swing at work already!