Lunch at Al Halabi

It was not often that a restaurant which looked good on the outside, served good food. At least not often here in Kuala Lumpur. So, Anita and I decided to be a bit more adventurous this Sunday lunchtime and for some reason, I fancied some Arab food. I passed by this particular restaurant on a newly opened section of Pavilion recently but it was too late for lunch then.

So, I decided to give this one a go. It was called Al Halabi, located on the seventh floor, through the escalator near Times Bookstore. It was part of a new section called Dining Loft.

It was spacious with a separate seating area in filled with natural light right at the back. A lot of shisha smoker back there, so we decided to take one of the seats in the main area. Very nice setting, true to Middle Eastern theme, with some of the waiters who were actually Arabic.

The cooks were definitely from the Middle East and they have a butcher there preparing fresh meat and ingredients, plus a baker who actually baked the puffs and bread traditionally. The grilling was also done in-house as well and the produce were displayed by the main counter as if you were sitting in a market. It was reminiscent of Marche.

What did we order? I started with some hummus with sliced grilled meat, and for the mains I had grilled pomfret while Anita had chicken tikka. We had some rice with them and I had some Arabic mint tea in the end.

I was impressed. I could feel the succulent fish melting in my mouth and the dips were amazing. Even the mint sauce tasted authentic - and made from real mint - while the rice was a joy. The mint in the tea was a touch to light to be honest and it finished up tasting rather bitter.

We gave up on desserts since we were just too full.

The seats were very comfortable as we were on a sofa, and I now understood why the patron seemed to sit down there for hours! We ended up sitting there for nearly a couple of hours, nibbling away at our food, before finally leaving the place. The staff were OK, although the Arabs struggled somewhat with their English. The other staffs who spoke English were Filipino or Bangladeshi. How I wished that the locals would work there, as I could see that most of the patron were locals.

Highly recommended although I hope that they could maintain their standard in the future. The place was still rather new when we visited.

Mooncakes and Lanterns

I didn't have much chance to explore. But at the same time, I must say there had not been much hype about the lantern festival this season. Maybe it was the refllection of the state of the economy, and it may also be that with the Bersih and the “Red Shirt” rally, there is a bit of tension running around.

So, I only managed to catch one at Pavilion last weekend. Pretty straight forward, with mainly stalls selling novelty mooncakes from a host of local hotels and restaurants. We didn't catch any events at the time I was visiting, but there were plenty of people around browsing.

A group of my friends may be planning to hit Petaling Street this coming weekend - haze permitting. We night catch more fancy lanterns there then ….

Turkish Invasion

The main lobby at Pavilion was filled up with an exhibit last week. It was by the Turkish Tourism board, complete with cultural dances and artwork demonstration.

Despite being a work day, the place was filled with shoppers curious with what was on show. A belly dancing routine prior to that certainly had something to do with the number of crowd gathering.

In the 15 minutes I was at the lobby, I saw a glass blowing demonstration and well traditional painting done by artisans. They were also serving free Turkish coffee and ice cream.

Quite a well executed program I thought ....

Saturday Outing

Idlan wanted to try some sports at school. He had started playing badminton, and a few of his friends wanted to play football and basketball later in the week. He was clearly into it and wanted me to get me a football.

So, off we went for a bit of shopping. He ended up getting himself the balls and a brand new sneakers. And the afternoon was topped off with a spot of hot chocolate at his favourite cafe. Unfortunately no practice for today as it was raining heavily by early evening.