Kedai Kopi New Light @ Gurun,Kedah

There are actually people who would travel miles out here just for the kangkong with brown cuttlefish dish.
They'll rave and rave about it.
Until you get so fed up with them, you want to try it for yourself.
Delusional homosapiens.
I don't fancy this yet it cannot be compared to Heng Kee @ Hing Kee on China Street .
That kopitiam has the honours of serving the worst sotong kangkung in the whole universe and many blackholes beyond.

Next !
Assam laksa.
Um,how do I put it.
The noodles are uncharacteristically twisted,gnarled and lumpy unlike the smooth ones sold by most chinese stalls.
More Malay than Chinese.
Next the sauce is not the sweet kind you find on the island but leans more to the KL type.
Sourish but not too overwhelming.
Bits and pieces of fish here and there.
Smells stinky,but not very delicious.
Doesn't appeal to the appetite by virtue of appearance alone.
Cos the entire dish looks like the sediments roadside hawkers would sieve out of leftover foods.
Bah ! Waste of time.

Curry mee.
Strange.
Comes with one small piece of chicken,tastes like Ipoh curry laksa,even contains long beans.

Siew Yoke rice.
Siew Yoke nice,not too oily,crispy crunchy skin.
Rice.Like a confluence of teochew porridge meets a lump of sun baked buffalo dung.
Effectively flushing the fleeting memory of the nice siew yoke you just munched on,into a sewage retention pond.

All day dimsum.
Not available or folded up?

The other stalls.
Don't know,don't care,don't want to know.

Note:
Many friendly,flea infested,itchy backside,parasitic old,diseased mongrels like to beg for scraps while you're at the table.

So what does one do when the meal turns out to be a dissapointment?
Admire the peak of Jerai and be awed by the crystal clear Drainwater with river silt in it,before you drive the heck out of here.

Urine beauty treatment @ Taman Free

Initially,the article got me very interested in what the old lady had to say.

The title itself got one's attention.

It featured a grannie contorting like an ancient chinese Jane Fonda on the cover and mentioned how younger people all admired her complexion,envied her vigor and pestered her to divulge her secrets to youthfulness.

Lapped it all up until I came to this paragraph....

However, Suzanne subscribes to the benefits of drinking one’s own urine, as advocated by J.W. Armstrong some 32 years ago in his book, The Water Of Life.
“We did not do it at that time. But an elderly Indian doctor said, ‘Don’t worry, the urine is very clean’. People in India and China are doing it then but they didn’t talk about it, so we didn’t know,’” Tony says.
So every morning at about four, Suzanne gets up and drinks a cupful of her own urine. She then dabs some of it on her eyes and face and leaves it to dry while she goes back to sleep.
When she is fully awake a few hours later, she will dab toothpaste and a particular soap on her face, and leave that on for a while before washing them off.

Ooi......editors at The Star,
if you are reading this,couldn't you have at least had some decency to censor this bit?
Did you think it was sooooooooooo important that the whole of Malaysia be made aware that

1. this auntie has a pee fetish ?
2. or that she prefers free sheeshee SKII ?
3. or even contemplated that we would even want to emulate her in enjoying a piss cuppa before the crack of dawn ?

Read the article below and you tell me if someone and some newspaper too, is like on the way to becoming nyanyuk already or what.

Fit as a fiddle
http://thestar.com.my/lifestyle/story.asp?file=/2012/2/1/lifeliving/10303198&sec=lifeliving

Joo Leong Cafe,Seafood Noodles & Porridge @ Sungai Tiram,Bayan Lepas(Night)

Flip flopping through various blog reviews,there are varying opinions as to what makes this place tick.
As well as vastly deferring preferences regarding what dishes are perceived as hype.
Most find the price a bitch.
Sadly all end up agreeing that the stock is super yummy delectably mmm mmm rich,flavourful and good.

Here's my take on this place.

The good :

1. Service is Quick Draw Mc graw-Faster Than Fast Food.You won't get the chance to warm your seat before your order makes its F1 entrance.
2. Cleanliness level is awesomely spotless,super duper clean ! Remarkable considering the high traffic,endless stream of customers.
3. The stalls in front are thank goodness just for added variety.Not for you to waste time and fill your tummy as you wait for your order.
4. Drinks arrive at the speed of light.Are aromatic,rich,nicely sweet,refreshing and good.
5. They are skilled at cooking fresh seafoods.Crabmeat will just fall off beautifully without getting stuck onto the shell.Prawns are sweet and succulent.Fried fishmeat (take note that this is fried till dry,Not juicy)is flavourful to the skin,gets more delicious in the simple stock.
6. While,I agree it is not cheap to dine here,one bowl costs an average of $12 upwards,Where else is one gonna get seafood this fresh?

The bad :

1. For the uninitiated,you are expected to figure out that you have to make your way to the back and place your order.The old man cum order taker, likes to give you that "when are you gonna make your move and come here you idiot" exasperated look with newbies.The rest of the family are just to 'polite' to help you out cos frankly they're too busy attending to their stations.
2. The much touted soup is extremely ordinary,rather oily on the top and spoilt by the unnnecessary addition of tiny stalks of chinese celery.You see,when the star ingredients come at the "just-cooked" stage,it will definitely have a "locked-in-taste".Thus the flavours,whatever people say,simply won't spill out to enrich the stock. What you get is a noodle soup and broth stock that is still in its infancy.
3. There are too little vegies perhaps due to the fact that the extremely high heat left them shrivelled,destroyed and useless.
4. The broth while nice and fluffy,has way too much preserved veg,that is more suitable for a peasant/labourers version of pork broth rather than seafood porridge.No amount of pepper and chilli padi could help save this dish for me.A bad choice of mine,which I eventually abandoned after eating just one quarter of it before tucking wholeheartedly into my crab.
5. The police like to open samans here.They always pass by here,since they like to hangout at a tomyam stall down the road.I don't blame them.The presence of this stall next to this busy road leading to the airport,poses a serious a traffic obstruction that endangers roadusers.Selfish customers desperate for a parking space love to double park,thus forcing speeding vehicles like buses and lorries to a sudden stop or to swerve onto the path of others in the next lane,that might in turn create ultimate mangle and mayhem.
6. The stalls have more flavourful foods than them.Thus our order of "steamroller went over it" flattened chicken satay,(never mind that it was way too sweet for our own good and the peanuts sauce looked more like blended peanut rojak sauce),was snapped up greedily and quickly by us,since we were all still hungry cause frankly the soup,stock,noodles and broth sucked.
7. The shopowner and breadstall lady have been infected with the Canneversmile disease
8. If I ever return,I will probably order their seafood soup minus noodles,minus broth.Just pure boiled seafood.That's what the big fuss about this place is.Plain and simple boiled seafood soup for me please.Leave out the vegies too.I beg you.Then maybe I would fully appreciate my meal .

Il Bacaro Venetian Restaurant @ Campbell House,Campbell Street

As you already know,I am thoroughly fed up at having been taken for a ride so many times,to the point that I am now overtly cautious about trying out new outlets.
Thus I am taking the easy way out again and posting up negative feedback from the horses mouth of the ....shall we say..."victims"themselves.

This is a ten table restaurant that looks like a cigar bar from the outside.
The couple running the show ...one is angmo,the other is Malaysian born.
Conde Nast Traveller describes them both as "uprooted from London" as well as "a restaurant serving cicchetti (the Venetian equivalent of tapas) and fish specialties".
In the next breath,they promise us authentic Italian and home-cooked Venetian.
Until another foreign customer describes their food as Northern Italian.

Perplexingly strange this one.
Like they didn't know that,words once spoken get immortalised forever even in this corner of the world wide web?

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Blue Alila ,United Kingdom:
“Not very Italian”
We visited this restaurant and wouldn't call it particularly Italian. It was as if the restaurant has given up on being Italian and has gone for the local clientele instead. Ever heard of Duck Pizza with Bechamel sauce before?


LGKnature,Langkawi :
“Great location, good food but small portions”
Located in a very nice old building with great atmosphere; not a big place and only 10 tables, but quite busy at the time I was there. Staff was very friendly and attentive, menu was limited, and good wine selection. Had a 3 course dinner; started with salmon and tomato salsa (very nice but small portion), fish with vegetables (no idea what fish it was and it was a very small portion) with roasted potatoes (some were overroasted which I left and no remark when they took my plate) and tiramisu (very nice, but was on my table within 30 seconds after ordering it). The food quality of what I tried is without doubt very good, but after 3 courses still feeling hungry is not a good sign; maybe I should have taken pizza (saw them in normal sizes passing by) or pasta to avoid this. The bill came up to 145RM including 2 glasses of good wine and that would be fine if portions are bigger. Overall it was far too cold for me and think you really need long sleeves. As this is new place (and was recommended by a friend) I will give it another try within the next 6 months as I think that many things were on the positive side.

MWLM Singapore :
“So much hype over nothing.”
Coffee, espresso, was a totally watered down americano and they had the cheek to tell me THAT was how they served espresso, utter rubbish! Coffee grounds could be found at the bottom of the cup! For that sort of price, Starbucks does a far better job! Looks can be deceiving.

The Little Nyonya Cuisine @ Gurney Plaza

Update November 2011 :

Apparently after the initial fanfare,they now have an issue with freshness and quality control which is so wrong especially since they use coconut milk so liberally.
Tubers can be undercooked and even left out in the open so long they start to rot,sambals left to discolour and darken due to over refridgeration.
Oils used for deep frying recycled countless times till the dishes come off as greasy rather than super oily.
Only recommended for those with stomachs of steel.
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Penang Peranakan claim :
Cowdung and Pigeon feathers.
Acar hu looks more like pekasam.
Enche Kebin doesn't even remotely bear any resemble Penang nor Peranakan both in taste and presentation.
Kari kapitan is Kapital-F-A-I-L

Celebrity Tie Up :
Looks like Axian aka Jason Yeoh of "Axian's Food Adventures" tv programme,absolutely doesn't mind denting his already bashed up reputation by using his celebrityship to back this outlet up so long as money come.
Checkout his facebook and blog and see all the crap hurled at his recommendations by countless Malaysians.
Where and which part of Penang did he crawl out from?
Some backwaters of Jelutong,the nucleus of tasteless Penang food?
Not that I am saying Jelutong doesn't have its gems.It does.A sad total of just 3 gems (ok I give in,make that 5,if u must have the 2 nasi kandar outlets included)in this vastly populated district,one the morning curry mee pushcart,two the economy rice that opens till dinner,three the crab porridge.But there are so many more horrible makan places to outweight the good any given time.

Price :
Like a Yoyo and Roller Coaster.
Crazy! Some items are cheap and some,expensive,drinks are a costly affair where they even charge 80sen for plain water

Overall Impression :
A big mish mash between self order ala Hongkong style food outlets,Old Town coffee counter and flooring,a tiny Tokyo kitchen cubicle(they even managed to squeeze in a satay area! good grief!),a roadside kopitiam drink counter with minimalist,colourful bench sofa and lighting that looks like it could fit into G Hotel's budget for the broom closet.
Simply put,they wanted to reach out and attract every fickle type of customer, thus they gathered apples,durians,petai,kiwifruit together,deepfried them in one big wantan and aptly named it Nyonya.
This is what REAL Malaysians will certify as R-O-J-A-K

Taste :
Penangites will hate this cos definitely not Penang in origin.Most glaring reason....absolutely no sugar in the food.Second...not fine,very 'chor lor',no finesse.
Rather it is KL/Malacca Streetfood cooked in the style of clever aunty types transplanted from New Village/smalltown eateries,where the food is a sweat pouring experience best eaten under a zinc roof,preferrably near a drain.
Homesick KLites will find this comfort food cos the noodle is undercooked,food is super oily,santan is cardiac arrest thick.Malaccans working here will love the WARM bubur chacha.

Serving Bowls :
Gigantic.Bowls are the size of a plastic hand basin,large enough for you to wash your face in.Plates the size of medium sized serving trays.

Management :
The Fuhrer.
Scowling,obssessive,verbal diarrhea, local big sized man who likes to pick on 'lembu' staff from the kitchen window where he is cos he got no confidence in any of the staff getting anything right

Service staff :
Sacrificial victims,barked at and cornered into a confused state of mind,by the big bad wolf marksman manager,who has fibre optic laser eagle eyes able to penetrate past customers heads just to keep tabs on every slightest mistake the staff might commit.Somebody get him a time machine.
That the staff are smiling is just a cover as it hides the fact that they are blur cowering foreigners who like to gather in a straight line,with their backs near the cash till and kitchen window waiting for a firing squad to pull the trigger and end their misery.
The whole idea,even if it infuriates the boss even more, is it offers them,a momentary respite away from His Excellency's "I wanna eat you" glares and poisonous stares

Menu :
Weird....even got Nasi Dagang(east coast kampung cina villager?don't laugh but that could explain the presence of White House coffee which reminds me of a kopitiam in Kelantan),Black Pepper dishes,Banana split,cheap supermarket western sausages for those that come to a Nyonya restaurant but don't wanna eat Nyonya food.The beef with ginger tastes more like the sauce used in the recipe for yellow wine ginger chicken.Butter rice is a horrible experiment gone wrong.

Order Chit :
Hongkong style,but terribly confusing even though it is just one small piece of folded paper printed on both sides cos there is no sense of alphabetical order.To give you an idea of what I mean,it is like going into a housing estate,finding that the road next to Jalan A is Jalan K preceeded by Jalan C and so on so forth.So in this case you need to flip your order chit back and forth looking for the corresponding alphabet to your order as if you were sitting for an exam

Value For Money:
Not really especially when they dare put one tiny,pathetic Jack-the-Ripper was here mutilated chicken the size of two fingers in my wash basin of curry noodles.
If you hanker for value for money KL/New Village streetfood,The Chicken Rice Shop's Curry Chicken Noodle is a better bet.

Comfort :
Warm,cramped and uncomfortable

Positive comments :
Almost always crowded cos of the "Nyonya"tag (NOT!),Axian's puny elfen nerd face and looks nicer from the outside than when you actually sit down and dine.
Food smells good on first impression,you dig in and the aroma really entices you.But once their dishes cool down,they are not in the least bit appetizing,just makes you wanna dilly dally,look busy rather than have to finish it.Bleaugh....
Look,I tried....I really did.

Kampung Sayang @ Sri Sayang Apartments,Batu Feringghi

1. 88 all you can eat and order dishes
2. Specially cooked up for you in Malay,Western,Chinese(oh no,there is even a feeble attempt at Eurasian) style
3. all for the grand total of below $20
4. churned out mainly by ONE chef,
5. with $5 refundable parking fees.
6. Recommended by Foodtok.com and Helen Ong.

You tell me,who on earth starts up a restaurant to loose money?

And please(directed to the clueless 'kind' hearted souls who heard it via 'word of mouth'on facebook)please stop directing the Malay people into eating here with the misrepresentation that it is a Malay restaurant.
Bear in mind,this is pork free but not certified halal.
When they find out that the chefs are chinese and have to pay parking unless they eat in,they WILL be angry.

Korea Palace @ Jln Tanjong Tokong

It used to be teeming with customers.Then Daorae opened up and all their regulars abandoned it.Today,Daorae too has a sparse following unlike the initial period.Korean food lovers shuttle between the two restaurants like a slow motion game of silent ping pong.

These are the things you might want to consider before you spend your hard earned money,or bringing your dahlink here and end up regretting it.

The facts about Korea Palace

1. The owner is a Korean lady who likes to golf
2. Thus she entrusts the running of the restaurant to a foreign staff base
3. Which is kinda weird when you are trying a Korean experience while being served by foreigners
4. The good thing about the staff is they are friendly.Much friendlier than locals,service with a smile!
5. The lady has obviously been staying in Malaysia sometime already,so much so that she has improvised the menu
6. So from costly fully imported Korean foods,you get a creative Malaysian ingredient substituted Korean menu.At this point it gets too annoying to explain.So in case you don't believe me,you are most welcome to go try this out yourself
7. This is obviously what she would serve everyday at home to her kids on Malaysian soil,so you're actually paying a mid range price for essentially home cooked menu in a palatial shattered dream.

Sin Nam Huat @ opp Tanjung Medical Centre

The rice is ala Goh Thew Chik at Chulia Street mixed with another Sin Nam Huat fellows stand alone shop nearby Sisters CKT/Loh Guan Lye
The roasted pork is ala Fatty Loh icky fatty style.Here they cut off the skin like a prime cut in a chinese restaurant,plus you have to request(read ....pay extra) for it.
The chai boey is also Fatty Loh style
The roast chicken SUCKS is limp like any foodcourt
The roast duck is actually not bad like New Lane's younger couple's stall
The drinks menu is terribly limited

Its confusing cos they give you all the flavours from all the different old establishments in your one order.

Its like I tapau from many different shops and decided to sit down and lunch in a kinky shop with mirrors.
I thought of returning but they have customers here who are agressive part time drift parkers aka nurses in uniform out for a quick bite,whom I really wouldn't want nursing me back to health after a carnage smash up in the mad scuffle for the limited parking spaces available here.

Fatty Loh (Nagore Road) vs Fatty Loh (Fettes Park)

Don't understand why a court case was necessary.
In any case the Fettes Park version wins hands down for taste,with heartwarming soups,where the drinks are mostly self concocted but gets a big zero for messy sloppy oily woof woof diner presentation.
Nancy Sit one ups the many proofs of his cooking prowess declared via various stained newspaper articles that declared him the best in Malaysia.Wonder what the huge sword represents though.

The Nagore Road version has cookbook perfect glossy chickens which makes him very popular at tourism fairs however uninspiring the foodcourt factoried flavours may be.
This outlet also has a tendency to throw in fried garlic(yucks)into the soup (gone case,totally corrupted) and rice(ok this is not that bad).
If you do request for self made drinks they won't bat an eyelid about passing off bottled drinks as that since,Datuk Kee,an Alleycat and many gods guard the entrance to the outlet.

If you ask me,I would prefer the former cos parking is easy,pony tailed lady manning the counter is such a sweetheart,if only I can get past the metal bedpan plates (the latter still uses plastic/melamineware)

Ultimately the choice is yours since so many other good chicken rice places have cropped up on the island outselling them both ever since.

Dining @ Straits Quay

Update: Due to the fact that it is a smaller sized restaurant compared to the other outlets,up till today the most packed outlet is still Blue Reef.Beware that the former Azuma type window sluts have taken to this outlet.Have yet to try the food here even once cos I notice that not many diners seem to be eating.This I presume is caused by extremely slow service.
Small and packed with no breathing space while strangled by window sluts is not my cup of tea.Thanks but no thanks.
On the brighter side most places(not Blue Reef) now display their prices for set lunches and dinners
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If you had listened to rumours like I did,and believed the rascals that spread word around the whole of Penang and got us Penangites so excited that lots and lots of shops had opened for business here,then you would have seen what I saw.
Maybe if I had come from a nearby kongsi and have never ventured further than the nearest neighbourhood grocer,I would be impressed.Other than KL based businesses making their first foray up north,the Sydney old quarter inspired interior cum dining piazza aiming to be an upscale Bangsar cum Clarke Quay and the stunning views,this place fell way below expectations.The place is still undergoing renovations at certain sections and most of the tenants have not moved in.Along the way you see plenty of wooden construction plank walls bearing promised names of various not yet opened outlets.
The doors are an ankle breaking trap for older folks,a stilleto destroyer and a deterrent for the disabled because when you push open the rather heavy glass doors,you'd least expect to step 3 inches down,right?Which bright spark thought of this inconvenience?
I have been had.
Either us Penangites love listening to untrue rumours and spreading them to their contacts without first checking them out ,or, for the sake of conversation they like to appear more informed and just blabber out without a single inkling or clue.
The 2 speciality shops have owners that look both anxious and wary of new customers.I don't know why.
Chew aquarium looks so sad and half heartedly filled with staff that suddenly spring up and give you a heart attack because they weren't expecting you to pop in.The 2 children's activity centres looks like a low cost outlet with bad ventilation and is so dusty looking .
Other than the very nice xmas tree,the so called Candyland advertised in countless banners,is nothing more than a few painted wooden planks for crying out loud.
Most of the dining outlets do not display their menu nor price lists.
Casting aside the spectacular view from the restaurants,the overall feel you get is truly unwelcoming and cold unless you arrive drunk and are tripping tipsy around for the next bottle of moet,chivas or stout.
As such after having taken a long walk from one end to another,from my observation,most first time local visitors (not me)will end up in the Blue Reef partly because
1.they don't have customers that stare window shoppers down
2.it doesn't look as if it will punch a hole in your wallet.
3.perhaps they travelled all the way from Nibong Tebal with their kids in tow.When the Candyland turned out to be a Scantyland,tired,defeated and hungry,they decided to dine here hoping it would cheer everyone up(you should have seen the sour faces,I didn't hang around to find out)

From the way the open air dining area is planned,I expect this joint to turn into a watering hole or an expats den filled with angmos(the rude types who have stayed here for some years already,the type you find in Cold Storage) who aren't local friendly.
The German joint had a very unsettled looking angmo lady customer,whose face and choice of menu (just a cold beer) spoke volumes to all passers by.Finnegans had foreigners and locals sitting like the same sides of a magnet,apart from one another and the Japanese inspired Four Seasons bakery has Singaporean ties if I am not mistaken.If I am right then it will mean you get nice looking breads bloated with minimum usage of flour.This is like a more upscale Gama four leaves bakery,you get my drift?
In Japan,the bakeries have evolved to equal Parisian ones,yet here in Malaysia and Singapore the owners still want us to think that the Japanese people still consume these kinds of breads.Then we come to Cheeky Duck a chinaman restaurant which is from England again( how come these people keep coming here?).Enough said.
I certainly won't come here for Christmas when it's still pathetically empty and still undergoing touch ups unless it's for a morning or evening stroll outside the promenade.This is the reason why even though hotels give huge discounts when they are undergoing renovations,the rooms still remain empty.
Not many like the idea of dining amidst unfinished business.
Perhaps it will pick up by next year.But if the place is gonna be filled with angmos like those you find in Soho's,Penang Road who are expecting SPG's for a good time and nothing else,or the type that emits bad vibes,would you like it?The only solution then would be to swamp the place with locals which will send them fleeing,yes?

Loke Sok Seafood @ Gurney Drive (morn till lunch)

The bespectacled lady order taker has a short fuse.If you dilly dally a bit longer she might chuck the menu in your face or abandon you.
This is where the ditzy looking curly haired bright red lipstick pony tailed old broad takes over.
Don't get me wrong,but she is terribly nice,full of smiles and accommodating unlike the earlier Miss PMS.People like her make me smile and fill my heart with warmth again.

The patrons are something else.This is an old timer hangout where groups of ancient walkers or jurassic joggers at Gurney Drive pop in to load back on the calories they just burnt off.To make the guilt lesser they drink chinese tea.
When you,the young blood step in,they either stare or look like they are snooty english diners having their tete de tete so why are you encroaching on their sacred territory.
When it comes to lunch time,some days you get to see some old over the top Phua Chu Kang type of contractors with Lolexes wolfing down their chow but not before they give you the sly up and down look as if you are the answer to their prayers come down from heaven that they have been waiting for all of their boring 50 over year old lifespan.
Returning to the subject of food,this is where I had the most TERRIBULUS sang yee mee I ever ate other than at Station One(komtar) and Food & Tea Garden(gurney plaza).It feels like chewing tasteless knitting yarn that was fished out from the sea.
I just don't understand why they suck at this dish when they are reknowned for other dishes.

Red Garden @ Lebuh Leith (after 9.30pm)

update: I forgot to add that this paranormal activity happens mostly on Monday to Tuesday.Other times you can watch weird performances like Penang's plumpest hippo getai style singer doing aerobic workout (cos that's the only way she know how to dance), 60something skinny Aunty Barbie singer in miniskirt and fishnets gyrating like she's Rose Chan and other weird acts that you need to be drunk to enjoy.Also the bah kut teh smells better than it tastes cos the pork is NOT fresh and the Fish Head dish is one of the most cut throat on the island .
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If you are a pensioner or above 50 or someone that used to go 'wild' in bomchacha cabaret nightclubs like during or before the 50s era you will love this place.
If you are living with your grandparents and they go MIA after 9pm this is where you can find them temporarily and miraculously cured of their arthritis.
After 9.30pm,pockets of retired Penangites with itchy feet that are raring to hit the tiny dance floor amongst potted plants in front of the stage dressed in their most 'outrageous' outfits(in some countries some people call this behaviour eccentric) congregate in front of the stage area with wicked twinkling eyes.Sometimes if you are lucky you could spot a chinese Joan Jett dancing with a Blonde Haired chinese Colonel Sanders.
It is as if this was what they were waiting for all their lives.To feel the warm glow of the hot spotlight on their wrinkly epidermis,just waiting for the chance to break out of their old crab shells and don new skins for the night.They dance and they twirl like male and female cinderellas as if they were in a vienna ballroom while dressed in fashion picked off from chowrasta market oblivious to the giggles and stares of diners.

At this point if you are below 50 years old you will probably unintentionally burn all the meats on your thai charcoal grill if you ordered that,feel your eyes pop out of your sockets because you just cannot believe the guts of these old hags and bags out for a good time at the expense of the younger innocent undancing ones.
Or you would loose your appetite or giggle until you fall off your chair or gobble so fast,burning your throat just to get out of here quick.
Pick one.

The electrifying organist on stage drives you bonkers with music that blind men play on the streets to get donations from the public.This kind of music makes me wanna grind my teeth and clutch my fork in anticipation of cold blooded murder,it also has the capability to turn teenagers moody and tweens nuts.
After 9.30pm THIS is the mad hatters teehee party of georgetown.
What's the best thing to do at this kind of teehee party?
Just drink(LOTS) don't dine or you'll probably choke.

Mount Erskine Hawker Centre @ Wet Market Open Air Carpark( Evening)

update 27th october:
Mr George Lam moustache has become part time fugitive after this piece came out.I last spotted him today riding his motorbike without strapping up his helmet (yea still dressed in a white singlet and the frightening white shorts) zooming past the Jamal Tariq nasi kandar and at the same time I also spotted Karpal Singh's son in sunspecs ( my dear we can recognise you,you know?just take off the sunspecs next time,doesn't make any difference) about to order his lunch there.the place is grossly oily mind you.I am not recommending it.
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I swing in here before 7.30pm when I don't want to go to after Jelutong police station area for nasi tomato.It is the home cooked type so it's incomparable to the earlier mentioned place.
The thing about this place that makes me loose my appetite is the loud character of a co owner cum waiter in tight white (frightening!)shorts and thick moustache hawking noodles just 5 steps away.
His voice is so loud,he needs no loudspeaker.I'm sure he startles the living daylights out of all living things till I hardly see any rats nor crows there to this day in that carpark area(maybe they're shivering behind the market)
And then he looks so hamsap with his get up I almost always tapau home so that I don't have to feel his iris and voice piercing through my brains and my clothes.
Let me describe him to you.
His moustache is like George Lam's.
His shorts are the 70's white colour type just like what we see in the pictures hung on our grandparents home's wall of 70s young men trying to look hawt while posing with a badminton racquet.I think he really believes he is sexy.Not....
His voice is designed to sink a ferry and cause a tidal wave,to stun potential customers into increasing his business.Or maybe it's his way of getting women to look his way.
I pity the flat residents next to this market to have to put up with this fella's earth shattering hollering almost every other evening.I hope the temple's foundation next door is strong.

Matsuki Japanese Restaurant @ Jln Pemenang

First and foremost I would like to say that I am very dissapointed that one of the bloggers that I like,vouched for this place.That person needs to hop on a plane via Air Asia to Japan and immerse himself there in order to know why I am about to spit fire about this place.Or if that is too much to ask I beg of that fella to please go make a few rounds of  Japanese citizen run restaurants in kayel or singkahpo.Heck come to think of it you can even find excellent ones in jakarta and bangkok
Service is as crass as another place in Tanjong Tokong.Head waitress looks like an Empress Dowager that's about to go undercover so she can escape from the confines of this Japanese hideout that probably enslaved her to a life of waitressing drudgery.All the staff here young and old had bittergourd juice before they started working.All cannot smile.Most like to dress like grubby bangla sweepers in shopping compleks in T-shirt and pants.You come here and you wonder if you have just entered the portal to Manchuria.
Eating Japanese food is about the whole experience.You will not experience japanese culture here.You will experience cold Manchurian culture instead.Taste wise is nice tasting yes that I agree but not what you would expect if you have had better and were thinking that you may have finally hit another home run.
The entire place is so run down and in need of a makeover.This is in sharp contrast to the nice looking bungalow that houses it.
After that 'wonderful' introduction the food arrives,I will cut the long story short and say that the food here arrives presented ala Japanese style but the cooking style has a distinct chinese influence.You will not get your five tastebuds and senses tickled here...maybe it'll tickle 3 out of the 5.
Let me explain it in another way.If we were to go online and purchase authentic japanese cooking ingredients from a real japanese grocer with an authentic recipe provided by a real japanese would that make an authentic japanese meal if we were to ask any qualified chef to cook it for us?No.
A colleague had a horror story to tell.She had decided on takeaway for her lunch break and you know how they packed it for her?They didn't even bother to pack it in a nicely segregated bento plastic lunch box .Her lunch was placed into 3 tiers of styrofoam boxes with the hot miso soup poured into a plastic packet.
It is a nice place indeed of course compared to so many lousy japanese places(popular because they are really really really really cheap) in the vicinity of Pulau Tikus plus they actually use japanese rice here instead of local grains.Also this is a good place to mingle with some colleagues or girlfriends who are not picky eaters and want to believe they are transported to Tokyo on a $12++ cheaper than Air Asia meal ticket.

Fatty Loh Chicken Rice @ Fettes Park

You would have been cajoled into coming here.Nancy Sit did and her pic is still adorns the greasy walls like it were a deity.
This place is a different kettle of fish.The first time I ate here I really hated it.But it kinda grows on you and I eventually learnt to like it.You have to be a Penangite or regular visitor to appreciate the food here.Because, like the carnavon street duck rice,this, is another oily,messy do.
Few would have not heard,of the war between the two Fatty's.One lies behind Giant Penang Plaza and the other here.Both went to court over the rights to use the name.Both are still using those names.Guess the Fattest to walk away from the battle must have been their lawyers.
This Fettes brother,likes to occasionally slip in a piece of paper into our takeaway to remind us that he is the original and no other,even if it is his bro running the other set up.There seems to be no end to this game of you up me and I up you .Last I knew,the other brother managed to get the then newly elected state government to select him for a hawker festival.Thus the pissed off other, started slipping notes into our plastic bags,photostated enmass like the 4 digit result,not hand written.
Just when I have learnt to appreciate the bitter herbal soup,oily rice,wet goey messy chopped up chicken,strangest recipes for other items on the menu,strange goings on at the mysterious door... way..... at the back of the shop(nope it is NOT a toilet ladies and gentlemen) and blur looking waiters (whether local or foreign everyone looks blur),something new burns me up.
Due to the fact that our state government wants the hawkers and food operators to do away with styrofoam packets,our friend here takes the initiative to wrap our food in plastic sheets.No wax paper,no styrofoam but bare plastic sheets.What is the point in that?It's just like jumping from the burning styrofoam pan into the fiery plastic goblet.
The worst is yet to come.Now due to health concerns with regards to the melamine/plasticware they serve food on,they have now replaced it with aluminium basins and bowls in every size.Big ones,small ones,flat ones,medium ones,little ones,large ones,not so large ones..sigh.
What is wrong with that you say?Well those things look like hospital bedpans cum doggie bowls on a dining table.Imagine trying to enjoy the meal from that,and no I do not like Clinic Cafe.

Welcome to Barbie the Nurse masak-masak for Ken the Dogtor diner.

The diner where your rice would arrive covered up in a round mini basin,atop a flatter basin.Where your chicken would be presented on a wider flat basin and taugey served on a medium basin,while the soup in the weeny basin resembles some discharge from Gleneagles.
Your expression will change from hungry human to lost appetite mongrel.
These basins look like they would fit right in on the floor of the SPCA .Thus you get confused whether you should scoop from them,lick from them or get down on all floors,shove your face in and wolf them down.

I have resolved to takeaway from now onwards.Am giving myself six months or so to develop cataracts so that I can blindly dine in again.

Chok Dee Thai @ Jln Burma

1. Expensive ! Dishes belong more to home cooked/economy rice category therefore to me the price is not justified.So I guess we are being charged for the interior decor

2. Green curry is more to Teochew-Phuket style which shows that the chef is absolutely clueless as to what good food should taste like

3. Red curry dishes have been watered down.

4. Clear tomyam is more lengkuas base than anything else

5. Lady boss looks like scary Thai version of Joan Collins

6. NEVER EVERRRR order the water chestnut dessert.It's absolute rubbish.The mettle of a thai chef is measured by the ability to master desserts.My guess is he never graduated.

Harvest In Cafe @ Irrawaddy Road

Passed by many a time during lunch hour and noticed that each time the place was always packed.Loved how nicely the windows showcased the customers inside and they did look like they were having a blast.The place had a kind of upper Manhattan feel to it where any carefree gal would regularly pop in to catch up on the latest juice with her pals.

So I finally took the plunge yesterday.And it greatly surprised me that such a promising and tastefully done up exterior would have no one to greet and usher you to the interior.I scanned the area selected a corner and the instant I sat down felt that it was decidedly warm.No wonder,the place had no aircond.

When the motley of waitresses had sized me up and when they had decided who was up for the slaughter the menu arrived,and it was in contrast a well thumbed piece with dog ears, a testament to the number of diners hosted here.
I resisted looking at the unfinished flooring and discovered that the only dessert they had was from the ridiculously low priced add on set.It had looked like a place for a sinful piece of cake there was none.only from the add on could you get a tiny morsel.Boy was I irritated.

The prices were cheap.There must be a mistake.Should I get out of here?
I should have trusted my instincts for so much is lacking here.

The soup was the first to arrive.Bega butter with a standard bun.Hmm not too bad.
When my Cajun chick arrived I was thrilled for it was pan grilled to my liking and not too large a serving.I pushed past the boiled brocolli to get to the rice and my face went downhill.
The cook was obviously influenced by those Ads where they spread butter atop hot rice.It just was too amateurish.Too heavy and unsalted,too plain.too oily and just unnecessary...a plate of fries would have done the trick.Suffice to say that almost every dish on the menu was accompanied by this unnecessary evil.
And for heavens sake was that kunyit in my sauce in lieu of saffron?

 I got bored and poked at his mussel.goood....mmmmm......then I flicked his pasta......baaaaaaddddd.

All in all dining here is like riding a roller coaster and I am not returning because no matter how cute the ice cream is the accompanying cake is ala Maxim. And thumbs down to the noisy diners that makes the whole place sound so like a school canteen cum dim sum palace.

Yong Tau Foo @ Padang Brown(afternoon)

this place is also strictly for Penangites only

1.Tastes nothing like the famous Ampang version

2.Some of the fishballs contain a mince filling that's been marinated with 5 spice powder which corrupts the entire taste of the dish the instant the hawker dips your selected choices into the common soup pot

Queens Food Market @ Queensbay Mall

1.Another 'char lan tou' kena kon into parting with my hard earned money write up by Helen Ong of The Star newspaper

2.owner is from KL went to london now in Penang.OMG! for your info london food is kenot eat wan ok?and KL people no want to eat KL type food while in Penang orite?

3.should be renamed Queer foodcourt for queer variety and queer setting