will i am's delayed diary

SimonLover was missing Thailand, so we had a Thai dinner at Aroi Mak Mak in Petaling Jaya. Goes without saying that KH joined us, but Drew ( previously known as QueerRanter-D ) was an uncommon dinner guest. Ever since he separated from Apollo, he was a tad bored, so we got him out of the house. The food at Aroi Mak Mak was just average in my opinion, but at least they had some decent vegetarian choices for Drew. For the first time, I had deep-fried kangkung. SimonLover says that it's a Malaysian thing at local Thai restaurants.  Naturally we looked for a place to yumcha after dinner. Omulab was full to the brim with a a long waiting list. That good ah? KH suggested that we go to Er Lou Cafe which was located on the second floor, a few doors down. Had the whole place to ourselves. SimonLover was in the mood for tong sui , but the the funny thing was, they didn't let him order it ala carte. Furthermore, there was an ala carte option for tong sui in the menu. In the end, Simon

  SK recently received her bonus payout, so it was the perfect excuse to wine and dine. She treated mum, KH, Gratitude, and I to a modern tapas dinner at Little Pig . Started off the night with some red and white sangria, and then she started mowing through the menu! That's the fun thing about eating with SK. I recommended the Crispy Pork Belly Eel Bao, and she loved it so much that she made a repeat order. The simple dish of potato omelette was also surprising good. The grilled octopus came with a sauce that screamed Kayu Nasi Kandar. I'll let the photos do the talking!

  The Year of the Rat luncheon organized by Apollo's mum fell a bit short on guests. The Tribe, KT,  MiniMe, and SK all couldn't make it. KH arrived ahead of mum and I, who came after Sunday mass. Interestingly, Apollo had drinks display at his living room, showcasing the variety of beverages that he had stocked up. He had everything from canned coffee, to sodas, to pre-packed leong cha. Wicked.  Our absent guests for 2020 missed out on a lot of delicious dishes like roast chicken, spring rolls, sweet and sour pomfret, vinegar chicken ( a halal take on vinegar pork leg with peanuts! ), assorted tempura, vegetable curry, stewed sea cucumber, crab meat and fish maw soup, and arrowroot chicken. However, that didn't stop us from polishing the food off the plates. Even opened a bottle of wine. My CNY binge continued in the evening. An ex-colleague of mine organized a potluck at their new home. As usual, I brought roast duck, while my more talented colleagues cooked. The host pre

The day after Ren Ri is the 8th day of the Lunar Chinese New Year. At night, the Hokkiens will go crazy over the Pai Ti Gong ritual which involves elaborate preparations of food offerings, prayer items, sugarcane, and fireworks. It's the CNY season's second wind. Some households turn it into a major gathering of family and friends. The energy can be felt at the morning market as people do last minute shopping for the occasion.  In the afternoon, I had a lunch date with SimonLover. The main point was for him to pass me an underwear stash. Haha. He helped me buy some stuff from the STUD warehouse sale. We met at Happy Sabah Pork Noodles , a place that serves sang nyuk noodles. It was too hot to chat there, so we moved on to ATE TEA Cafe .  Here's my stash : STUD scribble swim shorts STUD camo swim trunks STUD camo mesh brief -  Thank you SimonLover! <3   Zara camo socks -  Thank you SimonLover! <3 <3 Aussiebum Pride Mesh brief - Thank you SimonLover! <3 <3

Gratitude came all the way from Klang to treat us to a CNY lunch at Restoran Jing Man Lou in Seri Kembangan . It was a shocker to find that the whole restaurant was crawling with multi-coloured Styrofoam dragons. A few tables were occupied, but hardly full. The CNY menu was also limited which did not please our host.    The main point was to have lou sang , and of course have a pot of waxed meat rice. The food wasn't very impressive, but perhaps it was because we didn't order their signature set which is a 10-dish platter with one soup in the middle.    As though the meal wasn't enough, we went to Day Nine Kitchen for coffee and dessert.   SK's stomach is like a black hole, she could still order bagels immediately after a heavy lunch.   Back home, I put up customized Catholic CNY couplets that I requested from my secondary schoolmate. SK collected it from him during her recent trip to Kuantan. 

Boxing day was kinda boring, so SK suggested that we have a nice coffee session at Day Nine Kitchen , Taman Equine. One thing I like is that they often have seasonal specials. For Christmas, they had spiced cake, and spiked coffee! Not surprising that the cake wasn't to SK's liking due to the cinnamon, but she definitely approved of the whisky in the coffee. A great way to while the afternoon away...

The tradition of a Christmas meal with Gratitude started in 2011 and continued in 2012 . For some reason, it stopped, and we suddenly revived it in 2019. Immediately after Christmas morning mass, mum and I stepped on it to make it to Klang for a special lunch. Arrived at nearly the same time as SK and her globetrotter friend from Singapore, CG. They met at Stonehenge and kept in contact since. Gratitude had just removed the roast chicken from the oven, and was just beginning to plate it with the roasted vegetables. He had cooked up a storm to make up for the lost years. In addition to the chicken, there was a herbed salad with feta cheese, spicy aglio-olio spaghetti, potato salad, pork chops, and fruits. Everything was delicious. Gratitude really spoiled us. Dessert was Neopolitan ice cream with strawberries, and we even had Moscato during over post-lunch chat. Christmas dinner was with The Tribe back at Equine Park. Ordered Hakka dishes at Restoran Ker Jia Zhuang . Bored of the

Kenji, the cutie from Vancouver was in town, so it was our obligation to fatten him up with his favourite foods. Long before his arrival, we had quizzed him about his cravings. We narrowed it down to Hokkien Mee. And deciding which shop took another long process. On the appointed day, we met up at his home in Bukit Jalil. Said a quick "Hi" to his parents and passed him the packs of BKT herbs that he had requested. All of us ( Kenji, KH, Sharky ) went in one car to Jalan Dua in Cheras. When we arrived, we couldn't find the hokkien mee stall. Disaster! My research was lacking. Turns out that they close on Sundays. Opps. At the last minute, we made an on the spot decision to go to Mun Wah which was thankfully just ten minutes away. The whole table was filled with their specialties~ hokkien mee , pak ko ( something new for our VIP guest ), fried chicken wings, and fried fish cake. Pretty decent quality, but I don't think it's a must-have for me. Escaping th

Mum's heel was still hurting regardless of the multiple visits to the orthopaedic specialist at Tung Shin. Decided to try TDMC instead. Waiting times were much better there. The doctor told us that it was bursitis and would not go away so easily. He switched the medication, and recommended mum to undergo shock-wave therapy to clear off the inflammation. With the medical consultation out if the way, we went to get some comfort food at Kuchai Lama. Been wanting to try the curry noodles at Restoran New Lian Hin . We weren't disappointed. The curry was really thick and creamy. As if it wasn't sinful enough, we had the buburchacha too. Another explosion of santan with starchy chunks of yam and sweet potato. Although it was already late, we still made a quick stop at OUG market. Still managed to get some marketing done. In the evening, we received a dinner invitation from SK and Bryanisation. Shocked when they said that it was gonna be HaiDiLao . The pair of them actu

Celebrated Cutiepie's birthday four days after the actual date. KH and I asked her out to a simple dinner at The Sphere, Bangsar South. The choice of food was Dutch at a cafe called Koffie Kraft . Definitely a departure from our usual choices. And guess what? Its operated by a Korean. Chose a classic dish called bitterballen . A beef croquette that has a really interesting, pasty kind of internal texture even after it had been deep-fried to a golden brown. And if you ever go there, the pumpkin latte is to die for. Forgot about that once-a-year PSL nonsense at Starbucks. This is the real deal! At the end of the dinner, we force-fed Cutiepie a dessert platter ( waffle, stroopwafel, cheese cake, etc ) to celebrate her age upgrade.

Called in late on Friday because I had to patch a punctured tyre. Took me less than ten minutes, and MYR5, which is cheap by usual standards. Decided pack a box of keria gula melaka for my colleagues before heading to work. I had to wait around half an hour for them to whip up the first batch. Towards the end of my wait, I observed a peculiar scene at the stall. A lady filled a wok with a bunch of palm sugar. Then she fished out a packet of rock sugar and proceeded to wash it with water. Once that was done, she slashed the top with a pair of scissors, and the contents joined the gula melaka in the wok. I squinted my eyes, and then it dawned on me why she washed the packet earlier~ the rock sugar in the wok was crawling with ants. Lol. I wonder if the batch the lady was packing for me at the moment had a similar secret ingredient. Haha. Later that evening, I had a dinner date with SimonLover, Boon, and KH. Boon wanted to eat at Grub by Ah Hong . SimonLover and I were able to g

Sunday was pretty uneventful except for a dinner excursion to Klang Town. Really surprised that the Royal Town of Selangor is quite dead at night. Nary a shop was open, and the streets were not well-lit. Even more surprising was the fact that transexual sex workers canvas the streets around Jalan Temoh, pulling motorcyclists off their bikes! Agressive sales tactics. Gratitude jio -ed us for dinner at Noble Seafood , a restaurant with multiple accolades. Several signature dishes were chosen by our host. I must admit that the Stir-fried tapioca noodles is very good. Not overly oily, and has the requisite wok qi . On the other hand, I wasn't very impressed with the oyster mee suah . Felt a little flat. Other than that, the crispy chicken with almonds is something worth trying. After dinner, we went hunting for peanut soup. The original stall was at Emporium Makan, but all of the operators were dispersed after the place was demolished for the MRT project. Found the only pork