Carven's Table

This is my way overdue procrastinated post on Restaurant Amuse, went there for Degustation dinner this time last year on my birthday. The content might be dated, but within this year, Restaurant Amuse has been doing a pretty good job, heck they have done a better job now and the standard is no doubt one of the best in town.  I recently found the menu for my dinner that night and also the notes that i've written down while eating (there were so many courses, it helps to remember what we've eaten). As we all know, Restaurant Amuse is one of WA best restaurant that offers great gastronomical experience, impeccable and professional service from the staff and a place for romantic dinner. We went for the full degustation with matching wine, it was only $115pp (food only) a year ago, but this year they have only increase the price by $5, so not much of a difference. We also uses the entertainment book discount card, it made the dinner more worthwhile. We were seated at one dar...

So what is Lavastone? One would ask. Lava stone is the volcanic stone originates from inside the volcano, the slab of lava stone is heated to 400c in a specially designed oven. And the meal/meat of your choice will be presented to you on the stone when they are still raw. Mix Grill  So yea, you gotta do a bit of cooking here, even if you over-cook the meat, you can only blame yourself for it. However, with this method of cooking, it enables all the natural juices and flavours of your meat to stay within itself. And you don't have to worry that your meal will get cold, as the hot lava stone can stay hot to approximately 35mins, good way to enjoy hot food. Lavastone grill cafe is an old house converted into a restaurant, it might look small from the outside, but it's huge inside with lots of table in different section/rooms of the house/restaurant. Because hot stone grilling is their specialty here and the restaurant wasn't properly designed to be a grill house, you h...

I was woken up by a housemate of mine cooking up a storm in the kitchen over the long weekend, and yes it was brunch time! I couldn't help but to hear the sound of chopping, the sound of non-stop turning on the gas stove "tak...tak...tak...", all I could see is the HUGE bowl of sliced potato, piles of cabbages, carrots, chopped up field mushroom and a pot of vigorously boiling vege soup. In case you haven't notice, I didn't mention any meat here, that's because this housemate of mine is a vegetarian. While my mind is still half way departing from the dream world, for a second I thought we are going to have guest coming over for lunch. Later only I realised we are not having any guest around, the stacks of potatos, mushrooms and bowls of cabbage and carrots are in fact her meal for the entire week. Due to busy schedule at work, she has no choice but to cook her entire week's meal in a day. That aside, I did smell something good here. CURRY is all I could ...

Took a stroll to Northbrdige the other day, don't you just love how the city mayor trying to revamp it? Of course, the most exciting project of all gotta be Northbridge Piazza, but exactly how many Perth-ian hang out at Northbridge Piazza just like how Fed Square is to Melbournian. Northbridge might be a slightly dangerous place to go after dark, but if any Perth-ian likes to hang out the way Melbournian does, well you could at (CNR) James + Lake in a more laid back Perth style. (CNR) James + Lake is the perfect place to sit back and watch the days go by, perhaps some people watching too! Situated at the corner of James and Lake Street, facing the Piazza. Just right under the huge screen where you can find this hip cafe, churning out good quality coffee, cakes, lunch and breakfast. It is a quaint little place but full of character, friendly staff that are always happy to help, if I am not mistaken there might be free high-speed wireless too. Over here they offer counter ...

Makcik making Kuih Kapit (Nyonya's crispy love letters biscuit) I still remember clearly on last year's Masterchef when Poh, the runner-up decides on a theme for inventory test challenge. She chose Malaysian as a theme and everyone else was shocked and didn't have a clue what Malaysian cuisine is, I sill remember Julie the winner was panicking and she ended up cooking something more like Thai food. Har-Mee aka Prawn Noodle Malaysian cuisine is quite complex and kinda hard to define due to the diversity of it's multi-ethnic population of Malays, Chinese, Indian, Nyonya , Eurasian and Indigenous people of Borneo. Every ethnic group has their own type of food and almost every state has their own signature dish. If you happen to travel to Malaysia, you'll find yourself in the cross road of choosing what to sample, because there are just way too many food to choose from, the sky is the limit in when it comes to Malaysian food, best of all they only cost you around $...

Nothing beats having a bowl of hot noodle soup on a cold wintery night. I am always fond of ramen, and I used to have/still have this dream to travel to Japan, precisely Hokkaido just to eat a bowl of hearty ramen from a street cart when it's snowing. Few years ago, when I first arrived in Australia, I've had bad experience with the ramen in Australia, the noodle has strong alkaline taste and the broth taste exactly like msg, it was horrible. Then onwards, I held back the idea on eating ramen in Australia. No doubt, there are a lot of sushi place and Japanese restaurant in Perth, some of them are doing some wonderful Japanese food, but not a lot of them actually put their heart into making a proper ramen.  Making ramen require just as much attention to get the right consistency of the noodle and of course the pot of stock. Tonkotsu ( pork bone soup base ) broth normally takes up to a day to get that beautiful thick and silky white consistency, all taken from pork's bone...

Was in Fremantle to run some errands the other day, after doing what we were supposed to do, the arvo coffee fix kick in (it was about 4pm), and we're in need of some caffeine so that the day can go on. I suggested to go to the ever relax and funky Moore & Moore, that's exactly the kind of Freo's vibe you want to be in. The door was wide open and we stood in front of the coffee machine for a good 5 minutes to decide whether we would like some snacks as well. By the time we're ready order, they only just inform us that they are actually closed! Thanks for the heads up guys! It's ok, I believe we are still able to get caffeine fix while we're in Freo, all the cafes are within walking distance anyway, if worse come to worse, San Churros gonna be our savior. We were soaking up the Freo Doctor's breeze while walking to a potential cafe that still open, we saw Hush Espresso, I was like a little kid jumping up and down on the street as if the clown is g...