As Suanie Sees It

A few weeks ago, I received a small box of freshly-made FIDANI gourmet chocolates with a golden ticket inside. It was an invitation to visit Fidani’s chocolate factory where Willy Wonka Chef Amer Hamzah, FIDANI’s very own chocolatier would play host to a bunch of chocolate-crazy bloggers.

When he grows up, his camwhoring skills will pwn all of you

One fine Saturday morning, a bunch of us went to FIDANI’s chocolate factory in Shah Alam, where each FIDANI chocolate piece is hand-crafted by Oompa-Loompas skilled workers. Eiling who works for FIDANI (who actually did the inviting) greeted us and ushered us into a room. She brought out a HUGE platter of FIDANI chocolates for our consumption…

This was like, 1/4 of the platter

Then Cher Amer Hamzah came in and gave a most interesting presentation on chocolate — its history, the ingredients and processes involved in making chocolate, the differences between… uhm, different chocolates, and so on. Quite enlightening, and I will never look at Ding Dang the same way again.

Having fun and stuffing ourselves silly with the chocolates

After the very chocolatey lesson, Chef Amer allowed us to tour the rest of the factory, including where the chocolates are handmade, refrigerated and packed. According to him, we were the first people (non-FIDANI staff) to be allowed in his chocolate kitchen. Rather privileged, yah?

Before we could enter his kitchen, we had to wear a white coat and a hairnet…

Does this resemble the flashers you might have encountered before?

There were two or three big pumps filled with dark and milk chocolate (didn’t see any white ones). Chef Amer showed us how to make chocolate with fillings (requires high skills and technique, else it would come out looking rubbish) using (very expensive) moulds. Some staff were hand-rolling chocolate truffles; it was a very busy kitchen so I tried very hard not to get in their way too much. But they were very nice to us and also most helpful when we made and design our own chocolate later, though I could sense them smiling through their face masks whenever we pretty much made a mess of things.

What do bloggers do when presented with a platter of chocolates?

I made a dark chocolate piece and decorated it with dried fruits and nuts. Pretty much ate a huge chunk of it at home, and left the remaining bit on my table. One day I got home from work and was told that Ryan had helped himself to the chocolate. My table and floor was a tad sticky, so I guess he had a great time helping himself…

Me with my chocolate! And Cher Amer with his hand out so he could set it in the fridge

After we placed our chocolates in the fridge (for it to set), Chef Amer proceeded to make a chocolate rose. Impressive

The chef and the rose

Then we were led to the packing room where some noobs got too excited over a RM30k+ machine that jet sprays expiry dates on the boxes… and they proceeded to place their hands at the machine to be jet-sprayed with expiry dates too. Back at the conference room, Eiling fed us with more chocolates yet to be made available in the market. A chocolate tasting/ sampling thing lah; she wanted opinions for some new flavours/ combination. There was also one with durian cream. Surprisingly it tasted rather awesome! Eiling said that they use REAL durian flesh for the filling; there’s no way you can miss the smell and/or taste of durian in that one.

Me with a premium gift box of FIDANI chocolate

At the end of the visit, Eiling presented us with a gift - a bag full of chocolate from FIDANI! Heh, thank you Thanks again for the invitation; it was really educational, fun and most filling

Group photo

Click here to find out where you can purchase FIDANI chocolates. If you have a healthy budget and wish to get personalised chocolates (for weddings, corporate occasions, parties, as gifts or whatever), click here for their contact info.

Also blogged: KY, David, Hsu Jen

Click here to view my Flickr set for this trip (36 photos).

As demonstrated by our lovely Kim.

A couple days ago, we were at The Sanctuary at The Curve to celebrate Smirnoff’s launch of two new flavours — green apple and vanilla. It was happening, it was FUN, here are some photos and bits and bobs.

Green apple, vanilla, green apple, vanilla and green apple Smirnoff…

(There will be regurgitated photos because… well only a few people I know were there mah…)

I reached The Sanctuary about 8.20 pm, and there was a line of invited guests waiting to go in. Then one of the organisers saw me, and I was whisked to the Media/Bloggers registration counter. Heheh, what perks

I went straight to the table where Kelvin was already seated. He was accompanied with a guy who won the contest by Coconuts. Sorry can’t remember your name dude, but he was friendly and nice, a bit quiet because apparently this was his first time going to ’something like this’. Har, no clubbing before? Not really.. heh good luck in Netherlands dude!

Later ShaolinTiger arrived, and JoeyG took the stage and said some stuff, then there was really good music spinning…

ST, me holding a Smirnoff Green Apple, with Shirley, Riche-Monde’s brand manager

We had different cocktails mixed with Smirnoff vodka!

After a while, we were whisked into the Ice Bar (where the temperature was -15 degree celcius but no wind, thank goodness) to sample the different Smirnoff flavours…

It was cold….

Hot Kim (better known as kimfluttersby) was there… I think she looks a bit like Uma Thurman…

Kim wore the same colour as the bottle…

Kim is also one of the contestants of StarCeleb, a reality TV show on the search for 2 multi-talented individuals ready for stardom and more. StarCeleb will air on NTV7 every Sunday at 6 p.m., beginning this September. Go visit the StarCeleb website to find out how you can be part of the Live Recordings… Go Kim!!!!!

In comparison, here’s me posing with a Smirnoff Green Apple bottle…

Cannot make it lah But the new flavours were nice lor. We had lots and lots of Smirnoff Green Apple…

We downed these shots and more!

Xes was also there… Stewie was there… kinkybluefairy was there…

Kimberlycun was there.. Xaviera was there… Jack was there….

My hangover lasted 24 hours. But it was really fun, and I haven’t had this kind of fun for the longest time! I also helped a girl crying in the toilet back to her car, but that’s another story.

Thanks for having me!!!!!!!!!!

Others blogged about it too! :: kimfluttersby, Xes, ShaolinTiger, kinkybluefairy

So I was lovingly planting some bulbs in hope that they would grow into lovely lovely blooms when the earth suddenly shook and shattered. My bulbs were crushed. I was devastated. Then I heard a loud voice booming out of nowhere;

“Now that I have your attention, go to the nearest newsstand and purchase a copy of Weekend Mail.”

“But.. but.. I am gardening! My bulbs are all dead and now I have to buy new ones!”

“No, you will do as I say and take out RM1.20 to buy the goddamn paper.”

“Can’t I do this later? My hands are all dirty and it’s a couple blocks from the newspapers guy.”

“Now!”

Gulpz. “Okay. By the way will I win the lottery?”

“In your dreams.”

My heart sank as I walked slowly to do as I was told. What is it? I thought, what could be so important that it couldn’t wait till the end of the century?

This had better be good.

Turned out, it was. Who should I see but some chicks on the cover of the Weekend Mail? With a photo feature of Angelina Jolie holding a wad of money no less?

A-ha!

The culprits are on the cam-ho worthy shot are: Kim, Fireangel, Cheesie, Jas, Pinkpau and KinkyBlueFairy.

The second page of the feature looks like this:

FA and Kim hated their photos. I didn’t think the interviews were any good, but then do you see me writing for ANY newspapers? Take heart la bitches, could be a lot worse, no? You are femes, yay!!!!!!!!!!!

Nice plug, cheers. The online version is here.

By the way, I don’t garden. Not like that matters.

Just some photographs.. not really in the wordy wordy blog post mood yet… though there are things to say… but in the meantime here’s another what-I-did-bleargh post.

Bleargh.

Friday evening we went to Flagz again at Desa Sri Hartamas for awesome beer and slow food movement dinner.

Then we went to Thai Club — people who can’t shuffle but insist on shuffling should be shot.

Nothing much happened, except maybe you could ask KY about his U-turn incident. And Kim got asked for her ID at the club. Totally ridiculous.

On Saturday I attended my friend Irene and Alex’s engagement dinner at the Palace of the Golden Horses. It was my first time there… got lost on the way there and got lost on the way back. Got lost within the hotel itself as well. I am so geographically-challenged, I eat maps.

The dinner was nice but the company better. It has been a long time since I’ve met Irene; we’ve known each other since Form 1. She’s been dating Alex since Form 3… nine years now? Dunno, that’s like an awfully long time… one of those things that you thought would never happen, but it did… so there…

And another couple who topped Alex and Irene’s 9 years by a few months is Allen and Shu Ee, also from high school. Amazing. Jealousy almost made me throttle myself with the clean table linen.

After that I went to KL Hilton to meet the drunken louts.

… where at Zeta Bar I almost went up the stage to hump Mark Daniels.

Meet Fireangel and teh lalamui!

My hair colour is so golden, if I douse it with kerosene it would burst into flames.

The tragedy.