Wine Tasting in Margaret River & Swan Valley, Australia by Gneb

Margaret River
As I mentioned in my previous post about Margaret River Guest House, people either come to Margaret River for wine tasting or the local produce (e.g. cheese, chocolate etc) tasting.

I’m not a wine connoisseur, but I certainly enjoy the odd opportunity to visit different wine making regions and taste different wines. So, I made it a point that I should go wine tasting when I was in Margaret River recently.

Below are some of the wineries that I went to that I thought were really good. They looked more like hotels to me than wineries. All of them run their own restaurants as well. Best of all, wine tasting is free in these wineries!

Watershed

This is kind of up-market and in fact, we were told that this is one of the best wineries in this area. The people behind the bar are friendly and would patiently pour the wines and explain them to their guests. I bought a bottle of their 2005 Senses Shiraz here.

Leeuwin Estate

Another posh one in this area. This is another one we were told worth visiting and produces some of the best wines in the area. I bought a bottle of their 2003 Cabernet Merlot.

Voyager Estate

I’d say this is by far the best winery to take your beautiful pictures as the scenery is just great.

Lake Clifton Vineyard and Winery
On our way back to Perth, we saw this little winery that makes fruit wines. We thought it was so special and we’d never tried fruit wines, so we decided to stop and check it out.

It looks more like a little shed and they make wines out of different fruits, such as strawberry, mango, peach, pineapple and ginger. Very special!

Swan Valley
Swan Valley is another famous wine region in Australia and it’s not as far away from Perth as Margaret River. People usually can make a day trip up here from Perth during the weekend.

Houghton Wines
There's big green field at the back and you get to see many wild cockatoos here. We didn’t try out the wines here but the winery is such a beautiful scene. It also has a cellar that’s open to public.

Sittella
Now if you’re feeling a little peckish while in Swan Valley, Sittella is definitely an ideal place for lunch. Not only it has a very beautiful restaurant with a fabulous view over the vineyard, the food is also fantastic!

Life couldn’t have been more wonderful to start our lunch with a glass of wine from the winery itself.

Followed by these lovely starters...

And finish off with all these scrumptious main courses.

Sun Yoon Kee Seafood Restaurant, Penang by Gneb

A friend of mine told me how he enjoyed the “chu char” (Chinese cooked dishes with rice) at Sun Yoon Kee Seafood Restaurant, which is located in Lebuh Cintra, Penang. I happened to pass by Campbell Street (aka Penang’s Chinatown) the other day and since Lebuh Cintra is just around the corner, I decided to check out this typical old-fashioned Chinese restaurant.

Lebuh Cintra is located between Chulia Street and Campbell Street. Lebuh Cintra is fairly short but it’s also house to several famous eateries in Penang. The most famous of all is the “Bak Chang” (Chinese meat dumplings). There’re also Curry Noodles, Hong Tau Sar (Red Bean Soup) and the Hainanese Chicken Rice at the corner. I also noticed that there’s this newly opened Bee Hoon T’ng (Vermicelli Soup) place which apparently, is packed with people.

Sun Yoon Kee Seafood Restaurant is an old-fashioned Chinese restaurant. The shop-houses here are typical of the pre-war architectures seen around the City of Georgetown.

I was so tempted by the Roasted Pork at the shop front, so I decided to order some. The Roasted Pork is so delicious and the skin is so crispy.

The Prawn Curry tastes a bit like “asam laksa” soup. Very nice but a little salty though. The consolation though, there are so many prawns in the curry!


“Nam Yu” Fried Chicken – although a bit oily, this is so juicy and satisfying. Love the prawn crackers as you seldom see them being served with fried chicken these days.

Steamed To Fu in Gravy – the gravy tastes like “Sar Hor Fun” (fried flat noodles in gravy) a bit. Mind you, they serve very good “Sar Hor Fun”, so this dish is not bad at all.

If you’re looking for an economic meal for your weekend dinner, this is not a bad choice after all. The entire meal costs only RM34 (plus 2 iced Chinese Tea)

My scores:
Taste: 4

Environment: 1 (don't expect too much, the restaurant is old)

Service: 2 (not rude but don't expect 5 star service either)

Price: 4 (cheap and worth it)

Parking: 4 (in front of the resturant and along Lebuh Cintra)

Address: Lebuh Cintra (opposite the Bak Chang place)

Australian Meat Pies by Gneb

Being a huge pie lover, I’m always on the lookout for delicious pies everywhere I go to. So, it’d only make sense that I had meat pie eating in my itinerary, when I was in the nation of meat pies – Australia recently.

In fact, I decided to have a little indulgence by trying out the pies at 2 different places, as I knew I wasn't going to be in Australia forever...

With a statement as below, it’d be difficult not to over indulge in eating the tasty pies.

Besides, this is from someone who’s “serious about pies”!

You could find Jesters Pies all over Australia. In Western Australia alone, I’ve seen Jesters Pies in almost all of the major towns I’ve been to. Below are from the Busselton shop I went to.

The pies come in different shapes and with different savoury and sweet fillings. We tried 3 of them and they were all so delicious!

The steaming filling inside oozes out the moment you bite into the pies. You’ve got to try out their fries too.

Jesters Pies also sell boxes of frozen pies. All you need to do is to pop them into microwave whenever you want them.

Back in downtown Perth, I found the pies at the up market David Jones’s Foodhall equally as tempting. I succumbed to the temptation by buying a pie and a quiche for lunch.

This is so nice. I love the minced beef filling, it’s so tasty!

Having tried the Real McCoy Aussie meat pies, I left Australia with utmost satisfaction and definitely with no regret whatsoever.

Karaikudi Restaurant, Penang by Gneb

I was in Little India last Friday. I’ve always been fascinated by Little India, Penang. It is such an enchanting and delightful area of Georgetown, both ethnically and culturally. The place is constantly in “carnival mode”, with the loud Indian music playing all day long, back-dropped by the multi-colored merchandizes in the shops around this area. If you come during the Hindu festive seasons, you’ll also get to see the residents dancing to the music along the street.

As Little India is located right at the heart of the heritage hub of Georgetown, it has also attracted a lot of local and foreign tourists, especially those from the nearby Chulia Street. Some of them come for the historic buildings, where in fact you will get to see some of the best preserved historic buildings in Penang. Some of them come for the shops which sell imported goods all the way from India. If you’re into ethnic motif fabrics, this is definitely the place. There are also some, like us apparently, who come for the authentic Indian food.

Karaikudi Restaurant is a restaurant that serves North and South Indian cuisines. It’s located at the edge of Little India in Market Street.

Karaikudi Restaurant is apparently very popular among the locals and tourists. We’d only been in there for 10 minutes, before the whole restaurant started to fill up with customers.

The restaurant supervisor takes customers’ orders from table to table and would patiently recommend and explain the food to their customers. I find him an honest man as he did the due diligence in advising us about the portion of the food and he’d also stop recommending once he knows that we’ve ordered enough or we’ll be wasting the food otherwise.

Don’t miss the Mango Lassi (RM4)! It’s soooo nice, rich and refreshing!

Fried Cauliflower (RM8) – This tastes almost like crisps! So crispy and tasty!

Butter, Garlic and Cheese Naan (RM5) – For me, Indian meals will not be complete without Naan. I’ll have to say these are very delicious Naan too.

Plain Briyani Rice (RM5.50) – We wanted to order Chicken Briyani at first, but were glad that we finally settled for Plain Briyani as it tastes equally as savory without the chicken.

We ordered Tandoori Chicken (RM11) instead as we wanted to taste the chicken on its own without the flavour of the spices in the Briyani. It turned out that this wasn’t a bad choice at all.

To go with the Briyani Rice and Naan, we also ordered the Special Fish Curry (RM12) and Kadai Vegetables (RM9). I really liked the Special Fish Curry and I will definitely go back for more.

It was such a fulfilling and satisfying dinner. We were so full by the time we finished the meal that we had to change our mind about ordering their desserts.

In the end, we decided to substitute eating with window shopping in Little India instead, since we were on the verge of puking having eaten too much. What a scene Little India has become at night!

My scores:
Taste: 5

Environment: 3(Nothing fancy but comfortable enough)

Service: 4 (The waiters were smiling most of the time and the Supervisor was kind of honest)

Price: 3 (I actually thought it was ok for the amount and quality of food that we got. It wasn’t exorbitant for sure.)

Parking: 4 (Parking spaces available in front of the restuarant)

Address: No 2, Market Street, 10200, Penang

Tel: 604-2631345 / 2631359

By the way, they have also opened a branch at Hill Side.

Visit their website for more info: http://www.karaikudi.com.my/