Ministry Of Coffee @ Solaris Mont Kiara, KL

Having heard of Ministry of Coffee (MOC), I somewhat failed to check out the exact location of this cafe when I was at the neighbourhood. And one day, 'ta-dah', I spotted it. If one enters the SOHO car park, just look for the J exit, and MOC is facing the back road of the building. 

Here is the Ministry

I somewhat did not expect the size of the cafe to be this big. It occupied up to 2 floors, and overall, it offers an absolutely comfortable environment for those who appreciates spending good relaxing time in cafes. 

A view from the upper floor 

Having read the story on Doi Chaang coffee, I felt that its a story worth telling. It began when villagers of this hill tribe of the Doi chang Village (located in Northern Thailand region of the Golden Triangle) united to create their own coffee company. Talk about team work! The effort resulted in their own unique taste of single-estate, organic Arabica coffee. It is in fact now recognized as the top 1% of coffee. And having received many accolades for its quality of bean, one would not need any other assurance of the coffee quality. 

Story on Doi Chaang coffee 

I like the whole deco of Ministry of Coffee. Spacious, high ceiling, with a feature area, where they hang many colorful cups and sauces turned upside down, incorporating them to lighting. A creative way of using such simple items. 

Look up, or look down (if you're from the upper floor) and once will be cheered looking at such colorful lights

I was pleasantly surprised by the selection of food made available by this cafe, where they offered pasta, pizza, sandwich, salad, which comes in variety of choices, apart from their specialty coffee. 

In future, I will not pretend to be a person that is able to take strong coffee. I ordered the Piccolo Latte at first, where it is made up of double shot of espresso, and very little milk. I could take really bitter Chinese medicine, but I wouldn't want my coffee to taste this bitter. I then had to request for additional milk to add on. Then it turned out to be Latte like drink, which I was very much comfortable with. The distinct rich taste of the coffee aroma was apparent. 

Piccolo Latte. Price-RM9.80 (added more milk, on my own)

Spotted Open Fish Pie on their menu. In fact, I didn't really have much clue of what I was ordering. But when I was presented the food, oh i see... This is an open style pie, whereby instead of closing it up as a pie, its actually exposed. Cooked with creamy sauce, which taste absolutely delicious, it came with pan fried seabass, sauteed vegetable, and creamy mashed potato. 

Open Fish Pie. Price-RM21.80

Just look at how beautiful is this dish. They gave generous portion of the fish, and the seabass does tasted very fresh and delicious. Within this plate of dish, there were so much of vegetables, which made up of capsicum, zucchini, carrot, and spring onions. 

The mashed potatoes was not too smashed up, and I could taste chunks of potatoes, which gave a different texture to the tastebud, and the portion was seriously a lot, and I definitely couldn't finish my meal. 
As for the the cream, it was indeed very creamy and tasty, with the right level of saltiness. Thumbs up to this dish. 

Beneath the dish 

I was indeed very pleased with the selection, quality of food and coffee served here. Definitely calls for a second visit, soon. 

Ministry of Coffee 
J-G-09, Soho KL, 
Solaris Mont Kiara, 
50480 Mont Kiara, KL 

Tel : 03-6211 5531 

Business Hours : Fri & Sat 8.30am - 12mn; all other days 8.30am-11pm 

Facebook link, here

Shisha Lounge @ Solaris Mont Kiara

Having started its operation since 2009, Shisha Lounge has survived through its years of operation, when I see many F&B outlets has changed its operator, around the SOHO Solaris area.

I was somewhat convinced to come try food at Shisha Lounge last weekend, and was told that they served really good tasting Iranian food. In addition to this, they also served other varieties like Italian, Korean, Western like food.

I ought to say, this is one of the best food discovery, as I was almost in heaven, when I savor this one of the best tasting food I've ever tried. Hey, where have I been?

We started with the Gheymeh and Eggplant stew. Gheymeh is a Persian stew and in this option that we ordered, consist of eggplant and split peas. I love the thickness of this stew, that just goes so well with our rice. Eggplant is loved by Iranians and known as "the potato of Iran"..

Gheymeh & Eggplant Stew. Price-RM28

As part of side order to accompany our rice, we also ordered the yoghurt, that comes with small cuts of cucumbers, and dashes of mint. 

Yoghurt. Price-RM6

Yummeh Saffron rice..

The one photo I did not took was the saffron rice.  This was one of the best tasting rice ever. As I tried to find out a little more, I understand that Iranians has 3 methods of cooking rice. In this particular saffron rice that I tried, its parboiled rice, called 'chelo' where rice is first soaked in salted water before boiling. It is then drained and returned to the pot to be steamed. This method results in an exceptionally fluffy rice with the rice grains separated and non sticky. A big plate enough to be shared by 2 only costed us RM5. Way too reasonable. It also came with some butter for us to mix with the rice, resulting me to have continuous thought about this rice, even days after this meal I had. Oh dear! This is like I've fallen in love... with rice... *__*

A point to note, we ordered the Kebab, and the wait for a little long.. I think slightly around 20.. but but, it was definitely worth the wait, as the meat  has to be slowly barbecued, upon order.

We had the Barg Kebab which means Fillet Kebab, which is a Persian styled barbecued lamb, chicken or beef.  We ordered the beef, whereby its cut to stripes and marinated in onion and mix herbs. It was so flavorful, and with it being barbecued, the taste was even more enhanced, and the meat was so tender. A little sourish flavor that came with squeeze of lime onto the beef, alleviate the taste a little more.

Barg Kebab. Price-RM30

Being a chicken lover, we also ordered the Chicken Kebab. I'm not exaggerating if I say that this is one of the best tasting chicken that I ever tasted. Its insanely good! Again so flavorful, and the marination must have worked so well, as I totally can taste full flavor on every part of the meat.

Chicken Kebab on bone. Price-RM35

Shisha Lounge also offer performance daily, starting from 11pm.. and was told it ends around 3am. To all the late night crowd, this would be the right place to go.. And reservation is necessary for Fri-Sun, as there are huge crowd during these days.

Section for the band

Tropical setting ambiance

I can't wait to be back, again for the same food, and to try other varieties, and would definitely love to see the performance.

Shisha Lounge
Lot J-01-01 till 03
1st Floor, Soho KL,
Solaris Mont Kiara,
2 Jalan Solaris,
50480 KL
Tel :  03-6211 2338 H/P: 017 616 4043

Business Hours : 12pm-3am (however, during my 1st attempt to eat here, it wasn't open till 1pm).

Haagen-Dazs @ Solaris, Mont Kiara

A day after I snapped this shot, I was making my friends guess what this is.. Naturally, they all replied - salmon sushi la...They gave me a unbelievable look when I revealed that this is actually Haagen-Dazs latest creation - ice-cream shaped in sushi form. This latest creation by Haagen-Dazs wins, bar none, when come to their innovation in creation something as special as this.

This was part of the sushi on Sushi Platter served by Haagan Dazs

I was privileged to be invited by Pat-Lin Communications, PR company for Haagen-Dazs, to be amongst the group to try this, a day after its launch.

Regina doing the brief introduction - "boys & girls, may I have your attention please. thanks for being here this evening...."

Everything about Haagen-Dazs reflects their tagline of 'Journey of Indulgence' and it even began from its new menu - such good quality, and just wish can bring it ie. the menu home.

Excellent quality menu - looks really like a coffee table book

As the appetizer, we were served the mini version of the 'Sweet Romance' which was ice-cream with strawberries, white chocolate marble, white chocolate shaving and whipped cream. For white chocolate lovers, one will definitely be pleased with this - strong white chocolate taste, and shaved so smoothly that it gives a melting effect in the mouth. The 'Sweet Romance' creation at its normal size of 1kg, is priced at RM138, and one can have the cake specially made based on ice-cream flavor of one's choice.

Mini version of the 'Sweet Romance'

And here comes the highlight of the evening - the Sushi Platter, made up of 4 pieces of pretty and delectable ice-cream sushi. When the platter was served, oh boy, were we blown away.... it looked so real. This has been created for the ice-cream lovers that appreciates their me time, while indulging the ultimate in ice-cream.

We can't help but to admire the 4 well crafted sushi in this Sushi Platter before tasting it. Overall, great presentation and truly pleasing to the eyes, giving ice-cream lovers another meaning and experience in eating ice-cream.

Not only the sushi (or rather ice-cream) looked so real, it even has a small scoop of green tea ice-cream representing 'wasabi' which is a must-have as part of any sushi platter. Brilliant or what.. ^-^

Sushi Platter. Price-RM35

In this Sushi Platter, 2 of the sushi use vanilla ice-cream as the base, and 2 use macadamia nut ice-cream. This is because the solidity of this 2 flavours that made them most suitable to be used as the base. Well, can't imagine how many rounds of experiment would have taken place before finally coming out with this.

Though all 4 - Mango & Passion Fruit Sushi, Strawberry Gunkan, Kiwi Gunkan an Mango Sorbet Sushi tasted good, I especially loved the Mango Sorbet Sushi. Ought to be the due to the extra effort required to intersperse between the Mango Sorbet and vanilla ice-cream that made the salmon looking ice-cream possible.

To emulate the sushi look, chocolate was used to wrap around the sushi - representing seaweed.

A true indulgence

Proudly, this sushi platter was created in Malaysia itself, and has been launched in 6 other markets.

Dina and I, truly enjoyed our 'meal'

While indulging ourselves with this excellent creation, it was just praises heard around this cosy session at Haagen-Dazs's SOHO outlet.

Thanks to Regina and Joelle from Pat-Lin Communications, and also to the client's side, for extending the invitation to us.

Häagen-Dazs Soho KL
K-OG-12 Solaris Mon't Kiara,
No.2, Jalan Solaris,
50480 Kuala Lumpur
Tel:603-6203 6695
Fax:603-6203 6696

Porto Romano @ Mont Kiara

Passed by this particular Porto Romano outlet at Mont Kiara many times while heading to Solaris. And since we are to look for place to eat around this neighbourhood, suggested this Italian Mediterranean restaurant to Cass. After this dinner, I was recommending this place to few other friends, and found that this restaurant seemed to be missed, probably over-shined by its neighbour, Wendy's.

The traffic was rather smooth, and we managed to be on time, at 7pm for dinner. Having 2 floors seating, I opted to sit upstairs. Though the lower floor seemed pleasing to me, the upper floor was even better. Cosy, romantic ambiance and spacious enough. The business was really good as the restaurant got filled up in next hour or so, and saw quite a fair share of Korean and Japanese (as Mont Kiara is one of THE area for expats).

Inside the restaurant

We first had the salad, and this insalata porto romano salad was filled with fresh seafood, mix of squids, clams, mussels, and prawns marinated in herbs, lemon juice and extra virgin olive oil. The seafood was so fresh that you basically only need very mild sauce to go with it... and after adding on a wedge of lemon and salt, the taste got even better.

Insalata Porto Romano Salad. Price-RM20

Why have only 1 when we can have choice of 4 different types of pizza in 1 pizza? We went for the Four Seasons Pizza, where it allow us to choose 4 different variety of pizza, as long as original price of the pizza is less than the price of Four Seasons Pizza @ RM32. Choices of pizza we had was the mushroom, cheese, mediterranean, hawaiian. This is quite a good idea - at least each of us got to taste 1 slice of the 4 different variety, and I thought this was quite worth the price. The pizza size is huge, and by the end, we had a tough time finishing all. We were really satisfied with this order, as it tasted really good. Love the thin crust - each bite tasted good, and we were pleased with the generous portion of ingredients used. My favourite was the mushroom, and the mediterranean (where it used lots of mushroom and turkey ham, plus mozarella cheese).

Pizza Quattro Stagioni - Four Seasons Pizza. Price-RM32

We end our dinner by trying the Creama Catalana, a spanish dessert similar to creme brulee (meant burnt creme in French). We love this rich custord base topped with contrasting layer of hard caramel. The custard was cold, and with warm caramel. Don't mind having this again.

Crema Catalana. Price-RM12

We chatted and laughing the night away - and without realizing we were seated at this very cosy and romantic corner for a good 4 hours +. We were so engrossed in our conversation, that we didn't realize we were the last table left. ^-^

Good place for candle-lit dinner

Me and Cass, paused for a picture to be taken

Overall, the dinner was reasonably priced, yet with high quality and good tasting food served. Will definitely have more dinners here in days to come.

Porto Romano
28 Jalan Kiara,
Banyan, Mont Kiara,
50480 KL
Tel : 03-6207 8171

Departure Lounge @ Mont Kiara

I had a great Saturday yesterday. Wonderful lunch and dinner. In between that, I had some time to kill, so head on to Departure Lounge at Mont Kiara. Since I don't have space in my stomach, just had a cup of mint mocha while I surfed. Love the minty taste, complimented the coffee taste.

It was my first time ever hanging out on my own. Hmmm.. Not too bad. Liked it. Should do this more often. However, the speed of connection was really slow though. Yawn. And the 2 hours passed by real quickly - in fact only managed to clean up small % of my photographs.. .

Mint mocha. Price-RM9

There were quite a number of customers when I walked in. Love the cosy environment. Though both outlets are as cosy, I still prefer the Departure Lounge at Sunway Mas.

Books of various countries, for reference

Failed attempt to update my blog due to slow connection

Spotted this view while walking to car. Wonderful evening

Departure Lounge
No 10, Jalan Solaris 4,
Solaris, Mont Kiara, 50480 KL
Tel : 03-6203 0362

**Halal