New Golden Leaf Restaurant

OK, next stop, me and my hubby went out for one of our lunch dates during lunch hour and we decided to eat at New Golden Leaf Restaurant.

This be the signboard of the restaurant. It's actually another branch of the other Golden Leaf in Jalan Tutong nearby Lucky Restaurant, and it is located in Batu Bersurat which is a few blocks away from Gadong.

This be the interior of the restaurant. Just as full and as hustling and bustling like the main branch, but with better and more modern, up-to-date settings, unlike the main one that looked like the usual kopitiam setting. They have a corner there for the economy meals for those who are frugal (polite way for saying stingy) where you can pick and choose whatever you want together with rice at a cheap, economical price.

We decided to eat upstairs, so up we went. Nice stairs with cute polished wood.


The interior of upstairs, just as it is downstairs, but with a far stronger air-con strength here. Brr~!!!

This be our drink: Teh-C ping (my hubby) and hot Milo (mine). I just felt like drinking something nice and warm to counter the bloody freezing air-con. Room temperature my ass!


Close-up of our drinks

Free clear soup accompanying our food we ordered. I do wish they be a bit more generous with the fried shallots though

Here be our food: Sau rou with rice (my hubby) and char sau sau rou with rice. Not much difference really, just that I have more meat than my hubby's. I've always liked their sau rou, because they've got really nice fat and the skin is amazingly crunchy. Mmm~! Just as nice as the main branch's food


Close-ups of my hubby's food


Close-ups of my food

So if you got a craving for char sau and/or sau rou or just wanna have a nice quick lunch if you have shorter lunch hours, either the one in Jalan Tutong or the one here in Batu Bersurat would do just fine

Sugarbun

Another installment of food galore coming right up! For starters, we'll talk about one of my hometown local fast food restaurant that we went to last two weeks, namely Sugarbun.

I'm not entirely sure where and when Sugarbun originated, but ever since it came to my hometown, it became a sort of overnight sensation. Many people enjoyed going to that place for cheap, local fast foods and it was almost full everyday. Though to be honest, it's not really that of a big hit here in Brunei.

We were in a hurry to make an appointment with the wedding photo studio, so I didn't get a chance to take the signboard and the interior of the place, although the settings is more or less standard for all fast food restaurants. So I just took the food that we ordered.

This be what I ordered: Sambal fried fish with rice. This has always been my favourite out of their menu, even though it's actually quite pricey (about RM10.00). They tasted exactly as I liked and remembered. Nice and crunchy, fresh and juicy, and together with the sambal sauce, it was the perfect combination. And the pickled vegetables as condiment goes well with the rice as well, not too sourish, just the right taste.

This be what my hubby ordered: Beef stew with rice. Again, they've got the texture and the juiciness right, and the sauce was really yummy, just as I have remembered the last time (which was forever ago) I ate it. Although I keep getting the nagging feeling that we paying too much for so little a portion (this costs roughly RM 6-8)

Maybe next time when I drop by at the Sugarbun of the Brunei branch, I'll do a re-intro to this fast food restaurant. In the meantime, you'll have to settle for this small post, but it's definitely worth a shot eating here. All the local flavours in one minute.

Buffalo Steakhouse Restaurant

My friend and I decided to go try out the new steakhouse down in Gadong, at the same time, get to know a new friend who is a colleague of his, so on our occasional Saturday lunch date, we, along with my hubby, decided to head off to Buffalo Steakhouse Restaurant.

This be the signboard of the restaurant. It is situated at Gadong area where Centrepoint Hotel and The Mall is, and it's in the same block with the old Gadong Hua Ho. That place used to be SugarBun back then, but since business was a total wreck, my father-in-law's boss took over and decided to open a Western-theme restaurant, thus the birth of this place somewhere early this year, so it's really fairly new. Technically I heard rather bad rep about this from my eldest brother-in-law, but I prefer if I actually tried it myself and judge it on my own, because as the saying goes "One man's meat is another man's poison".








This be the interior and exterior of the restaurant. It's got a nice feel and nice ambience and all that, but it's kinda odd to have it orange-themed, though I guess it's the originality that counts. Feels slightly more like a dine-in cafe rather than an actual restaurant, actually, if it weren't for the fact that they have a inner room for privacy or parties and such


Am a little trigger-happy with the counter. I can't help it. I tend to enjoy the display of glasses, cups, bottles and sugar and spice casings

This be the menu, which looks like it's been done by a bloody amateur copy shop where you can have it done for 5 cents a piece or something

This be our appetizer...sorta. The bread had weirdly odd sweet taste but it makes you have the impression that it's stale (or was it?)

This is the garlic friend my friend ordered. I don't think I ate it, so I can't comment on the taste. I let him finish the heap


This be our drink: Ice lemon tea. It tastes more or less alright, but the intriguing thing is that the ice chunks on top gives you the illusion that it's the lemon flesh or something, when in fact it isn't. It's really cute, coz the first thing you'll think when you see this is "Oh, lemon flesh?" but when you eat it, it's actually ice! LOL


This is the appetizer my hubby ordered: which is fried calamari. When I picked it up and ate it, it's just not crunchy. In fact, it felt soggy, though the calamari in there was pretty Q, more or less, but not so good without the crunch of the other layer



This is what my friend ordered: Sizzling lamb shoulder (I think), and I gotta say, that's a whole lotta chunks in there! Though I had to be careful to take the picture lest I get my own hand sizzled on the pan


This be the cream of mushroom soup (I think) that my new friend ordered. It wouldn't be nice to take a gulp from that, so I just let her have. It looks tasty though, but actual taste-wise I wouldn't know


This is what my hubby ordered: grilled lamb chop. The meat that I snagged from him tastes pretty good, although it needs to be a bit juicier


This is what I ordered: Grilled tenderloin steak. Like my hubby's lamp chop, it wasn't juicy enough, and when I asked for well done, it came out still having a bit of reddish raw tint in the middle. The broccoli was slightly raw, like it was just put in warm water for a few seconds and taken out, and the corn could be raw too because it came off the cob so easily. And apparently we're not exactly given the choice of the sauce either, but I'm not complaining. As long as it can help to make the meat taste juicier, I'm fine


This is what my new friend ordered: some kinda mushroom with sauce (I totally forgot what the name was) She's vegan, so she didn't order any main course meal or anything (I admire that diet dedication; for me, gimme meat anytime~!)


This is what my new friend ordered as well: Fried Onion rings. I grabbed a bite from it anyway, and one thing came to my mind: Not crunchy. Nuff said


Later on, after my hubby left, since he had to work and his lunch hour was almost over, we stayed and chat for a while and then suddenly we were approached by the waitress with a glass of ice-cream and told us it was complimentary for each menu that exceeds 90++ dollars or something. She gave us three small bowls so that we can share it out, but at this size, we decided it's best if we just scoop it straight from the sundae glass itself. LOL! It seems that the ice-cream is probably the only thing that was truly a satisfactory

Overall, it was alright to me. Maybe a 5 out of 10 rating, if you must give me a rating to level them out. So if you're willing to spend a lot of money on overcharged, over-priced food that is barely satisfactory, go right ahead. Otherwise, I would probably recommend some place else for Western food

Akhbar Ria Restaurant

My best friend and I had went out to run some errands, and after it was done, he was craving for some roti canai, so we went to a nearby area to eat, which is Akhbar Ria Restaurant.

This be the signboard, entrance and exterior of the restaurant. It's been around for quite a while now, even when I was still being courted. It's situated just right at the front of the Kiulap area, behind my hubby's workplace and being in the same row between PetVision, a whole bunch of tailor-making shops and the newly opened Guardian.


This be the inside of the restaurant. Nice and small, and quaint. Technically I often come here after work to order take-out of Indo Mee with sunny-side up egg, but this is probably the first time after many years since I actually came in and sat here and ate

This be our drinks: 100Plus, best isotonic and re-hydration drink for all Asians


This be what we ordered: Roti kosong with sauce. It's basically roti canai without anything added like eggs or whatnot and the curry as the sauce to eat with it. Personally I prefer my sauce to be condensed milk. Nothing beats eating bread like have sweet stuff to compliment it

Close-up of our roti canai

They serve mostly Malay and Indian food, and they're all very simple stuff and cheap too. So if you feel like grabbing a small bite, this is a pretty good place to be