Accidentally had most of a week off, so I’ll return with a positive review. This restaurant has been established at Publika Mall for a while, but recently set up shop in Suria KLCC. My colleagues recommended it, so we gave it a try. It serves a mix of local and more bistro (actual bistro, rather than mamak) style food. In KLCC it has a small indoor area, but more outside seating complete with plastic plants. We ended up outside, which was a bit corridor-like, but we were seated away from the main walkway.
I’d like to say we knew we wouldn’t get dinner, so went for a big meal for lunch…however that would be fibbing. In reality, the food looked so interesting (and we misjudged portion size) that we ended up having a huge lunch and not being able to eat our dinner!
Wife chose mussels to start, and nasi kerabu and ayam percik as her main. Naturally the latter arrived first. The blue rice came with chicken floss on the top, a vegetable accompaniment of banana heart, cabbage, cucumber and long beans, plus salted egg, a mild sambal belacan (shrimp and chilli sauce), another sauce (salty, she said), and of course the chicken itself. Percik means splashed, and here that meant the chicken was cooked to a crunch with spices and had a mild coconut curry sauce on it. She thought the whole set was really good.
The seafood starter is a build-your-own affair – first choose clams or mussels, then your dipping side of chips, garlic bread or man tou (small deep-fried sweet fluffy buns), and finally your sauce from a range of 16, I think. These sauces range from classic French/Belgian options for mussels (though none wine-based) to chilli or lemongrass Eastern styles. Wife had mussels in lemon garlic butter with man tou. This seems to have been a strong combination, as she said it made the best version of this dish she had had in Malaysia!
I had a starter of sweet potato fries with blue cheese sauce (crinkle cut normal chips are available). The sweet potato was done Taiwan-style with a very light coating; the blue cheese mayo was salty and tangy, went really well with the root vegetable, and was plentiful! Perfect example of how to do a simple dish well.
My main was ‘breakfast in bread’, vegetarian version. Each of these dishes is a crusty roll hollowed out and filled with a breakfast option. Mine was peppers, leeks, spinach and mushrooms, topped with cheese and a fried egg. To ice the cake, the top of the roll was made into very good garlic bread. If I were making this at home, I would put the vegetables in a light sauce, but that is probably the only improvement. Except adding chillies, obviously.
We really didn’t need any more food than that, but we are both fans of creme brûlée, and they had a trio set. These were vanilla, chocolate, and mango. The latter two were fine, but not an improvement over the basic dessert, in fact perhaps even a detraction. Didn’t stop it being a tasty way to finish our gluttony!
Service was really the only let down, and that sprang from inexperience and over enthusiasm, we guessed. At one point we counted five people in turn checking we had received everything! Nearly all of the staff seemed very nervous, and unsure what they were doing; however it was good natured. It was a toss up as to whether to score very high or just high overall. I was in a very generous mood after the food, but if I go back in 3 months and the service is dubious, I’ll drop it.
Address: Lot 415, Floor 4, Suria KLCC, Jalan Ampang, 50088 Kuala Lumpur
Telephone: 0172238018
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