Food Travelogue in Taichung!

Without a doubt, our best time in Taiwan was actually during our two days one night in Taichung, Taiwan. Not only we had fun with Alex's family from his mum's side, we also had a lot of good food. A LOT of food.

So, our foodie adventure started once we arrived at the train station. Just a walk away, there was this fancy shop, very crowded, selling local delicacies in creative packaging.

They sell desserts too, but because the queue was just too ridiculous, we went to meet the aunt and cousin at their other branch, another 5 minutes walk away~


This branch was of a different concept. Renovated from an old bank, this branch is popular for its 卤味 (braised dishes)

Alex and I only shared a drink, while savouring some braised dishes the aunt had ordered~

And apparently, when in Taichung, one must eat its 肉丸 (gigantic meat ball. I added in 'gigantic' because you will see why soon)

So, we did. Aunty Meigo took us to this eatery which was supposedly the favourite place of my mum-in-law..

 Did you see how enormous one meat ball is??? So what they do is, they deep fry the meat ball (which has soup in it!) first, then serve it with some homemade sweet chilli and garlic and soy sauce.

How one portion looks like..

and here's a better look at it~

Very juicy, and addictive. I was full after one, but turns out most people would order more than one. My mum-in-law could even finish three by herself ;)

Throughout our stay in Taiwan, we been to this franchise 春水堂 numerous times because its really good. In Taichung, we found ourselves in that franchise twice, different outlets both visits, but consistently good quality and experience.

Here are some of the yummy snacks we had during our visits.

 三沾小麻吉

 鮮三菇

 港式蘿蔔糕

 芋頭糕

 茶香蠔油鳳爪

奶油吐司

and Alex's favourite of all time

deep-fried mantou, dipped in condensed milk.

All of the items were really good. The deep fried items are not oily at all, and the braised items are very flavourful. There were a couple more dishes that we tried but due to them been eaten before getting immortalised through the lens, yup.. gone. lol

In Taichung, there is also a really famous night market ~ 凤甲夜市

and some of the loots from the night market..

 corn grilled in 'sha cha' sauce.

 A small sausage sandwiched in a bigger sausage! Wickedly yums!

and we had more salted chicken nuggets, tempura, chips, and fresh fruits..

Next morning, Aunt Angela bought us breakfast - the taiwanese way~

So so full~~~

And just when we thought we tasted all, we were treated to a luncheon at 廖妈妈 - a hakka restaurant, as our congratulatory meal with the extended family of Alex's mum. I really could not remember the names of the dishes, so just feast your eyes ;)

and just when you find yourself too full to even move or digest the wonderful meal you had, they served us complimentary desserts!

 Chewy pearl balls in syrup

and my all-time favourite..

mochi with lots and lots of peanuts!!!!

 

*burps*
That was a really good meal.

And that ends our finger-licking good trip in Taichung! Hope I managed to get your stomachs growling ;)

Review: G Hotel Sesame Restaurant Wedding Package

Continuing back from our unpleasant experience with Macalister Mansion, after long hours of browsing and comparing options, Alex and I came across G Hotel and I finally made contact with them for their wedding packages.

To our pleasant surprise, not only were their replies swift, but also very helpful. The only thing that might have caused us some inconvenience was probably the high turnover among their staff, as throughout our interaction and liaising with them between mid June till our wedding date on the 13th of December, we had different people taking over our event - to the point that out of our 3 drives up to the hotel, we were greeted by different coordinating teams/staff. Needless to say, there were some issues on the wedding day itself, but mainly to do with the rooms reservation (might blog about in the future) and also miscommunication in not providing us with the complimentary Executive Suite (which was later rectified), the food and beverage team were given strict instructions to provide the best service they could for our personal wedding. And I have to say, they went beyond our expectations and all our family and guests were really pleased with the whole run through of the event.

So let's have a look at the package we had. Keep it mind that we were only looking for a venue and package that suits a small and intimate wedding of only 60 guests. Thankfully, G Hotel recently started to introduce such packages for their Soy and Sesame Restaurant.

For their Intimate Sesame Wedding package (RM1188++ per table which equals to RM1378.08 per table), it came with

• Sumptuous supreme 9 course Chinese Set

• Free flow of Chinese tea

• Free flow of soft drinks or fruit punch

• Complimentary pre-dinner cocktail with selection of two (02) snacks

• 5-tier wedding cake for cake cutting ceremony

• Champagne fountain set-up with 2-bottles of sparkling juice for toasting

• Complimentary backdrop

• Complimentary usage of multimedia projector

• Red carpet aisle with special flower display

• Fresh flower poises on all dining tables and reception table

• Tea light candles for all dining tables

• Elegant designed set-up for bridal main table with fresh flowers

• Special chair décor for bridal main table

• Complimentary food tasting with one (01) bottle of house wine

• Complimentary wedding invitation cards

• Complimentary guest’s signature book

• Delectable Chocolate pralines to your guests as a giveaway

• Chinese red dates tea

• Complimentary usage of tea set

• A pair of Christofle chopstick

• Capturing the moment at Hotel’s premises can be arranged

• Exclusive VIP parking lot for bridal car at the Hotel façade

• One session of Danai Signature Massage

• Complimentary fitness centre membership for one month

• Complimentary dinner for 02 persons on your 1st Anniversary

• On Your Wedding Night: Complimentary One (1) luxurious night stay at Executive Suite with breakfast 

Sounded pretty good to us. So I paid the first deposit (half of the actual cost), went up to G Hotel for the food tasting with my family, Alex was able to visit the place a day before the wedding, finer details were discussed and carried out with great teamwork, and all in all, we had a beautiful time during the wedding celebration.

This is how Soy restaurant looked like.

 (photo taken from http://www.ghotel.com.my/images/gallery/dining/sesame-soy/10.jpg)

which was transformed into this for our Christian ceremony and exchange of vows

and then we moved on to Sesame Restaurant (connected to Soy) for the chinese tea ceremony and the wedding dinner~

which originally was this..

(photos taken from ghotel.com.my)

and beautifully arranged into this...

 

 

 

I would also love to have pictures of the food, but unfortunately most people might not be as unembarrassed to snap the food. Plus, service is different for the main table and the guest tables. While the guest tables were served a huge portion for 10, while a waiting staff serve them individually; at the main table, we were given and served individual portions with different presentation altogether.

So, I only have pictures of the food taken during food tasting, and also some pictures taken by my brother-in-law with his HTC One lol.

(by the way, while we expected the food to be mediocre or not as nice as the ones we had during food tasting, they surprised us with good flavours and generous portion. There were many compliments for the food served! Kudos to the chef!)

So we began our feast with

Kerabu kwei fei abalone
Vietnam prawn rolls
Baked sliced smoked duck meat
Fresh scallops with asparagus

and then came the Seafood soup of crabmeat and dry scallop with bamboo fungus (which we chose to replace the sharkfin soup)

  (it was so good, everyone thought they were having sharkfin. Very fragrant, light yet flavourful.)

The other dishes of the day were..

 

Fried prawn with cheese and garlic.

Braised sea cucumber with limpet abalone and broccoli

  

Baked cod fish in honey sauce

 Roasted duck with mini mantau

 Pineapple boat fried rice

and dessert were..

Chilled mango with pomelo (left)
Chilled honeydew melon with sago and ice cream (right)

and my uncle (the head pastry chef of shangrila kota kinabalu) also brought along his cake for me (the best cheesecake ever), and instructed the kitchen staff on how to serve us the cake lol

All in all,
I can only say that despite the whole hoohah we had with the hotel in terms of rooms reservation, we were extremely pleased with our decision to choose G Hotel's Sesame and Soy Restaurant as our wedding venue.
The pictures above (if not credited) are all taken with our personal cameras. More pictures of the wedding will be shared later on once I have the copies from our professional photographer ;)

The New Year

Phew.. and just like that, it is 2014.

New Zealand is one of the countries that welcomes the new year first, so Alex cheekily told me to call up my parents (in Malaysia) at 12+am New Zealand time (which was 7+ in the evening in Malaysia), and said "Hey, I'm calling from the future." Hahahahaha.. I know... It was pretty lame.. But we did it anyway hahahahaha...

Most of the time, the new year's eve is a good time to just reflect on the year or some just go all out to party. For us, we were literally the least happening young couple out there hahahaha. Let's see, what did we do?

We woke up slightly late, had our usual breakfast - a banana each, toast with eggs and spinach, yoghurt. Then, we got ready for a drive up to Whatipu - a really beautiful and untouched beach with black sands, located quite a drive away from the Huia dams. So as much as I love the beach, I actually do not look forward to the drive through the very winding and narrow roads...

So after an hour's drive, we were greeted with..

It feels great to feel like you have the whole place to yourself. While most people cramped themselves in the over-crowded Piha beach, a little detour brought us to such sanctuary. The weather was just beautiful, and the view was breathtaking.. A perfect place to enjoy each other's company, and say goodbye to the year~~~

After that, we went back home, lazed, watched two movies, I prepared dinner, we had dinner, watched more stuff on the computer and TV, and saw the fireworks from the sunroom of our lil home.

That was how we bid goodbye to 2013.


Back to some seriousness,
2013 was an incredible year. There was a lot of tears, despair, hope, wonder, more tears, drama, huge lessons, being humbled, and just being in awe of God's timing and plans, which are always greater than our understanding.

2014 is going to be a crucial year for Alex and I - where we will be? will we be separated by distance again? will our careers change?

So many questions, but your guess is as good as ours - we too have no idea how things will pan out.
All i know is, there is a kind of liberty and peace - to stop trying to steer our lives to the way we want or understand, and just allow God to be God. We will continue to be steadfast in our faith and in our prayers, and I can't wait to see what our Lord has in store for us this year :)

Happy New Year to all of you too!
Let it be a year of redemption, revival and finding the purpose of our lives !!!