Shanghai 10 Grand, Avenue K

After battling Friday evening traffic into the city, a usual 10-minute journey that took 45 minutes, I was grumpy and ravenous. My friend H who had made the proposition for dinner at Avenue K had promised good food at reasonable prices, and I was intending to hold her to her words.

We arrived at Shanghai 10 Grand at the basement of Avenue K, right above the hordes of LRT commuters. At this point, I remembered a pleasant dining experience at the Shanghai 10 outlet in Bangsar Baru more than a year ago, and a less pleasant one at the outlet in Queensbay Mall in Penang, so really, the evening could go either way.

H took to the task of ordering for all four of us with great ease, fuelling suspicion that she had been lunching extremely well at her new work surroundings. We were a little taken aback when all the food arrived at one go and we had to join our 4-seater table with another to make space for all the plates, teacups, condiments and whatnot.

Fried flat glass noodles with crab roe and shrimps. I'm not a huge glass noodle fan, the stringy variety anyway, but this one transformed me into an instant convert. Tasted like hor fun, with rougher texture and more bite, and each piece see-through to boot! The crab roe and shrimps were abundant, though you wouldn't be able to tell from my awful photo.

The outlet name has Shanghai in it after all so missing out on the Xiu Long Bao would have been a crime. The XLBs here are decent, with the right amount of filling nestled in a small mouthful of soup. It isn't quite Din Tai Feng's 18-fold offering, but it'll do.

Egg tarts, extra milky. Because I'm quasi lactose-intolerant, one half of a tart was just about all I could stomach.

Fried yam cake, instead of the usual radish cake. I have to say I much prefer this to radish cake. There's just so much more substance to yam than radish.

Crispy prawn rolls in beancurd skin. Nothing extraordinary but credit due for the chunky fresh prawns within.

Pickled cucumber. Refreshing, tangy with a mild hint of spice and everything nice!

There was also an order of the ramen in Shanghai-style hot & spicy soup but I completely forgot to get a shot of it. The noodles were springy, and a nice soupy addition to the rest of the relatively dry meal.

We polished everything off, right down to the last sliver of cucumber. The bill split up evenly to about RM16 per person, which is reasonable enough so all the horrors upon exiting the Smart tunnel earlier were well forgotten!

Din Tai Fung, The Gardens

Having heard and read so much about the revered Din Tai Fung franchise, I was looking forward to catching up with nice bunch of people there one fine afternoon. Din Tai Fung hails from Taiwan, famed for the ubiquitous siu long bao (meat dumpling) and while there has been no shortage of places serving up this delicacy in Malaysia, the high degree of variation in flavour and overall quality compels one to continuously search for the perfect dumpling.

The company, as usual, was awesome. The food? Let's get to it!

First up was of course, two steamers of the original siu long bao. They do have other interesting varieties but we decided to stick to the basics first.
We ordered two steamers of six dumplings. The dumplings were smaller than expected but the skin was perfectly textured. And for its size, each dumpling held a lavish amount of delicious soup.

The franchise was also known to serve a mean la mian so I ordered the Spicy Pork & Prawn Wantan la mian. I think I could've done better. The spice basically came from an inordinate amount the house chilli paste heaped onto plain wantans and admittedly springy and toothsome.

The others ordered Pork Chop fried rice....

...la mian with mustard greens and pork...

...and Chicken Chop & fried rice. There were murmurings of appreciation as we settled into our meals. Portions were unstinting and we were all happily stuffed by the time we wiped our plates clean. Still, there's always room for something sweet.

Black sesame and red bean buns which looked luscious, but I simply couldn't fit anything else in. The bill came up to around RM130 for five, including beverages. It was by no means a cheap lunch but a very satisfying one. Service too was quick and attentive, save for a little screw-up with an order that appeared twice.