Patisserie Equateur (赤道法式烘焙) . sun shines after the rain

I started to realize that more and more cafes are mushrooming not only in Penang island, but also in Butterworth, it's a good news to people who stay at mainland (my sister) as they don't need to travel far to have high tea. As for me, I don't really bother to travel far just to have a meal, as long as the food are worth for it; I can travel to Raja Uda for lunch and come back to the island which to and fro spend around 1 hour. Whenever I'm in Butterworth, it's a must to look for my sister moreover it's her school holidays now and she got nothing to do at home I assume lol. It was not a good day when I departed from my home, rain started to pour heavily when I happily having my lunch somewhere near to Chai Leng park. Lucky us as the rain stopped when I reached my sister's place, without second thought, we decided to head out for high-tea; yup girls always have more space for dessert. 

Wanted to go Patisserie Equateur (赤道法式烘焙) for so long since early of this year where they just started their business, too bad it was not open when I was there, few times and I started to lose hope on them. Nah, just kidding. My sister went there few months back and she promised to bring me here as she kind of likes the desserts; from the photos, those desserts really look good  and they a little bit make me feel to visit this patisserie eventho I'm not a dessert lover. 

We look for our seats first before we made any order at the counter, the helpful staff keep recommended their signature dessert such as Chocolate Raspberry Mousse Cake (nah, the word chocolate scared me off), Creme Brulee (wanted to try other dessert than this) and Crispy Cream Puff (my sister had it before, so I thought to order something else). 

There's a self service corner where you can get your ice water or refill the hot water into your pot of tea; we didn't went to the corner that day as the staff did help us refill the hot water. We just sat there and enjoy our tai-tai moment. 

Lady Moon | RM13.90

High tea moment wouldn't complete without a tea set, so we ordered Lady Moon, one of their signature which is a combination of French Rose, Lavender and Osmanthus. This is a 2 pax set, RM1 surcharge is needed for additional one more cup. Le sister said that they served transparent glass cup on her previous visit, I saw some of the diners also using the glass cup, most probably they were out of cups, so they served this fleury cups; I kind of heart this cups! Never try this combination of tea before, it is quite refreshing to me.

Iced Caramel Macchiato | FOC

We were so lucky that they having a promotion that with every purchase above RM35 in single receipt, we will get a free iced caramel macchiato. Don't ask me when is the promotion ended as they didn't stated it in their Facebook page either, the promotion will be carried out according to customer's responses. Again, they were out of cups, that's why they serve this in a plastic container. This is up to my liking as it doesn't taste too sweet with the amount of caramel, at the end of your sip, you can taste the mild coffee taste, which is quite suit my need. 

Mont-Blanc | RM17

Was quite in shocked when I saw its name on the receipt. As the name given, the baker made this dessert according to the appearance of European Alps mountain, Mont-Blanc. For the orthodox of Mont-Blanc dessert, the chestnut cream is in brown color, they sprinkle some icing on the cream and topped with a chestnut; there is a mango pudding inside the chestnut cream. This taste a little bit too sweet because of the chestnut cream, but if you eat it with the mango pudding it will be just fine. Personally, I don't really like it as the chocolate cookies at the bottom is so hard and we even having trouble to cut it with a knife; we made a big mess while cutting this. 

French Vanilla Brulee Cake | RM10.90

This is my favorite! It doesn't taste sweet yet at the same time it's so creamy with the brulee sandwiched between the thin sponge cake. Since all their French dessert require a very delicate handmade process, so the quantity of each dessert is quite limited, if you wanted to try their signature, I think you need to reach there earlier. I was quite surprise to see they topped some edible gold flakes on blueberry, I never have dessert with gold flakes before! The gold flake is actually tasteless but it makes the dessert looks grand, don't you think so? I would go back to Patisserie Equateur for this! Heavenly good. 

Macarons | FOC

Again, when we almost finished our dessert, the staff served the macarons to us, which are free of charge as well. Lucky us that day! My sister claimed that the macarons are too sweet, but for me it is just nice. I started to love macarons more and more eventho it taste quite sweet, but I can accept it; I can't accept the sweetness from chocolate tho. 

等一個人 . 花茶

Location

41, Lorong Teras Jaya 2, Kawasan Perindustrian Teras Jaya, 13400 Butterworth, Penang.

Business Hours

1pm - 11pm; Closed on Monday

E-mail

PatisserieEquateur@gmail.com

Facebook

Patisserie Equateur

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Am I going on the right path I wonder?

The Thistle Bindery | Binding & Weaving Pages of History

It is the month of September now, it means that the one-month-long Georgetown Festival 2014 came to an end now right together with national day of Malaysia. As I mentioned earlier, the only event that I participate in GTF 2014 is the "Binding & Weaving Pages of History", some kind of bookbinding workshop which was instructed by The Thistle Bindery. It was a 2 days bookbinding workshop and I registered for both days as I'm really quite into handmade kind of stuff. Our instructor, Ian Tan, who came from Singapore is a conservation architect and I have learnt a lot from him throughout the workshop; my enthusiasm towards craft/DIY is alive again, let's see how long can it stays in me. Even though I kind of stop the handmade moment of mine once I started to be really busy on my full time job, but the skills are yet rusted as they are born in me. Way the feather. I feel to post a little about the workshop to show you guys on how I spend my 2 days with Ian and with the books, papers. 

Only Ian has his apron with him when we started the glue-ing session to prevent the glue from dropping on his clothes, wish to get one for myself with my name on it. Talking about apron, I once asked the Starbucks barista whether I can get one of the Starbucks apron as well; of course I know the answer before I asked, but never try never know right? End up I didn't get that Starbucks apron. Love that wooden tool box that use to keep all the tools needed for bookbinding, now I just keep my handmade tools in a drawer, and here and there. Kind of messy, sometimes I can't even find the tools when I need it. Laugh. 

Different kind of bookbinding samples were displayed in the room but not for sale, they are masterpieces of Ian's for each workshop, that he also use them as his template during the workshop. You can see there are several type of stitching available here, but of course we can learn it all in 2 days, so we just learnt the basic, the rest I think we can find it online, in somewhere else. Since it was a 2 days workshop, I just roughly jot down what I have done and I think this would be a long post with plenty of photos. Enjoy!

Day 1: Japanese Stab Binding

The workshop was held at Yeng Keng Hotel, 10am until 5pm as per stated in their schedule. Thinking that we only made books and nothing else? Nah, then you are wrong. The bookbinding session is actually started by 1pm onward, so we kind of visit the George Town area during morning session. Since we were going to make a photo journal kind of book, so we had visit some historical sites in George Town, took some nice photos and we can actually print them and paste it in the book that I were going to show later on. 

Ian work as a conservation architect, so he know well why and how the old people built the temples or houses with certain design, he shown and told us stories about the buildings; I'll never know this kind of things if it is not by him. 

We stopped at Yap temple, somewhere nearby Khoo Kongsi to make some stone rubbing with crayons that provided by Ian. Of course we did asked for permission before we really did the stone rubbing on their carving, some people might not allow and feel that it might spoil the carving. To prevent the crayons from contaminate the carving, we first put a tracing paper before we did stone rubbing on the recycle paper that we going to make it as our book cover. The grey shirt guy is Ian, who trying out the carving pattern on tracing paper before he rubbed on his book cover. I was first wanted to make the cover with pink base paper and blue crayons on top, later on I realized that it was quite 'dirty' to put on the cover, let's see what I have at the end.

Random shot while waiting for others to complete their stone rubbing. Ian gave us full freedom after the stone rubbing, we separate into few teams to walk around the area before meet up at Yeng Keng Hotel at 1pm. Sharing is always the part where you let people know about you more and more, so we had some story sharing session before the bookbinding; the fun part started after that! I will not share any dimensional or the step-to-step bookbinding here, as I feel that we need to respect Ian for working so hard to conduct workshop here and there. You may sign up for Ian's workshop at Singapore which he will conduct from month to month, visit The Thistle Bindery facebook page for details. I'm sure if you are not in Singapore, you will still able to find some local instructor for bookbinding; or you can just date me out and I can teach you some basic bookbinding if you trust me lol.

Here are all the tools needed for bookbinding, I'll not talk about some tools that you similar with. Awl and bone folder is needed the most for bookbinding; awl is the one where we used to make pinholes on papers and book cover so that we can stitch the book easily. Bone folder is use to fold paper and to remove the 'wrinkle' on the paper, it's a great invention as it really help a lot while we stick paper to paper using glue. Ian was selling awl and bone folder in the workshop, I got them with RM10 only which we couldn't get this price at the market. Bought it for 2 reasons: I want to make some books at home which need these and it's so cheap. Yeah, I always buy tools if they selling at low price even I know I might not using it or only once or twice in a year; sound rich lol.

Glue and brushes. This ain't the normal white glue for handmade stuff that we can get at market place. I assume all of my readers know that starch can be made into glue after heat up with water, and it will be a perfect glue for crafting project. As per Ian, starch glue not easy to dry while white glue dried very fast, so he mixed both starch glue and white glue to make it perfect for bookbinding. I love this mixture of glue, very sticky towards your craft art but when come to your hand, it wouldn't hurt your hand even you touched it so long time. Ian even teach us, glue should apply on the surface with weaker absorption, for example paper vs cardboard, glue should apply on paper then stick on the cardboard but not another way round as the cardboard is with higher absorption level which will attract more glue on it and make the glue very hard to dry. I learnt a lot as I told you!

Last but not least, the string. Before we really stitch our books, cut the string from arm to arm long, don't too long as it might trouble you while you stitch the book. Use bee wax to coat few layers on the string before you get the needle, this will prevent the string from becoming tangle while you start to stitch your book. Putting this size of string into a needle could be a problem too, your mouth play a very important role here where you need to bite it and make the string flat so that it can go through the needle hole. Don't worry with the bee wax, it's safe to eat. 

That's the photo journal book that made by myself, decided to put all photos into one if not this post going to load super slow and you might just leave this post before the photo finish loading. I like this cover page as it looks neat compare to the blue one I shown previously. Ian ended the workshop at 6.30pm as we accepted challenge and chose the more difficult stitching pattern, he did offered a simple one but this one looks nicer. Imaging that you need to get the string go through the pin hole on the cover/papers (poke with awl) 2-3 times, it's very hard to pull the needle as the space become tighter, I even broke a few needle. After I get the hang on it, it became so easy; I managed to stitch 2 books while others completed only 1. 

Day 2: Long & Link Stitch Binding

The tools that we used for day 2 were similar with the day 1, but we were no more using recycle paper as the cover page, we used dried lotus leave and challenge accepted again! The dried lotus leave itself is quite weak, it will just crack at somewhere else if you press it hard, so we apply a thin layer of coating (I forgot what it call, to make it looks shinny and strong) before we headed out to have historical walk again. 

We were not visiting any temples in day 2, but to go different markets and talk about spices this time. Ian wanted us to get some spices, and he explained the history of the spices, quite cool huh? So I got some mint leaves, cinnamon, black stone flower, peppers and etc., so each of us required to talk about how grandmother stories that why we pick that spices before the bookbinding session.  

The book binding is more or less the same as day 1, but this day we kind of make some collection book which consists of paper bags instead of paper, once done it will become something like files that you able to keep postcards, tickets or tiny things you found throughout your journey. I didn't write much about day 2 as all the things we used or did was the same, just we changed the inner papers to file kind of bag, I just straight away show my masterpiece.

This is it! Cool right to have lotus leave as cover and we able to finished the class before 5pm, as most of us who attended the first day workshop know how to stitch by ourselves by looking at the pattern provided by Ian. This one is the easy one with long stitch at the spine of book, but I did not know Ian will going to make a tie at the middle part of the stitch (the blue color string), so I pulled the string (red one) as tight as possible, ended up the knot seems a bit weird at the middle. Ian said it's a good thing to have tight string along the pages, so that the inner papers wouldn't move around easily. Mission completed. 

Here's the details for The Thistle Bindery, if you are interested on bookbinding, do contact them.

Facebook

The Thistle Bindery

Website

thethistlebindery.wordpress.com

E-mail

thethistlebindery@gmail.com

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I haven't watch [等一個人咖啡], but watched [The Hundred Foot Journey], quite nice!

Lang Hoose . late brekkie

Didn't know that there is a new cafe opened along the Beach Street until the day when we strolling around the area on bicycle; it is added in my must-visit-list then. On a fine morning where we don't know where to have breakfast (need some break for the local style brekkie), we decided to pay Lang Hoose a visit. Why Lang Hoose? It means 'Long House' in Scottish, according to Ken's blog; it is a hotel+bar+cafe to be exact. So glad that the owner said I could walk around the cafe and take photos as I wish while waiting for our food to be served, I did but photos are not being shared here as I forgot to bring the flashlight along with me, my camera always can't function well in dim light environment. No, I'm not blaming you my baby NEX.

That is the first floor where the bar is located, ground floor is mainly for cafe section. No people were here under the broiling weather, guess it would be only cheerful during late evening or night time where the sun is hiding somewhere else. 

Mango Lassi | RM7 . Banana Milkshake

They look the same here, both also in pale yellow color and I totally forgot the price for the banana milkshake, first time for being failed to remember the price. Nothing special on the beverages, but I quite like their banana milkshake as the taste is so creamy and rich.

Nasi Lemak | RM5

Said that I don't want to have local style breakfast but I still want to order the nasi lemak, as I heard that this is good over here. I don't really like to eat cucumber but I like these Japanese cucumber which with lesser/no cucumber seeds. I waited quite long for this to be served, from what I saw that day, it was the owner she did the cooking all by herself without help, luckily I was not that hungry. Overall, the nasi lemak is great with the not-so-spicy sambal, which really up to my liking. It will be even better if the fried anchovies are to be more crispy. 

All Day Breakfast | RM16

Here, we have the western style of breakfast, it's quite good but not heavenly. The red bean was served in hot, where normally I got mild cold red bean to be served at other places. You couldn't see the sausage and sauteed mushrooms in the photos (angle problem), I really enjoy their ham and the sauteed mushrooms, taste good! 

Please be informed that Lang Hoose Cafe is currently closed for minor refurbishment, I think they will change some menus to serve you better. For any updates on the cafe, please refer to their facebook page. 

Location

269, Lebuh Pantai, 10300 Georgetown, Penang.

Business Hours

8am - 3pm (cafe); 5pm - late (bar) | Open Daily

Contact Number

012-220 8774

Facebook

Lang Hoose

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It's September. Count down-ing again. 

Nando's Peri-Vilege

Do you like Nando's? It's quite hard for me not to like the food, every time I passed by the restaurant, the smell keep twiddle my nose and it started to make me miss the food. There are sure few times in a year that I dine in Nando's either with my family or friends. If you read my previous post here, you will know I sign up for their membership before that cost around RM10. 

This is the card design I got myself (out of 4 designs), let's talk about the old peri-vileges that I got through the membership. Once I sign up the card, we can choose a date as our anniversary day with Nando's, you will receive a SMS/e-mail from Nando's that you entitled for a quarter chicken set during that month. Not only that, during your birthday month, you also entitled another quarter chicken set, it's so cool to have free food right for just sign up that membership. Once in a blue moon, you will receive another SMS/e-mail/postcards that inform you what promotion is on-going in their restaurant. 

This month, I received their letter that Nando's going to upgrade their peri-vilege system, it means no more using the card I got previously; okay will just keep it for my collection then. On the envelope itself, you will know the new method is something related to apps/software once you read that "slide to unlock...". I'm quite enjoy the old method and it served me well, but I understand people need to improve, and let's enjoy the new peri-vilege we got here. I'm going to share how you can sign up the membership for FREE and enjoy their peri-vilege like me, in case you do not have this kind of information. 

First, you will need to search the app "Nando's MY" in App Store (if you are android user, search it in Play Store), the size is only 30MB++, wouldn't eat your space too much. Wait patiently until the next move. 

Open the app once it completed download in your phone, slide to left or right until you see this "Peri-Vilege" on your screen and tap it.

Just forget about the old peri-vilege if you did sign up the card like me previously, the new system means you need to register again.

Once you tap "Register", it will switch you to Safari app (mine is like that, ain't sure if yours are the same or not), fill up all your information and there is a column stated as "optional". I recommend you to spend few seconds to fill in the information as you will be rewarded a Chili once you completed the column; will tell you how the Chili work in later part. 

You are almost there! You will then receive a SMS with the Verification Code, key-in in the Nando's MY app and that's it!

You will have your own membership number. What you need to do is flash this app with your membership number on the screen upon ordering to start collect Chilies. These chilies are for you to earn your rewards; spend a minimum of RM30 (in single receipt, excluding government tax and service charge) and you can get a Chili. Like I told you earlier, you are entitled a Chili after you fill in the optional information while registering the membership, tap "View My Chili/Rewards" to check total of chilies you have earn so far. 

What rewards you will get from the Chilies? Here's the answer:

• The 3rd Chili gets you 1/4 chicken
• The 6th Chili gets you 1/2 chicken
• The 9th Chili gets you whole chicken

After you've collected 9th Chili, Nando's will restart your Chili journey from 1st Chili while all of your saved rewards remain in your membership account. So now I have 1 Chili in my account, 2 more to go then I'll earn my 1/4 chicken, how worth! For more info, you may just read Nando's peri-vilege website here to know how to redeem the rewards. Wait no more, take your smart phone now and download the app! 

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We made pizza for lunch just now! Om nom nom.

Re-visit Sushi Zento . dinner treat

I went to Sushi Zento located at Precint 10 like million times, you may read the previous post here and here to know my previous experiences. I always went there during weekdays so I do not experienced bad service like what I read from other blog(s), weekdays = lesser diners in the restaurant mah. So this time we went there during weekends (nah, we didn't purposely plan to go there during Saturday night), for the sake of eating Japanese food after so many Korean stuff nowadays. Of course, to avoid the waiting time in Sushi Zento, we called earlier to make reservation, this is a must whenever you are about to dine there, no kidding. 

This was my first time sitting in their "glass room" partition instead of inside the restaurant. The you will ask, will it be troublesome when you feel to get some sushi since there is no conveyor belt in the glass room? I'll say it will be if it was last time, but now they are no more using the conveyor belt service in the restaurant, so no different for you to sit near to conveyor belt or the glass room. This is to ensure all the sushi plates they served to diners are fresh and in good condition, I kind of love this idea as sometimes I do not know how long is the sushi been putting on the conveyor belt and ain't sure if they are still fresh to eat. Thumb up for you.

The caterpillar-like of wasabi. There is no sweet sauce on the table, if you need it just wave your hand to the staffs. Talk no more, will straight away go to the food part. 

Shake Yaki Meshi | RM10

My all-time-fav in the Sushi Zento, the price for the salmon fried rice still remain the same as 2 years back, this is why I love it more. The normal fried rice cost you around RM7, why not add a bit to have better taste than just normal fried rice right? Personal thought. The salmon fried rice isn't greasy, every bite you have you can still feel/taste the diced salmon, wonderful I would say. I still remember I posted this before and said that it was quite salty 2 years back, but now I think it is not, maybe they change the recipe a little bit or my taste-buds just gone haywire. It is just up to my liking now. 

Buta Kakuni Ramen | RM20

I seldom have ramen in Japanese restaurant, if really want to have noodles I'll go to udon first instead of ramen; I always thought that the ramen taste is quite insipid. But we give it a try this time, and it totally blow my mind. The noodles is served together with stewed pork belly, flavoured half boiled egg and Japanese fish cake that at first should be cooked in soy sauce broth according to the menu. The friendly staff suggested us to change the soy sauce broth to Kyushu soup (pork-bone soup) as it will make the ramen double heavenly and she is right with that! The soup is so 'creamy' and rich that I would just finish it after I've done with the noodles. I would recommend this to you, so good and I just couldn't forget the taste of the stewed pork belly, so soft and melted in mouth. 

Wakadori Teriyaki | RM16

My first try the pan-fried chicken with teriyaki sauce was at Edo Ichi, so I kind of in love with that taste after my first try, this is why made me to order this that night. Same taste and the chicken is so juicy! The chef is so generous for giving more teriyaki sauce in this dish, you may dip the pan-fried chicken with that sauce to make it tastier. 

Una Cheese Roll + Shake Tataki Roll | RM26

At first, we just wanted to order the Shake Tataki Roll, a reverse roll topped with seared salmon; when we placed the order, the staff again asked us whether we want to exchange the another half to Una Cheese Roll. which topped wit sliced eel and cheese. One roll consist of 8 pieces of sushi, then we decided to change 4 pieces with another flavor; we pay same price to try 2 different flavor, worth! I was then asked her are all the rolls can be exchange, then she said only this 2 can be mixed, the rest are not, we were lucky to order that btw. Both taste good especially with the herbs on top of the roll, it enhance the taste. 

Yaki Gyoza | RM9

The must order dish in Sushi Zento, I'll definitely order gyoza whenever I'm in a Japanese restaurant, and the one in Sushi Zento is the best I had. Always, people tend to like the gyoza which stuffed with more minced pork and vegetables, but I feel that a good gyoza doesn't need to have a lot of stuffing, the portion of vegetables and minced pork must be in proper ratio and the soy sauce is also important to enhance the taste of gyoza. It's up to my liking so I would like to recommend you as well, but if you like more stuffing in gyoza then you might not like it tho. Overall, I feel that their service is good even during weekends and there were full house when I was there, I still feel that the staffs trying hard to serve us and they are quite friendly. 

I'm the person who willing to spend more on food, as long as they are worth the money, you might think that I'm so rich and are able to spend so much on food but this is how I enjoy my life. Some people prefer to spend theirs on make up kits, clothes, accessories and etc. but I prefer to spend mine on food. You might think that I didn't control my diet and grow wider compare to last time, but you didn't notice that I was actually too thin few years back, I feel healthier and stronger this way. Nah, just my midnight thought. One shouldn't judge others by its cover, if you really care about them, you should care their happiness but not their weight. END.

Location

Precint 10, 10-A-11 & 12, Jalan Tanjung Tokong, 10470 Penang.

Business Hours

11am - 11pm (Daily)

Contact Number

04-899 2725

Facebook

Sushi Zento

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抱著太大的期望看LUCY，結果...