ALWAYS IN TROUBLE...: Penang Again – Day 3

Slept really late last night writing the previous post and woke up wayyy past lunchtime today. Decided to go to Gurney Mall and snoop around to see what we could eat. We’ve gotten the idea that most restaurants in Penang close between 2.30 and 5.30pm, which really sucks.

Browsing the food section in the information directory in the mall, we impulsively decided to visit a classy looking Japanese restaurant on the 3rd floor.

Their menu was very stylish. (Though hard to understand cuz there were no descriptions!)

The decor was unique too. They had a Zen Garden!

But we soon found out that looks can be very deceiving. From the moment we walked in, we found out that most of the staff couldn’t even speak English. Those who could, could only manage bits and pieces. But never mind, at least we still managed to communicate in Malay and bits and pieces of Mandarin from Nic.

Then the food arrived.

The Mango Ebi Maki, which was…okay. It looked pretty, but wasn’t wrapped very well and kept on falling apart.

The food was generally very bland, nothing spectacular. I had a Teppanyaki Beef set, and Nic had a Unagi Tempura set. Those were still alright. But the Soft Shell Crab Temaki and Sushi Moriawase Kozue which we subsequently received were terrible! The crab wasn’t just a soft shelled crab, it was also soggy. Even the seaweed wrap wasn’t crispy.

It looked pretty though…or maybe that’s just my photography skills improving. :P

However, if you think that’s bad, I can tell you, the Sushi Moriawase was worse. I forgot to take a picture of it, but I think their sushi chef should be shot. Twice!

Firstly, it came so The sushi was mostly rice, but the rice was so incredibly sour that it was totally inedible! We think they might have accidentally poured too much vinegar into the rice, or perhaps didn’t stir it properly so it all collected in one spot. That was fine, however when we alerted the staff to it, they did not even offer to replace the damn thing. They just went off and told the chef about it. Not wanting to spoil the mood, we just ignored the rice and ate everything else.

The bill came up to a whopping RM110.40. Not too bad a price to pay if the food was good, but for the crap we got I thought it was very expensive. We would’ve had a better experience even if we had decided to eat at McDonalds.

After we left, we still were not satisfied and meandered around the mall for a little while before heading to pick up my personal tour guide (RE: my Aunt – and she’s an actual licensed tour guide) from her office. She brought us to a quaint little dessert house called Sugar Dynasty on Nagore Road.

I forgot to take a picture of it so I grabbed this off someone else’s blog. :P

Despite my lack of photos, I would definitely recommend going there. It was a tiny little family run shop, with only about 5 tables for eat-in customers. Desserts were RM2.50 each, and were thick and tasty. My favourite item was the sweet potato balls served with a mixture of sugar and chopped up nuts. Doesn’t sound like much but it was goooooood. And cheap too!

After that we walked around the road abit. Penang has quite a number of quaintly businesses.