Classic Greek from Pizza Pizza - $4.80

Domain @ Cyberjaya, Malaysia.

There’s no such thing as good pizza in Malaysia. That said, you take what you get, and as far as that goes, this is not bad at all.

A small simple shop serving a variety of pizza and limited pasta dishes, Pizza Pizza was empty when I drove past it, but it seems most people just get it delivered.

Anyways, the Classic Greek had minced beef, black olives, onion, capsicum, mushroom and cheese. I got a 9” to myself, which was surprisingly filling. Every bite was flavourful, a nice bread-to-toppings ratio.

I’m definitely going again.

Cajun Jambalaya Pasta from Cheesecake Factory - $14.95

132 Christiana Mall, Newark, DE - 302.454.9444

http://www.thecheesecakefactory.com

Firstable, I sorta guessed the price, so don't get all finicky on me for being wrong.

This was my first ever experience at Cheesecake Factory after numerous previous attempts so there was a bit of hype and.... and it fared pretty well in my mind.

I drove my takeout order about 30 minutes away before chowing down and the chicken was STILL tender and juicy. I really love how they placed a fat layer of shrimp and chicken over the bed of al dente pasta. I almost want to say everything was spot on for this dish, but alas, there is a complaint - the lack of Andouille sausage. That's my favorite part of Jambalaya! How can you make jambalaya without the Andouille sausage!?

That "flaw" alone is reason enough for me to choose something else on the menu the next time I go - but that's also because I have a hidden agenda to explore some of their other tantalizing dishes (e.g. chicken madeira... mmmm).

Bulgogi Bento from Korean BBQ & Sushi Restaurant - $8.95

3 Liberty Plaza, Newark, DE - (302) 455-9100

Here's a lunch special from the only Korean restaurant I know of in Newark. Bulgogi is thinly sliced prime rib eye that's marinated in some special Korean sauce. It has a slightly sweet taste to it, Usually, if you eat in, they provide you the raw meat and then you grill it yourself at the table.

The rest of the stuff they give you is part of what I think is called banchan? It's just an assortment of little side dishes. I think this place always give you a fried shrimp, two sushi pieces, a scoop of rice, and kimchi. For those of you who don't know, kimchi is the reddish stuff in the 2nd picture - essentially, it's pickled cabbage.

The rest is random - I think this was the first time they gave me cantaloupe, and I usually get the sesame-oiled broccoli and those sweetened potatoes (not sweet potatoes, but sweetened).

Thosai from Rahim’s - $0.50

Cyberjaya, Malaysia.

This is thosai. I didn’t make it. It’s indian also. I’ve just found that it’s made of rice, black gram and fenugreek. It’s actually quite tasty on its own but you usually eat it with chutney or dhal. I like chutney more but since I got a friend to get take-away for me, he didn’t specify that and instead I got dhal.

It’s usually a full circle but this one looks folded, cos again, this was take away. 

Excuse the brief post but North Korea are playing a ridiculously good opening game against Brazil now and I need to get ready to cheer in the off chance that they score.

Aww man…. Brazil just scored against North Korea… RIP the korean goalkeeper.

Homemade Chapati - $0

My kitchen.

OK so it isn’t absolutely free but I don’t know the cost of 3 cups of flour, a few good throws of salt, water, a few teaspoons of yoghurt and about half a shot of oil. A shot as in alcoholic shots. That’s all the ingredients I used.

I decided to make chapati after reading the recipe and finding out that it is incredibly easy to do. It didn’t turn out so good, but was fun and easy and at least now I think I know where I screwed up and can make a better batch next time.

  So 1 cup of flour is all the measurements I was given. The salt you add to taste and the water, well, however much is needed to get the flour into manageable dough consistency. Oil is optional but I think you should add it in. This gives you 5 chapatis.

I made 2 batches, one with water and another with yoghurt. Mixing flour with cold yoghurt is TOUGH.. that shit is slippery and doesn’t mix well, and getting the right mix is hard. I ended up adding another cup of flour into it, in an attempt to find the right flour-yoghurt ratio balance. When rolling you apply a lotta flour so it doesn’t stick.

The pic on the right is how it should look like after the first flip, and when the other side looks like this also, you flip it again. It will start puffing up if you don’t control the heat on the pan, which I guess makes for an interesting visual treat but that’s not how real chapati should be like. Oh I should mention this is not bad for your health at all based on the ingredients, and the fact that you don’t cook with oil. Notice I said this “isn’t bad for your health”… I didn’t say “this is really healthy”. Cos I dunno how beneficial it is for your health. The oil you add into the premix doesn’t make it oily (to the touch). And because you don’t cook with oil, the flour  that you used to smoothen the dough will also transfer to the pan and eventually onto the finished product. Yeah, you eat raw flour. Unsure of the health benefits there but let’s just say it is for the sake of ending this post.

So where did I screw up? I made it too thin, and cranked up the heat on the pan. That resulted in very crispy chapati, like biscuits. Chapati should be like tortilla wrap, it should be soft and bread-like, as in non-yeast bread.

Also, I forgot salt with the yoghurt mix. So while it was slightly smoother, it was completely tasteless. Which wouldn’t be so bad if I had curry to go with it, but that’s my last mistake – I made chapati without any curry.. or ANYTHING… to go with it. That’s like making rice but forgetting about all the other stuff. Real smart.

A Leisurely Gentleman from Logan House - $10.00

1701 Delaware Avenue, Wilmington, DE - (302) 652-9493

http://www.loganhouse.com

The Leisurely Gentleman is a burger where the bun is composed of grilled cheese sandwiches. My jaw dropped when I first heard that alone, but there's MORE - the top grilled cheese sandwich has a tomato in it and the bottom one added bacon. If that's not an ingenius idea, I don't know what is.

From the sounds of the description alone, you'd expect it to be some towering sandwich you could barely get your jaws around, but it turns out to be an entirely manageable sandwich.

Seeing how simple yet, extraordinarily awesome the result is really makes me think I need to add this sandwich to my cooking repertoire.

Assorted Baklava from Naf Naf Grill - $2.99

1095 East Ogden Avenue, Naperville, IL - 630.904.7200

http://www.nafnafgrill.com/

Even though my description of this dessert won't sound appetizing, just know that I really do love this stuff. Anyway, whenever I sink my teeth into this delectable dessert, cardboard always comes to mind. I thought of cardboard when I tasted my dog's dry food too, but that was different. In the case of the baklava, the texture is what makes me think of carboard. It's heavily layered with the top part being thin and light, sort of like paper, and then bottom being thick and dense just like cardboard.

The flavor is really fantastic though. From what I can gather, underneath the top layers of thin, crispy dough is a layer of crushed nuts sweetened with honey or syrup. The second picture shows an overhead picture with the papery layer taken off to give you an idea.