Japanese Teppanyaki At Nami, J.W. Marriot Hotel, Bkk

This modern looking Japanese restaurant was originally called Tsu Nami. It was open a few months before the actual incident actually took place. After the incident, some people were blaming them for the bad luck, so they decided to split the restaurant into two parts--Tsu and Nami. Tsu serves fresh sushi, while Nami serves Teppanyaki.

The thing I like about Nami is that they are pretty generous with their vegetables, hence we do not feel bombarded with beef/meat overdose. There are lots of choices from Tiger prawns, Salmon, Snow Fish, and different variations of Beef eg. Angus, Wagyu and even the famous Matzusaka!

Each set was accompanied with a bowl of soup with the choice of their own special Miso soup or Shitake soup. After trying both, I personally prefer their Miso soup. It's not the usual type of Miso that you make at home, but it has a touch of creaminess and tasted like lobster bisque to me.

Potato salad


Traditional Salad

There are also two choices of salad, either the potato salad or their traditional salad, both of which are very fresh. These are served with several choices of dressing, but I always choose their sesame dressing as I think it really compliments the crispness of the vegies.

The teppanyaki chef arrived right after we finished our salad and introduced himself. He performed several cooking tactics throughout the meal to keep us entertained. I was once invited up to try to do some tricks by catching the egg thrown in the air with a spatula..I ended up breaking two eggs, which was later used in the fried rice.

Our entree in the set included prawns and scallop with sauteed baby spinach.

The snow fish here is probably my favorite as it came in a beautiful big white chunk, while the chef slice it into pieces right before your eyes. It's probably by far the freshest and prettiest snow fish I've seen in Bangkok. We ordered Japanese fried rice as an accompaniment, however they were a bit too dry for my liking.

We also ordered both Angus Tenderloin and Wagyu Tenderloin. Both were very tasty, tender and flavorful! We ordered both types to compare if there is actually a difference, and indeed there was! The Wagyu was definitely more tender! Another thing I like about Teppanyaki is that there is not much seasoning other than salt and pepper (and maybe the occasional garlic butter), this allows real flavor of the beef to stand out. The previous time I was here, I also had a chance to try their Matsuzaka beef, it was really melt in the mouth texture!

The Angus Tenderloin


The Wagyu Tenderloin

Our meal was finished with the refreshing Japanese Melon which was extremely sweet! One of my most enjoyable meal in Bangkok!

Here are pics from my previous time in Nami.

Heart-shaped fried rice


Fried ice cream


Japanese Daifuku

Chocolate Chiffon cake

I made this cake while I was in Bkk. This is actually my first successful chiffon cake! I used to love sponge cake as I find them easier to make, however, after getting tips from Khun Jum's blog, it seems so much easier now. I'm really in love with chiffon cake now as the texture of the cakes stays soft and fluffy even after you put it in the fridge, unlike sponge cake which will harden a little as it contains butter. Will be making more of these in Melbourne if I can find all the ingredients.

Lunch at Secret Garden, BKK

I'm back in Melbourne. Will post up more pictures from my Bkk Trip. Anyway, I read about Secret Garden in a Thai food blog, and since it was so near my house, I decided to try it out. This restaurant was seperated into two areas, one was for desserts and the other side was for main courses. I was actually more drawn the the bakery side of it when I first read the blog, but since it was lunch time, we decided to give their food a go.

The place has a unique and sweet decoration with pastel colors theme. We ordered a variety of common Thai dishes in order to be able to compare it with other restaurants' standards.

Lime Chicken.

This dish consists of thinly sliced chicken deep fried and topped with toasted sesame, and mayonaise on a bed of shredded deep fried Chinese broccoli.
This dish was not as good as I'd expected. The chicken was a bit too thin and it was on the dry side. I preferred Banana leaf's lime chicken.

Traditional Thai cupcakes with preserved turnips.

It was my first time having these, so I couldn't really give a comment. It tasted not bad though.

Deep fried crab and cheese sticks

This was pretty ordinary too, would have been better if it was crispier.

Stir fried shredded morning glory.

The seasoning was pretty good, but the morning glory was a bit old, hence it was slightly tougher on the teeth.

Deep fried Catfish salad.

This was quite interesting. I was expecting it to be crispy and crunchy, but it wasn't crunchy, neither was it soggy. Let's just say it's pretty unique and different from the ones in other restaurants.

Coconut rice with green chicken curry.

Papaya salad.

We ordered two cakes for desserts. The Japanese cotton sponge cake and the crepe cake.

The cakes display

The Japanese cotton sponge cake was a disappointment as the texture was crumbly and dry, not soft, fluffy and moist like I'd expected.

The Crepe cake, on the other hand, was very good! The sweet/tangy strawberry sauce really complements the creaminess of crepe cake. The crepe cake was soft and light, each layer was spread with a layer of fresh cream. It was really easy to cut through and I really enjoyed it! Highly recommended!

I think this place is worth visiting anytime you have your sweets craving, or want somewhere peaceful, yet cozy to chill out with your friends!

Not so satisfying Taiwanese Food

I'm still in Bangkok and will be here for the next 2 weeks. My dad recently read a Taiwanese restaurant advertisement on the newspaper, so we decided to try it out. The restaurant is situated near the Emerald hotel on Ratchadapisek Rd. We were the very first customers to arrive, and were lead upstairs by the waitresses. When we looked at the menu, none of the dishes really stand out, so we decided to take the waitress's recommendations.

Our first dish was the "Three flavors Chicken"

I couldn't really differentiate between the 'three' flavors..and could only taste the pepper inside the dish. I was also quite unlucky as the pieces of chicken I picked out consisted of mostly bones.

The next dish was Fried Oyster.

This dish is actually not bad and tasted very different from its Thai cousin. The accompanying sauce was pretty good, but the tapioca starch was way too thick.

The steamed prawns are quite ordinary, but it was probably their best dish as they were really fresh!

Stir fried Spinach with Garlic.

This was pretty mediocre as it was a less oily version. Healthy things are usually less tasty.

I think these are steamed Balmian Bugs with garlic and soy sauce

Tofu and Seafood in a Clay pot.
This was not bad, but maybe more soy sauce might help.

So far the dishes were all edible so we decided to order another dish. Another waitress recommended that we ordered a Fish-head Hot pot and so we did.

It was a decision we all regretted! The soup tasted really funny and has a very fishy taste, so no one in my family really touched the dish.

After leaving the restaurant with an unsatisfied stomach, we decided we needed something sweet to cheer ourselves up/do our taste buds some justice! My friend told me about this cake shop called Coffee Bean By Dao and raved about how irresistible their coconut cake was, so we decided to check it out. I decided to buy 3 cakes and enjoy it at home with our own homemade cappuccino.

The cakes there were 'home-made' looking type, instead of the French type like "Lenotre". The bakery shop/restaurant was really packed with people, and it was quite hard for me to actually observe the cakes on display.

Our first cake was the Coconut cake my friend told me about.
It was really fragile. I agreed with my friend that this cake is good, it's probably the best one out of the three I bought as it wasn't overly sweet. The whipped cream and shredded fresh coconut pieces complement the sponge cake very well.

Blackforest Cake. This was my sister's choice. I thought it was pretty ordinary, though my sis liked it.

The last piece is Macadamia Cheesecake. This was a limited edition and was recommended by the waitress. It was better than I'd expected! The texture of the cheesecake was smooth and creamy and it really brings out taste of the Macadamia nuts.

To be honest, I was a bit disappointed by the cake's appearance at first, but it tasted better than it looks. The cakes were pretty good, but I think they are quite overpriced for their size and standard. They are more or equally expensive compared to the hotel ones. I think that if their portion size is slightly bigger or if the decorations were improved, a lot more people will be hooked!