Eric @ericfoodreview

Crispy Buta's Belly. 11 hour 34 min pork belly, pickled salad, smoked chili peppers and toasted bread. The bread was crunchy and salty. The crust was crisp but the middle part was still soft, the chef did a great job. The pork belly was surprisingly good. At first sight I thought it's gonna be soggy since I saw it had lot of sauce, but I was wrong. The meat was super tender and easily fall apart with thin layer of fat and the skin was super crunchy. They did give a green thingy, not sure whether it's a sauce of a dipping but it tasted superb. It held a big role on that dish. Spread lot of that green thingy to the bread, put the pork belly on top of it then took a big bite. It's heavenly good. The pickled salad was also good. It had sourness from the tomato and sweetness from the onion. Actually I wanna give a full mark but it's quite pricey. 80K+ for a salad, 2 pieces of toasted bread and 7 slices of pork belly.

Kue Beras Goreng Dengan Babi dan Sayur ala Shanghai. Wok-fried rice cake with rice and vegetables in shanghai style. The rice cake was chewy as it's supposed to be, not bland thanks to the sticky sauce and quite tasty. However, I didn't taste the distinctive wok fragrant, the smoky hot round fragrant, it missed that thing. They did give the fried pork fat. You know what, I love my lord then I love my lard. It's just so damn good. Small diced of fried pork lard, it's not melting in my mouth but when I bit it off, it tasted like burst of goodness.

Sup Pangsit Sayur. Vegetable and pork wonton in signature pork bone soup. The colour of the broth was milky white. Good indication that they really simmered the bone in a long time. It's rich, super rich to be exact and quite thick. I'd prefer to have a light clear broth, but the richness made me go easy on them. The dumpling itself was a real deal. It's sweet, it's salty, it's fatty. Exploding with juicy fattiness. And little tip, do not cut the dumpling in half or it's gonna be messy.

They have 3 types of noodle. Small, medium and a wide one. My fav is gonna be the small one. Not too springy but not too soft either. The topping was generous. The dumpling was good, generous amount of meat inside and the skin wasn't easily break apart. The fish ball was so so, it's good but not chewy enough. The char siu, it's so mouth watering. Fatty, savory, sweet, it's so glorious. They did give shredded chicken, but I ain't like it. It's not like the taste was bad, I just don't like breast meat. It's a personal thing. And the most important thing, you can ask for fried pork lard. Like I've said, I love my lord then I love my lard. It's so damn good. Crispy, fatty and full of bomb flavor. And prise wise, it's a super great deal. Under 25K you'll get this whole thing.

Nasi Tim. When I eat nasi tim, I always put my concern on the texture of the rice itself. Here, it's just right. Not too soft but not too hard either. The topping was generous. Huge portion of minced chicken. So yes, it's halal. No pork detected. The combination of rice, sweet and salty minced chicken, sourness from the pickles (not only sweet, it also had such sweetness to it) and the spicy cayenne, bravo. They did give steamed egg, not really like the egg but look! The egg has 2 yolks! Just kidding, you won't get it. It's pure luck.

Soto Ayam. First of all, I wanna tell you this. You won't get it as tempting as this one. I did some trick to make the topping float on top, otherwise it's gonna be a soupy bowl. But don't worry, you'll get this much topping. You know me, I won't lie. 

Everything was good, everything was well prepared. The soup was rich, not some watery broth kind of bullshit. They put lot of shredded chicken breast, I personally don't like chicken breast. But, there's no way to put thigh meat in soto. It won't absorb the richness of the broth. So it is what it is. And to make it even better, they put lot of fried shallot. It gave a whole different dimension to the broth. It's like the shallot put a layer of flavor to the already good broth. 

All in general was good. Their nasi tim was tasty, the noodle was fabulous with generous amount of topping, and like I said their soto was also great. So it's like a one shop stop. There's everthing for everyone.

Ikan Lempah Tenggiri. It had no fishiness at all. The fish was good. Juicy and meaty, not lean kind of fish at the first place. The owner said that she took the fish directly from Bangka. I'm not really sure whether that really necessarily needed, but it sounds cool right? The broth was super strong. A little bit sweet, lil salty and spicy and sour. Okey, it's more on the sour side to be exact. They used pineapple and galangal, I think that's why the broth was super rich. You gotta eat that with rice, otherwise it's gonna be too rich. 

Was that a good dish? For me, yes. But if you ask me was it good Ikan Lempah dish? I ain't sure. I don't have any decent bangkanese food experience, so basically, I've nothing as comparison.

Bold Bulgogi. Romaine, bulgogi beef, cherry tomatoes, daikon, potatoes, sweet corn, alfalfa sprout and bulgogi aioli. Okey, let me be honest. It's not really that tasty and definitely pricey. But let's give this a second thought. It's passable, fresh, huge portion and the most important thing (make you feel) healthy. 

The romaine was crunchy, the beef was lil sweet, crunchy and juicy cherry tomatoes and bit sweetness from the corn. Quite a package of flavors. Still, it tasted kinda bland. Oh, and the wrap was great. Not too thick but thick enough to hold all the components. Despite the lackluster appearance, it's supposed to be a healthy food. And healthy thing isn't meant to taste great. So if I put that as consideration, this salad thing was a real good deal.

Salted Pork Belly with Rice. How often you find pork belly with salted egg? Not that often right? I did try this and it's quite good. Fatty and bit creamy from the salted egg yolk. However, it's not as good as the chicken one. 

The chicken was plump, juicy and crispy. The appriance wasn't as good as the pork one, but the taste was far tastier. So if you happen to come, I'd definitely recommend the chicken one.

To complete the bowl, they did give an egg, cassava leaf and a bowl of sambal matah. The egg wasn't runny enough. 

If it were, it'd taste even better. The cassava leaf was good. Soft and have such earthiness to it.

If you pass the stand, you'll realize that the stand is literally next to one of the biggest salted egg branch, so you may change your mind and buy that one instead. I'm here encourage you not to do that. Try this one, you can compare both of it and you'll find that they're completely different. They all have their own strength. 

Baked Egg Tart. I really like the texture of the tart. Crunchy and crispy, just like it's suppose to be. However, the main star in this menu which is the egg was a total turn off. Yes the texture was good. Like custardy and moist with bright tempting yellow color, the top coat was kinda jelly-ish, which I love. But, the taste was super meh. Almost tasteless. No creaminess, no egginess, no nothing. Just slight sweet after taste. I expected something more, something eggy, something creamy. Maybe it's just a bad batch of egg tart? I don't know.

Steamed Dumpling with Mixed Mushroom & Truffle Oil. I'm gonna give an extra credit for this gorgeous innovation. To be honest, it looked like a round shape choipan and it also tasted like one. The texture of the dumpling was glutinous and sticky. The filling was thin-long sliced mushroom. I did like it. The juiciness of the mushroom that contrast the stickiness of the dumpling itself. Interesting I must say. I can smell light truffle aroma from the dumpling. Not a strong truffle taste, just a slight hint after taste and it's good.

Pan-fried Turnip Cake. Call me old school or whatsoever, but radish cake is always a must order in dimsum places. By far, this is the tastiest radish cake I've ever had. It tasted like the traditional radish cake. No xo sauce, no beansprout, no chili, no nothing, just pure radish. Very basic but super tasty. They pan fried the radish into perfection. The outside was bit burnt and gave crisp texture and it had that charred smokiness to it, but the inside was so soft and just a little bit dense.

Compared to my favourite dimsum place, this place had no chance to compete at all. To be honest, I was totally ready to bash the shit out of this place. Most of the dimsum I tried were meh. But, when I tried this radish cake, Oh my God, swear to God, it's so gewd. This dish saved this place. A must order one. 

Medium Cone. You can pick up to 3 flavors. I chose the Cioccolato, Fragole and Straciatella. 

The Cioccolato was good. So chocolatey, not too sweet and not too bitter.
The Fragole was sweet and fresh. It's not sour strawberry kind of sorbet. Slightly sweet and I could taste strong strawberry flavor. 

The Straciatella was the best out of this three. Normally I don't like vanilla flavor. But here, it's not too sweet, not too milky, just a hint of vanilla taste with choco chips. So yeah, I did enjoy this one. 

This was my second experience with Gaya Gelato. My first experience wasn't that great, but now it's not too milky and not too sweet. Maybe I picked the wrong flavor previously? Not sure. But I did enjoy my second visit.

XL Cheeseburger. It's been a while since I had a decent burger. So when I saw this menu, I gotta try it. The plating was super simple. Big round plate and they put the burger right in the middle. The also gave a batch of french fries in a mini cart kind of thing. The fries was not special at all, just mediocre fried fries. Well, it's a side dish so didn't really matter. The burger was quite good actually. They cooked the beef medium to medium well. Not too raw but not over cooked. I'd prefer the patty to be medium rare though. But, still satisfying. The mozzarella cheese and sliced cheddar were not really strong. Just made the burger slightly saltier and cheesier. The sunny side up made the burger creamier which I like but messier at the same time. The caramelized onion was the bomb. Sweet, oniony, earthy, super fragrant. The onion really boosted the burger to the next level. The bbq sauce and creamy mushroom were so so. Nothing stand out. And the sweet potato chips was unique. Adding crunchy texture and nice sweet earthy flavor. 

The bun was pretty oily and flat. The bun was quite wide then the patty and other components was way too small. They stacked all the component right in the middle, looked like a tower that easily crumble. There's no glamourous way to eat this. For me it's not their greatest forte. Overall it's good but not mind blowing. It had potential.