Petaling Jaya - Hailam Cafe

Hailam Cafe is located in Jalan SS2/30 in Petaling Jaya, it is the same row as Lobsterman just behind Yee's Tuition. Its a corner shop by the lorong which looks like its spin off from the Tang House of Fishball, I noticed the staff wear the same uniform, having similar menu and serving the same yummy lime plum juice.

The main difference in the menu here are new items like fish noodles, which comes either in soup or fried with chee cheong fun. My personal preference is the fried fish noodles with chee cheong fun which goes for RM5.

Tea time snacks such as yam cake and Chinese desserts are available here too. Some of those available are sweet potato barley, black gluttonous rice, barley foo chuk jingko, etc. which goes from RM2 to RM5.

GPS: N3 06.781 E101 37.251

Ara Damansara - Tuk Tuk Dei

Tuk Tuk Dei technically means quite ok but so so in Cantonese and yet this is the name of nice and cozy coffeeshop in Ara Damansara. Its air conditioned and open and it just serve your usual coffeeshop stuff.

I like their teh-si special here, which is iced teh-si with palm sugar (gula melaka). You can see the layer of tea, milk and palm sugar in your drinks, taste just like any iced teh-si but palm sugar gives it a nice and rich aroma, pretty cool drink ;).

I tried their bittergound noodles here, its basically soup noodles with bittergound, tomato and chicken in it, nothing to shout about, but when you feel heaty, its something nice to eat. The char koay teow is also not bad and so if the wantan mee with roast pork and curry :).

GPS: N3 07.202 E101 34.746

Maran, Pahang - Sin Tong Kok Egg Tarts

We stopped by Maran for lunch after our camping trip to Hutan Lipur Jerangkang nearby, this is a busy restaurant serving reasonably good and priced Chinese dishes. The pillow pau seems to be very popular in this shop too and you have to order it in advance.

Anyhow, another popular thing here is their egg tarts which comes in many flavors. Other than the regular, you have a choice of pandan, dragon fruit, carrot, etc. Its quite unique and the good thing is the fruits flavor does not overwhelm the egg tarts. I find the regular and pandan one really good especially eating it when its hot!

RM1 per tart and you will need to wait for quite a while, because they will only start making the tarts once you have order them and the queue can get quite long ;).

Excellent Article On Cancer

Got this from one of those email forwards... very interesting ;

AFTER YEARS OF TELLING PEOPLE CHEMOTHERAPY IS THE ONLY WAY TO TRY AND ELIMINATE CANCER, JOHNS HOPKINS IS FINALLY STARTING TO TELL YOU THERE IS AN ALTERNATIVE WAY .

Cancer Update from Johns Hopkins


1. Every person has cancer cells in the body. These cancer cells do not show up in the standard tests until they have multiplied to a few billion. When doctors tell cancer patients that there are no more cancer cells in their bodies after treatment, it just means the tests are unable to detect the cancer cells because they have not reached the detectable size.

2. Cancer cells occur between 6 to more than 10 times in a person's lifetime.

3. When the person's immune system is strong the cancer cells will be destroyed and prevented from multiplying and forming tumours.

4. When a person has cancer it indicates the person has multiple nutritional deficiencies. These could be due to genetic, environmental, food and lifestyle factors.

5. To overcome the multiple nutritional deficiencies, changing diet and including supplements will strengthen the immune system.

6. Chemotherapy involves poisoning the rapidly-growing cancer cells and also destroys rapidly-growing healthy cells in the bone marrow, gastro-intestinal tract etc, and can cause organ damage, like liver, kidneys, heart, lungs etc.

7. Radiation while destroying cancer cells also burns, scars and damages healthy cells, tissues and organs.

8. Initial treatment with chemotherapy and radiation will often reduce tumor size. However prolonged use of chemotherapy and radiation do not result in more tumor destruction.

9. When the body has too much toxic burden from chemotherapy and radiation the immune system is either compromised or destroyed, hence the person can succumb to various kinds of infections and complications.

10. Chemotherapy and radiation can cause cancer cells to mutate and become resistant and difficult to destroy. Surgery can also cause cancer cells to spread to other sites.

11. An effective way to battle cancer is to starve the cancer cells by not feeding it with the foods it needs to multiply.

WHAT CANCER CELLS FEED ON:

a. Sugar is a cancer-feeder. By cutting off sugar it cuts off one important food supply to the cancer cells. Sugar substitutes like NutraSweet, Equal,Spoonful, etc are made with Aspartame and it is harmful. A better natural substitute would be Manuka honey or molasses but only in very small amounts. Table salt has a chemical added to make it white in colour. Better alternative is Bragg's aminos or sea salt.

b. Milk causes the body to produce mucus, especially in the gastro-intestinal tract. Cancer feeds on mucus. By cutting off milk and substituting with unsweetened soy milk, cancer cells are being starved.

c. Cancer cells thrive in an acid environment. A meat-based diet is acidic and it is best to eat fish, and a little chicken rather than beef or pork. Meat also contains livestock antibiotics, growth hormones and parasites, which are all harmful, especially to people with cancer.

d. A diet made of 80% fresh vegetables and juice, whole grains, seeds, nuts and a little fruits help put the body into an alkaline environment. About 20% can be from cooked food including beans. Fresh vegetable juices provide live enzymes that are easily absorbed and reach down to cellular levels within 15 minutes to nourish and enhance growth of healthy cells. To obtain live enzymes for building healthy cells try and drink fresh vegetable juice (most vegetables including bean sprouts) and eat some raw vegetables 2 or 3 times a day. Enzymes are destroyed at temperatures of 104 degrees F (40 degrees C).

e. Avoid coffee, tea,ea and chocolate, which have high caffeine. Green tea is a better alternative and has cancer-fighting properties. Water-best to drink purified water, or filtered, to avoid known toxins and heavy metals in tap water. Distilled water is acidic, avoid it.

12. Meat protein is difficult to digest and requires a lot of digestive enzymes. Undigested meat remaining in the intestines become putrified and leads to more toxic buildup.

13. Cancer cell walls have a tough protein covering. By refraining from or eating less meat it frees more enzymes to attack the protein walls of cancer cells and allows the body's killer cells to destroy the cancer cells.

14. Some supplements build up the immune system (IP6, Flor-ssence, Essiac, anti-oxidants, vitamins, minerals, EFAs etc.) to enable the body's own killer cells to destroy cancer cells. Other supplements like vitamin E are known to cause apoptosis, or programmed cell death, the body's normal method of disposing of damaged, unwanted, or unneeded cells.

15. Cancer is a disease of the mind, body, and spirit. A proactive and positive spirit will help the cancer warrior be a survivor. Anger, unforgiveness and bitterness put the body into a stressful and acidic environment. Learn to have a loving and forgiving spirit. Learn to relax and enjoy life.

16. Cancer cells cannot thrive in an oxygenated environment. Exercising daily, and deep breathing help to get more oxygen down to the cellular level. Oxygen therapy is another means employed to destroy cancer cells.

Kg Subang - Restoran Maxis

Quite an ordinary coffeeshop but there's one noodle here that's a bit different, Vietnam Noodles. Basically its still clear stock soup with thick meehoon like noodles, almost like laksa noodles. Topping for the noodles includes vegetables, normal fishball, fried fishball, pork, pork balls and prawns! There is not much wow factor in it but its quite nice and good when you don't feel like anything heavy but greedy for choices of toppings :)

The other thing that looks good here is the char koay teow... well, its just ok but with a bit of banana leaf on the plate, perception also different, that's how I got conned to order, hahaha... but it was ok!

GPS: N3 09.021 E101 32.561

Kapar - Fried Shark @ Restoran Soon Leong

There are 2 shops in Kapar known for its fried baby shark dish and 1 of it is Soon Leong which is located on the main road of Kapar town. Open as early as 9am, this place serve Chinese dishes to go with rice only.

Me and Soh Cicak wanted to try their famous fried baby shark and we ordered 1 for each of us. The shark simply deep fried covered with some chilies over it then having some light soya sauce poured on it. Its simple and nice.

Almost the whole shark can be eaten with only a long bone in the middle, very suitable for kids too. The chilies does not add any spicy taste to it but just fragrant it better. The meat are soft and tender covered with crispy skin and its great when taken hot!

Soon Leong is airconditioned and they have hot water boiling around the shop for Chinese tea lover, you can either bring your own tea (like we did, thanks for Cicak for his nice Tiak Kuan Ying) or you can choose from packets available.

Its cost Rm13 for 2 sharks and for hot water for our tea, not too bad I would say, should come back to try other dishes as well.

GPS: N3 08.291 E101 22.305

Kapar - Dim Sum Chee Cheong Fun

Hmm... what's better for breakfast? Dim sum or chee cheong fun? How about both in one? Well, this morning as I was walking to have a look around at the tiny wet market in Kapar town, I stumbled upon this motorbike hawker stall that sells pau, dim sum and chee cheong fun.

Its parked outside a coffeeshop, so you can either dine in the shop and order a drink or like me and soh cicak, we just sat at the stools next to her bike and eat. The aunt here is really friendly, taking time to explain what she have and asking detailed questions like if peanuts are ok with you, etc.

They basically have 2 steamers and 1 pot keeping the food hot. First steamer are all Pau and Loh Mai Kai (chicken mushroom gluttonous rice), second one are dim sum and chee cheong fun and the pot are yong tau food.

They don't have the usual huge variety of dim sum, but simply some simple home made fish balls, fish rolls (foo chok kuen) and siew mai. I took 1 each with a piece of chee cheong fun plus 1 piece of yong tau foo, she mixed them up with sweet and chili sauce together. For topping, you get sesame and finely crushed peanuts.

Everything is ok but the dim sum paste, which are made from fish are soft and fresh. As the aunt could see that we are not local with computer backpack on us (she actually thought we are fresh graduates, hahaha!), she spent some time to chit chat with us. The stall was operated by her in law and now she took over, with the childrens all married, she is not sure if anyone will take over. But the good thing is the dim sum fillings are made from fresh fishes, bought fresh everyday from Sekinchan at about RM20.00 per kilo! She uses only "beh kar" fish (in hokkien) for her dim sum (70 cents per piece), no wonder its soft and no fishy smell. The yong tau foo which is sold at 60 cents per piece is cheaper as it uses only "tofu" fish.

In the end, the aunt also offered us some of her yong tau foo soup since we did not take any drink from the stall, the soup is not very tasty but guess what, no MSG! Its really just simple and ordinary food that she sells, but I think that's what good about hawker food, nothing too fancy, simple, nice and a lot of sincere hardwork from them to make it nice!

GPS: N3 08.285 E101 22.449

Subang Jaya - Ho Kien Pan Mee @ Restoran Lian Heng

This place in SS19, Subang Jaya (same row as Hong Leong Bank) have been around for a very long time, I used to go there after school for lunch with friends during secondary school ;). Anyhow, the stall here serve excellent pan mee for those who likes soft pan mee.

Look for the pan mee stall, you have to go there, take a number and sit down. Later, when its your turn to order, they will come and get your orders. On weekends, the queue can get pretty long. We were lucky that day, waited less than 10 minutes to be served and our food came another 5 minutes later.

The pan mee here are teared by hand and they make it thick and soft, I mean really soft, probably best to eat with a spoon. I had the dried one, its quite different and yummy with lots of toppings plus again, good pan mee can't go without good chili sauce ;).

RM4.00 for a big bowl and RM3.50 for a small one. The other thing unique is that the coffeeshop also sells sugar cane and coconut juice :).

GPS: N3 03.911 E101 34.759

Sg Way, PJ - Big Tree Pan Mee

If you do go Sg Way during lunch time, check out this place, pretty decent food. If you come up from the federal highway to Sg Way main street, turn right after the wet market and its on your left after the bicycle shop and parking lot. Its just zinc roof with a big tree on top.

We tried the pan mee here, I had the dried one and we ordered some extra dumpling. The pan is quite decent but what makes it good is really the chili sauce itself! The toppings for the pan mee are plenty full as well. Dumpling is big and nice too at RM1 each. Pan mee is RM3.50 and herbal tea is about RM1.00. There is also a tai chow stall next door where you can have fried noodles, rice, etc.

GPS: N3 05.202 E101 37.344

Nilai - Restoran Feng Ling

It was a good hash with tonnes of fun and flip flop going downhill at Sg Pening-Pening on a fine Saturday afternoon, but what was better is the good lunch that was waiting for us at Restoran Feng Ling at Taman Semarak Nilai.

We got there for a late lunch at about 2pm (the kitchen break at 3pm) and there were 6 of us. We ordered a Chicken Ginseng soup (half a chicken), a Chat Sing Pan (literally means 7 stars seabass), a sea cucumber pot (hoi sum poh), fried pork lard with luncheon meat and prawn as filling, roast pork/duck and some vegetables. We later top it up with another 2 dishes (vege and a kuai fah kai which is chicken mix with fish paste but put back to the chicken skin) as Jack and the family joined in.

The chicken ginseng soup was quite good, just nice for 6 persons with nice big chinese mushrooms on top of the chicken. As for the highly priced fish (RM96 for the fish alone, about 500-600g), we have it steamed, we really couldn't appreciate it, I think its better folks like us stick to normal cheaper fishes, hehehe... waste money only. The sea cucumber pot is really good, sea cucumber are really soft and full of flavour, great to go with rice.

Now, what really special is this pork lard thing, I couldn't believe my ears at first when the waitress recommended that, I mean, taking pork lard, which can gimme heart attack almost instantly and wrap it with more meat and prawns (cholesterol shooting up like rocket)? Hehe... but turns out, its not that bad. The pork lard is a really thin piece, fried to crisped with luncheon meat and peeled prawns and some century eggs plus vegetables as filling. The texture mix is good with crunchy skins, yummy!

In total, the damage was about RM285.00 inclusive of tea and rice, not too bad for an aircond full service Chinese restaurant, most likely can't eat for the same price in KL, give it a try, but forget about the sing pan fish! Oh ya, this place also serve buddha jump over the wall, but you have to order in advance ;).

GPS: N2 49.258 E101 49.039