As Suanie Sees It

Early last month, we received an invitation from Andrea to dine at Coca. Truth to be told, I’d never heard of it before but almost everyone around me has. Goes to show how much or how little I know, but please do not let that minor hiccup stop you from inviting me to anywhere. I am a fast learner

I reckon that most of you Muslims who read my blog should be grown-up enough to NOT complain about my blog posts on food. Okay lah you can marah-marah a bit heh, but that’s not really going to stop me Well, look on the bright side — you get another buka puasa dining option! I am so kind and generous, I overwhelm myself sometimes

Coca Restaurant @ Subang Parade

One fine evening, KY, FA, Ringo, Tim and I went to Subang Parade for said dinner. KY told me that Coca is well-known for their steamboat. So that was what I’d expected to have. There we met with Andrea, who is the Marketing Manager for Coca; a most pleasant and friendly lady. She told us that she would not be feeding us steamboat, but an array of dishes with rice to showcase Coca’s new extensive menu. O okay, I’ll go have their steamboat another time on my own then.

Drinks and juices for everyone!

I had the Thai longan drink, it was nice. KY ordered the roselle drink and he said that it was super nice, especially with the inclusion of a very crunchy roselle bulb.

First off, appetisers. We had the pandan chicken, stuffed prawns and deep-fried calamari.

Appetisers - pandan chicken, stuffed prawns, deep-fried calamari

The pandan chicken was very delicious, definitely one of the better ones I’ve had. You should try it when you pay Coca a visit. The stuffed prawn wasn’t really to my taste, but it’s not bad. I think they had fish paste, prawns and mushroom bits. Tim really loved the deep-fried calamari — that was also when we discovered that Tim’s allergic to shellfish. Hah! There were lots of what looked like crunchy deep-fried flour that came with the calamari. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be garlic! Very nice!

Seafood tom yam, steamed fish with Thai sauce, green chicken curry

The seafood tom yam was somewhat spicy, with very generous portions of seafood. I forgot what type of fish we had, but it was very fresh and rather nice. The green chicken curry was not bad, though it could be improved because I’ve had better somewhere else.

Kailan, prawns, tofu with scallops

The stir-fried kailan was yummy. FA thought it was a tad sweet; later Andrea suggested that maybe the chef had included some fish sauce in the dish. The fresh prawns were deep-fried with oats; sweet and satisfyingly crunchy. While we were trying to cram in as much food into our stomachs as humanly possible, Andrea came around and asked if we would like to try some tofu because she didn’t want Tim to go hungry (him being allergic to prawns and crabs) and he said yes. So a claypot brimming with tofu, mushrooms, mixed vegetables and fresh scallops appeared on our table a little while later. I think Tim whacked most of it, as I was not the bottomless pit as I thought I was.

The big ticket item - chilli crab with crispy man tou

We also had chilli crab, accompanied by deep-fried buns for you to soak up all the sauce that is served with the crab dish. I had most of it because I love crabs. Even then there were lots leftover We did think of you, Kim. According to Andrea, this is a very popular dish at Coca. The sauce is strong, slightly spicy (for me) and when you take a crispy bun to it, it was awesome.

Sago in coconut milk, mango with glutinous rice, red ruby

Then came desserts. My favourite has to be the sago in coconut milk. Well I liked the others — fresh mango with sticky rice and red ruby — as well, but the sago did it for me. For some reason, Ringo cannot take coconut milk, and so she had…

Ringo with her ais kacang

Well, we were thoroughly stuffed at the end of dinner. I still cannot believe that we had so much to eat! I asked Andrea for a quick round-up bill of what we had. She said it would come up to about RM 500. Well, I’m glad that Coca belanja-ed us makan

I was told that there are currently two Coca restaurants in operation — one in Subang Parade where we had dinner, and the other at 1Utama. They are looking to opening another outlet, but have yet to make a decision on the location. You can check out their website for full addresses, contact info and opening hours.

Kepuasan tahap maksima

Well it was a most satisfying meal. I had a lot of trouble walking afterward. Thanks for having us

- Full Flickr set here, including a couple of extra photos and larger sizes. You get the idea.

A blog post suggestion from my earlier post, Blogger’s Block, suggested by KY.

KY is so great that he makes the stupidest faces and NOT scare away children.

KY is so great that he makes the beach his bitch.

KY is so great because he gets to hang out with me, who is greater

KY is so great. I like KY because he is so great.

Have a good weekend!

When? 18 March 2006 (Sat)
Where? Sepang, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Who? DJ Tiesto aka Tijs Verwest aka trance god
Why? Renault F1 Pit Party / Asian Tour 2006
$$$? RM67 (pre-sale), around 15 Euros

First of all, thanks to Spongefox for the tickets and some ‘closer’ pix, and Janice for the vids and pix.

Kenneth drove and we reached the KLIA Limousine Shuttle Bay (with some confusion) at around 8.30 p.m. Since it was Renault’s party, they had one of their cars on display but I didn’t go there to look at sexy chicks in seriously tight lycra. So yeah, no photos of them.

People people lots and all sorts of people

The first opening act was already playing — Derb and Drum Connection were bloody fantastic! Their energy level was very contagious; I wish I’d been there earlier.

Then Francis Cobb & Bass Agents came on, his ‘working the crowd’ was a bit off but oh well. Around 10.15 p.m. he made way for some lion dance show… it was a bit wtf but Tourism Malaysia probably had a hand in that…. Then some fellas lined up to play the kompang and 10.30 p.m. Tiesto appeared. Yeay!

(So the 5 hour set promise was fluff… )

The opening was great… I was just a tad stunned to see him live, albeit from a distance but better than pixelated, you know. Then something ridiculous happened — 10 minutes into Tiesto’s set, some dudes came from nowhere and plonked their fat arses beside us and konked out. WHAT THE….. shitheads who just want to pop pills, get high and get knocked out should stay in whatever ulu disco they frequent, instead of sabotaging our movement space. FFS it was only 10.45 p.m. … omg fucking noobs.

Anyway…

Tiesto played the first set from ‘In Search of Sunrise 5′, then tracks from the album ‘Just Be’ and later ‘Magikal’ then ‘In My Memory’… Halfway into the show there was this little Indian dance troupe that was meant to complement the ‘muhibah’ spirit of Malaysia, seeing that the Chinese lion dance and Malay kompang dudes already did their stuff… but these dancers, they were good to watch.

Btw I hate whistle blowers like that.

There was also a female singer whom I’ve seen in some of Tiesto’s live gigs vids, not sure of her name, she was ok,rather good and happy and lively and all that, except that I wish she’d stop massacring ‘As The Rush Comes’.

When Derb & DC were playing, Kenneth told me that he saw PassedOutBen and suggested that KinkyBlueFairy should be there as well. Sure enough, this is a photo I nicked from KinkyBlueFairy:

We kept dancing and drank some while Tiesto worked the crowd to a feverish pitch; great presentation, great lighting, great showmanship, great atmosphere and from what I could see on the big tellies, he was phenomenally happy. A++ all the way.

And if anyone remembers the name of this track and let me know, I’d be most happy and highly grateful: Thanks bobdoom from the Tiesto forums!

Something else noobish happened as well;
the organisers ran out of warm beer to sell.
Sien.
Though at any rate they were so much better
Than the Zoukfest organisers
Yeay.
There was also laser lights,
Blinding they were to my eyes,
Sien.

But I suppose they do look quite pretty
When they are not glaring directly at me.

Overall it was fun and I was happy
Even though my limbs were weary
If you think I bitched too much earlier
It’s only ‘cos I spent quite some time preparing this post for ye.

We left at around 2 a.m. just as Tiesto played ‘Love Comes Again’. I was told later that he ended with ‘Traffic’ for his encore — not surprising and I told you so

We limped out to the car
Didn’t get too far
Before we had to stop to pee
Then we got hungry
So off we went to William’s
Who was still open, bless ‘em
And all the dancing that I did
Went down the drain when I eat
Damn it Suan ‘Kate Moss’ Nie
You go all out to elude me.

More from:

Fireangel
ShaolinTiger
KY

Added:

When friends stood you up over 6+ hours for food, they become willing participants to camwhoring sessions. Except for KY, who has a Mother Earth-instilled generous selfless nature and is always willing to share his good self with the rest of the unworthy humankind.

Today we shall be exploring the various human expressions.

First there were the grins.

Then came the sulks.

And pissy wissy.

Which led to hamsapness.

They also paid for late lunch/early dinner and accompanied me to watch SATC reruns for the rest of the evening. Thanks Paul and Kenneth! May you not fly 6+ hours aeroplane next time. Even I don’t do that… heh…