Cubes Chinese Cuisine @ Jaya One

Cubes @ Jaya One

Two Fridays ago, I got an invitation from Eiling to do a food review/free dinner at Cubes @ Jaya One. I have read about Cubes before, at least having knowledge that it is a Chinese restaurant and not blindly go there and ask for a medium rare steak :p



KY arrived just moments before me and we spent about 20 mins flipping the menu waiting for our host.


Eiling & Mr Ang

Our host arrived, pictured here with the owner of the restaurant, Mr Ang. He was a very hospitable, friendly and nice chap. I know the one question everyone is curious and dying to ask is, "Why CUBES?" According to Mr Ang, the name "CUBES" came about as he didn't want his restaurant to sound typically Chinese (ie. Garden, Imperial, Palace etc) so "CUBES" popped in his mind and it was no turning back since.


Dalmore 21 & Glenmorangie Lasanta

Eiling was being generous, she pulled out 2 bottles of Single Malt whiskies for the dinner but only I drank with Mr Ang. KY claimed he had his quota of alcohol the night before and Eiling was suffering from a mysterious allergy. We polished the Dalmore off. Have yet to try the Glenmorangie Lasanta... Will curi some from the alcohol corner at home teeheehee.


Aromatic duck

First dish to arrive was, I quote, "Probably the best aromatic duck....." This is their signature appetizer dish. The duck thigh was brought out and flossed right infront of us. It is served with thin crepes, similar to popiah skin, jullienned cucumbers, spring onion, and the special sauce.



Eat it the same way as you would with peking duck skin :) The aromatic duck roll is quite good, at least compared to the one I had in The Social. We polished up both wraps and meat.


Double boiled Scallops with Tung Sum Soup

After an amazing appetizer, out came the special soup to help cleanse the palate. We were served a bowl of Double boiled Scallops with Tung Sum Soup. The soup taste herbalish (I like) as it has ingredients such as wolfberries and Tung Sum (a type of ginseng lookalike herb). The taste is further enhanced with the use of ingredients such as pork ribs and sweet succulent scallops. Eiling claimed that this is her favourite soup here and I don't see why not.


Tiger Prawn with Rice Crisps

Next in line to enter our mouths was this Tiger Prawn with Rice Crisps. Before you ask, "What? Rice crisps??" Well believe me, never judge a book by its cover! This may look abit weird but it tastes fantastic. The prawns are huge, fresh and succulent and according to Mr Ang, the rice crisps are intended to neutralize your taste buds. Very amazing chemistry I must say!


Honey Glazed Spare Ribs

The Honey Glazed Spare Ribs await us while we finished the last gulp of the soup and licked clean the prawns' shell. This is another signature dish at Cubes which the owner is very proud off. It is not hard to see why he is so proud of the ribs.


So tender

They're juicy, bursting with flavour and tender! The meat just falls out from the bone at the poke of the fork. I usually shiver at the sight of pork fats but this one just melts in your mouth and the form of reaction my body sent me was a message to the brain saying, "This is oh too good, can I have another piece pleaseeeeee?"


Homemade beancurd with spinach and mushroom

Fans of beancurd will rejoice for this is a piece of heaven. The beancurd is soft, and the gravy complements well the usually bland beancurd. There is also a layer of spinach which I have mistaken it for seaweed on top of the perfectly golden brown beancurd.


Deep fried & stir fried lotus with celery

The last dish of the dinner was this healthy mix of vegies consisting deep fried and stir fried lotus with celery. I particularly love the deep fried lotus and have had my first deep fried lotus during CNY 2 years ago. It serves as a very delicious and addictive snack (fattening too but who cares!).


A very healthy vege drink

But of course, when you have the owner at the table with you, the dinner don't stop here. He instructed the kitchen to blend a very special healthy vege drink for Eiling who claimed she can't have alcohol for 5 days. Can't really remember what combination of vege was used but I remember there was Kai Lan and Celery in it. Surprisingly, it tastes really good!


Fruit enzymes- Dragonfruit & Starfruit


Fruit enzyme- Apple & Ginger

He also generously brought forth his special not-in-menu fruit enzymes, brewed by himself and brought out on special occassions and requests to entertain guests like us. The fruit enzymes were amazingly drinkable (*grins) and I almost couldn't tell what I was drinking as it does not really have very strong taste of ie. ginger.


Almond cream with black sesame glutinous balls

I thought there wasn't any space for desserts but I went on to have a bowl of Almond Cream with Black Sesame Glutinous Balls. To be honest, this dessert will require more than just a love for nuts, it is only for the acquired taste! If you think almond on its own taste bad, I can just say almond cream tastes _________. There's no word to describe it but in my humble opinion, I dislike almond cream. The black sesame glutinous balls were yummy though :D



To wrap the dinner affair up, we were served rock melon and papaya. These are the very same rock melons used by Italian restaurants to complement the parma/air dried ham. They're very sweet, you can almost become diabetic if you're overdosed with this fruit!


KY and his awesome flash

Pardon me for the inconsistencies in my pictures (some with flash, some without). I am looking forward to see KY's pictures as he takes really good food photos IMHO and his awesome flash is just too awesome.

Overall, it was a great dinner and I left with a bloated stomach but not a single cent poorer (except for parking) and a new friend found (who owns Cubes haha). I will recommend this place to my colleagues for and we can drop by for lunch.... great food at less than a kilometer away!

p/s: As the concept of Cubes is Chinese fine dining, do expect the prices to be alittle steeper than your usual dai chow corners. But if you don't mind paying a bomb for typical Chinese restaurants, then do give Cubes a try!


Read related review-
The Star


Cubes
18-1, Block L1-1,
Palm Square Jaya One,
No. 72A, Jalan Universiti,
Petaling Jaya.
Tel: 03-7958 6616

[disclaimer: the opinions expressed here are based on my personal views, tastebuds and preference and may vary for others. please dont sue me, i dont have money. kthxbye.]

Lek Seafood @ Silom, Bangkok

With all our money invested into shopping, shopping and more shopping, we could not afford to splurge lavishly for our dinner so we went for Thai dai chow instead. Ziling had done some researches on where to have dinner and recommended Lek Seafood as a few people have blogged about it.


Thai paku pakis in sambal belacan


Tom Yum Goong


Fried pork ribs


Thai style Oh Jien


Grilled sotong


Stir fried brocollies with prawns


Stir fried pork slices


Happiness comes in 1 litre bottle Coke

While the food is not fantastic, our local Malaysian dai chow fares much much better, I think it's reasonable food at reasonable prices since our whole bill came to only about 1010 Bahts, which is about RM17 per pax. Not forgetting that we had a wonderful drink that is NOT alcoholic and that is none other than the old skool Coke in 1 litre bottle size, loads of ice and it was such a comfort to the heat! This was the only time I had so much Coke since my new year's resolutions.

Lek Seafood is located just below Chong Nonsi station (Silom BTS Line) and you should be able to spot it easily, just a few doors away from a 7-11 store and with a bright red recognizable Coca Cola signboard.

Read their stories too-
Eiling
Ziling


Lek Seafood
156 Soi Phipat,
Narathiwat Ratchanakharin Road,
Silom, Bangkok.
Tel: (02) 6366460, 6366054

Pratunam (Food)

After much shopping, we decided to cross over from Pratunam Market to across the street where we entered into another mall (oh ze wonderful air cond!) and another mall, sorry I have forgotten the name of the mall but Big C Supermarket was the anchor tenant. It was also in Big C that I encountered the "No Alcohol Before 5pm" Rule which IMHO is the most ridiculous rule because that was why I couldn't get my Smirnoff Double Black. Grrrrrr!!!


Grilled beef balls with spicy sauce


Assorted preserved food/pickles/jeruk


Thailand's Ceasar Salad


Fried assorted noodles


Fried Thai fishcakes and sausages


Fried assorted sausages galore


Erm sausages again, long ones ;)


I like Thai fishcakes!


Cooling drinks for a hot sunny day

The thing about streetfood in Bangkok is that the Thais love sausages and anything and everything fried. You can almost spot stalls selling fried food everywhere. The funny thing however is the weather there is atrociously scorching burning sweating hot! But they still like to eat hot and heaty fried food. Hmmm, it's like going to Iceland and having ice cream/ice blended drinks as streetfood.

Pratunam Market

Pratunam Market is a flea/wholesale market similar to that of Chatuchak but without the hype and popularity of the latter. It is situated in Pratunam and somewhat nearby to the Platinum Mall area. We had initially wanted to go to Baiyoke Mall but the taxi driver dropped us here instead.



Pratunam Market stretches from one end of the shops to another end (as pictured above in green canopies by the road) and stalls were set up at the corridor of the shops. Another section of the market would be inside a building which is rather big and felt like a maze.



Pratunam Market is actually not too nice to walk if it's on a really really hot day as you can feel the heat trapped within the building and before you can find anything nice to buy, you'll be screaming to get out and look for the nearest air cond area.



Luckily there is an air conditioned haven that comes in the form of Indra Square, just a 5 minutes walk away from Pratunam Market. Trust me, you wouldn't want to get out of the air conditioned premises after having a taste of what the heat is like in Bangkok.



Back to Pratunam Market, I would recommend only walking the outside part which is the stores next to the roads, to walk inside the building is quite a waste of time as I find the goods there not appealing at all (ie. alot of shops selling clothes for old people/very ugly clothings).



Some interesting sightings would be these obscene t-shirts selling just infront of an eatery shop!



And how did we cool down on a particularly hot day?



A mini coconut juice!!! These are at 20 Bahts each, and yes it's the same coconuts you find in Jogoya or Tenji! The coconuts are also chilled so you can imagine how heavenly it was........

In fact this would be perfect on a hot day in Malaysia like now....... Ahhhhhhhh.

Mango Tree @ Suvarnabhumi Airport

On our last day, we decided to be safe than sorry and took a taxi to the airport about 2 hours earlier. True enough we reached Suvarnabhumi Airport with about 2 hours to spare. The checking in was pretty breezy, and we were in the dutyfree shopping area in no time.


Fresh Orange Juice- 110 Bahts

Knowing how both of us are very much into dutyfree related shopping, we spent a good hour or so browsing through the DF goods- liquor, chocolates, perfumes, tobacco etc. Generally the DF goods in BKK Airport is higher than in KLIA, so we didn't buy any. We had wanted to grab dinner before flying back to Malaysia, our initial plan was to have McDonald's pork burger, but sadly we were told there is no McD in Suvarnabhumi Airport! I was obviously very disappointed as I had been looking forward for it :(

Ultimately, we had to settle for some food and since I had a balance of about 1000 Bahts, we decided to dine lavishly and so we chose Mango Tree.


Young Coconut- 110 Bahts

We had our drinks, Young Coconut for Eiling and Fresh Orange Juice for me :) Well, it was my last chance to have the awesome orange juice so I had to order it even though it is quite expensive now that I think about it :/


Khor Moo Yang- 190 Bahts

We were quite tempted by the pictures in the menu, one of the items that caught our eyes was Khor Moo Yang, which is actually Grilled Pork Neck. Honestly, the picture of the meat in the menu was much leaner but the real dish looks pretty fat. It was rather fat, and of course we didn't eat the fats! Quite a disappointment :(


Tom Yum Goong- 230 Bahts

We ordered a Tom Yum Goong to share and it was pretty good. Not too spicy, just nice...


Ayuthaya Beef Noodles- 190 Bahts

The Ayuthaya Beef Noodles was on promotion and is one of the cheapest mains on the menu. It has been quite some time since I last had beef noodles, so I thought it'll be fantastic to have it here just to see if there's any difference between the Thai version and the Malaysian version. Tastewise, the flavours and what's in the bowl of noodles is no difference than what we have back home. It is rather good and the kitchen was particularly generous with the beef parts (beef balls, tripes, tendon, beef slices) :)


Phad Thai Goong- 200 Bahts

Eiling had the Thai Char Kuey Teow or known as Phad Thai Goong. The flat rice noodle used here is thinner in width, somewhat like fettuccine. Eiling didn't give a good review on this though and didn't really finish it too. Therefore, I would like to praise myself for making a smart choice by ordering the beef noodles :p


Final meal in Bangkok

The whole meal cost us 1102.10 Bahts (about RM110) and I used up every penny of Baht I have left in my wallet for the meal. If not for the fried cricket bugger who conned me, I would have an extra 980 Bahts for another supper on Air Asia or something. Grrrrrr......



Mango Tree
@ Suvarnabhumi Bangkok International Airport

[disclaimer: the opinions expressed here are based on my personal views, tastebuds and preference and may vary for others. please dont sue me, i dont have money. kthxbye.]