Excapade Sushi

This time, we went to Excapade Sushi. My fiance and I wanted to eat out before we went to watch the premiere of Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, but unfortunately because he was ill, he had to settle for non-fried foods, so we decided to eat here.

This be the signboard of Excapade Sushi. I forgot to change the settings of the camera, so I had to manually adjust the brightness via computer, and this is the best I can do. Excapade Sushi is somewhere within Gadong area, also across the street from The Mall, though I think it's opposite Booker (or maybe not) and is the probably the same row as La Mee restaurant.

This be the entrance towards Excapade Sushi. The staircase is situated in one of those mini corners of the building, but it's not really that hard to find

This be the main layout of the restaurant. As you can see, Excapade is bloody popular and the longest running and longest standing Japanese restaurant in Brunei, with its only rival being Misato situated in Kiulap. No other Japanese restaurant can beat them as they have so many branches throughout the area and has brought down many other small fry Japanese restaurant out of business. You have to make reservations to get a good seat, otherwise you have to wait forever to be seated.

Luckily there were plenty of empty seats at the bar counter, so we sat there instead, since we came in without a booking. Just like any other authentic Japanese restaurants, they have the sushi train where you can get anything you want from there


These area is where you would like to dine among very few friends or if you would like the privacy. At the far end are private rooms, mostly used when you're having big parties or maybe a two-to-two dining together with a special someone, and can only be available via booking, no walk-ins

We usually opt to drink their in-house green tea (ocha) coz other drinks cost a bundle. I like Japanese cups. They're so simple in design yet very worth the use. I enjoy holding it like a proper Japanese would hold: one hand holding the top side of the cup and one hand at the bottom, then the hand on the bottom is the one doing the work pushing the cup to tilt the tea for you to sip. Reminds me of those old-school Japanese people who drink them in elegance

We ordered our food, and one thing Excapade took pride of was the fact that they make their food SUPER FAST! Although that is usually part of the requirement for Japanese cuisines. Sometimes they say speed reduces quality, but definitely not the case for Excapade

Teriyaki Tofu. One of my fiance's fav dish. I'm not really into tofu, but this is pretty good

I totally forgot what is this called in Japanese, but it's basically sizzling fried string mushrooms in butter and teriyaki sauce. It's a recent fav of ours. It tastes pretty good. You have the usual teriyaki sauce taste, and then the buttery aftertaste. Very unique dish. Though I still prefer eating it via steamboat

My fiance ordered gyoza ramen, and ramen always reminds us of Naruto. Unfortunately half of the stuff (like the vegs) he doesn't like to eat anyways...

I ordered sashimi bento, the most expensive bento set in the group. They've got fried garlic rice, an assortment of sashimi and an assortment of sushis, with the usual egg and miso soup, and fruits for dessert. It's the whole package. Thankfully we didn't order anymore side dishes or it would've stuffed the guts out of us

There you have it, Excapade Sushi, probably the best place to sooth your Japanese cravings~! Itadakimasu~!

Nyonya

I am going to submit entries every once a week in bulk to show you how many places we have been throughout the week to have our chowtime. Sorry for the late entry though because of the CNY celebrations.

Last week we have gone to Nyonya for our lunch. It is located right in the heart of town, which by the way, has turned more or less into a ghost town ever since The Mall in Gadong was built.

This be the entrance of Nyonya. Not sure if it's true, but this is the place where they often sell food of the Baba Nyonya nature, which is Chinese food that have a mixed of Malay culture in it. To learn about Baba Nyonya, you can go here.


This two be the layout more or less of the restaurant. It's quite small but comfy. It's situated within the area of Yayasan, which is the downtown shopping area that used to be the heat of the town back then before The Mall existed. If you were to sit there, you can really feel the quietness of its ghost town nature, and occasionally at the right time, you'll hear the sounds of prayers and maybe sounds of water boats because Yayasan is built right gobsmack between the Sultan Omar Ali Saiffudien Mosque (nickname the mini Taj Mahal) and the Water Village

Waiting for food in Nyonya is just as long as if you were in Sari Wangi. Sometimes we like to joke saying that they must be still harvesting the ingredients to make our food. LOL! But just like Sari Wangi, their food is worth the wait.

This is what I ordered: Sizzling Japanese Tofu with Rice and Coke. I've always liked to eat Japanese tofu of all the tofu in the world. Sizzling and piping hot, it really brings out the oyster sauce smell, and they often cook the tofu with just the right texture, with scrambled eggs as the base. The sauce is just nice to be condiment for the rice.

This is what my friend Khiong ordered: Mango Fish with rice and 7Up. I have yet to try that dish, but I can tell that the fish is fresh, and the sauce, just by the look of it, makes your mouth water.

This restaurant has a rather pricey menu, but they are still worth the money to eat. So if you have the craving for Baba Nyonya food and are not in a hurry, go ahead and try it

Sari Wangi

Well, to start off this food blog (and to test my brand new camera at the same time), I got started by going for my craving for Indonesian food, and thus we ended here, in Sari Wangi

This be the signboard of Sari Wangi. This restaurant deals with authentic Indonesian cuisines and are nice and rich to the taste. It's situated just across the street from The Mall at the far end of the building where Lucky Donut is located (I think).

This be the inside of the restaurant. They've got nice settings and good sound system (I know coz they always turn on MTV or Channel V for the customers' viewing pleasure) and it feels almost a little bit like a mix of Chinese and Indonesian culture in the decors and atmosphere.

Once you make the order you have to wait for quite a very long time. They don't have much customers, but they have a lot of branches everywhere, and that's probably where they get their most of their dough from. Last time I had a bad experience eating in this restaurant coz there was a baby roach in my curry that I ordered, and they offered to switch me for something new. It's all good. I've got an iron stomach, probably, coz nothing happened, and it was just a one time thing. Nothing to be so fret about

This is what I ordered: Kangkung cooked in sambal belacan with rice and 7Up. It is worth the wait. I always jump to the chance to eat kangkung because my future mom-in-law banned it from the kitchen after falling for some stupid forwarded email (which she still believes it to the letter till today).

I ate with a couple of friends. This is what my friend Khiong ordered: Set Nasi Ayam Bakar Special, or something like that. It's basically roasted chicken with rice and a sunny-side up with curry soup and belacan for condiments. My other friend Yap's girlfriend also ordered the same

This is what Yap ordered: Sup Tulang with rice. It's actually an amount fit for 2 but Yap has a big appetite and it's actually also good for 1 person to finish it, so he did, though he offered his girlfriend some. Her girlfriend didn't finish her food though, which is kind of a waste, really, and she's skin and bones as it is!

Overall, it's still a great eating experience. The food's got enough flavouring, the portion is big (which is my fav) and it's worth the wait and worth every penny. Best place to go for Indonesian cravings.

So here we are. The first food blog entry! Hopefully I'll enter more by next week!