Umai-ya Japanese Buffet @ Damansara Uptown

How to satisfy my constant craving for Japanese food?

Eric would say "Go for buffet la... you can eat as much as you want!"

And so he recommended his favourite Japanese buffet outlet - Umai-ya.

He said they serve the best buffet and wanted me to try it out.

There are currently THREE outlets : IOI Boulevard, Damansara Uptown & KLCC.

We went to the nearest - at Damansara Uptown (which I like for the envinronment too).

They charge RM58++ per pax for buffet lunch from 11.30am till 2.30pm.

First in line, Tempura Mori comprises of fried prawns and vegetables.

I wish I could only order Ebi Tempura coz I'm a fan of prawns but not fried vegetables.

Simplicity is the best. A simple lady's finger can be grilled for the aroma

and yet still preserve the natural sweetness and softness of the vegetable.

Okura is one new dish to be explored here!

One of the must-try dish is the soft shell crab and egg omelette sushi

called Kani Tama Maki (the word Kani always amuses me). 

I love the big chunk of soft shell crab and thick egg omelette wrapped

with moderate amount of rice and seaweed. Yuhmzzzz... 

Sashimi! It comes in pairs... and we get to order as many as we want!
There are salmon, butter fish, tuna, octopus, cuttlefish and seabass.
I always wondered why is the tuna here is brownish compared to
ones I used to have which is reddish in color?
Nevertheless, the sashimi served here are fresh... 

My favourite... Sukiyaki Beef!
As Eric do not take beef, the big pot of sukiyaki is entirely mine to finish.
The beef slices are purrr-fect and is one of the best I had!
The raw egg is not to be poured into the hotpot (this ain't a steamboat),
but is for the beef slices to be dipped for extra softness and aroma. 

Under the grilled section in the menu, you may find this small tiny fish

called Sishamo, which is a copelin fish. It is filled with tiny eggs in it 

with not much flesh to be found. So you could eat the whole fish, yes, the head,

tail, and whatnot. 

Next in line is the Saba Shioyaki which is a grilled mackerel fish.
This isn't one of the best dish we had that day, probably it is way too dry.

We too had some tofu - Agedashi Tofu.
These fried beancurd in some light soysauce topped with minced meat
and spring onions is a simple dish, but it is truly satisfying. 

Before I was convinced to try out Umai-ya, I did some research about this place.

And was told that the Unagi Tempura is one of the popular dish.

Sadly, this dish couldn't be found in the buffet menu.

So we ordered this from the ala-carte menu.

It was a well-worthy order as we were served thick slices of deep fried unagi!

One comment to improve this dish is probably the dressing. 

It somehow tasted like dark soy sauce. It would be perfect if the dressing is improved!

A fan of Umai-ya....

Ze World Best Instructor.. Baba Liow! :P

Although my preference for buffet would eventually makes me
end up in Tao @ Sunway Giza because they serve far more varieties,
still, I would come back to Umai-ya again for their innovations.

From the conventional twist of Agedashi tofu, to Okura, and something like Unagi Tempura,
I'm ready for Umai-ya to blow me away with their new creations soon!


Details for interested foodies.... 

UMAI-YA (IOI Puchong)

Block A, IOI Boulevard, 

Jalan Kenari 5, 

Bandar Puchong Jaya, Puchong.

Tel: 03 8075 1113

UMAI-YA (Damansara Uptown)

49A, Jalan SS21/37, 

Damansara Utama, PJ. 

Tel: 03 7726 4410

UMAI-YA (Suria KLCC)

Lot No. 428, Level 4, Suria KLCC

Jalan Ampang,Kuala Lumpur.

Tel: 03 2161 3939

yummylicious!!! 

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Zen Japanese Restaurant @ Sunway Pyramid

It's gonna be a night of forced diet today.

Mum has left for the night to great aunt place in Serdang.

Leaving me behind, alone, lonely, food-less at home.

Hunger makes me think about food, particularly Japanese - my favourite!

And recently someone asked me where to get good Jap near Klang.

To be frank, Klang offers nothing but bak kut teh.

So the first thing that came into my mind is Zen @ Sunway Pyramid!

It's just 15 minutes drive away from home - IF I'M THE ONE DRIVING!

(Vvroooommmmm!!!)

Reminiscing my visit there although it has been a month or two back... 

Do enjoy the simple and almost-forgotten reviews... :)

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I love the choice of salad in Zen. 

We ordered the salad with snow crab which is simply delicious!

Love how the aromatic miso dressing jive with the crunchy leafy salad with juicy crab meat...

For appetizer, we were introduced to Zen's cheese baked scallop with Japanese mushrooms.
I remember that this dish is quite pricey - around RM14 per piece.
But it was all worth it looking at the succulent scallops drowned in the
generous portion of my favourite mushrooms.
I could have both myself - but mum always say... "sharing is caring"... :)

And how could one skip the sashimi section in the menu??!!!

For a new sashimi lover like me, we made a good pick 

for variety of sashimi - from salmon, tuna, to octopus.

Zen do serve one of the freshest sashimi I've tasted.

One of my must-have dish in a Japanese restaurant - unagi!
I love how thick flavorful unagi melts in my mouth..
We ordered an Unagi Roll and oh-myyy... the unagi is superb!

Mini Sukiyaki pot with seafood - it makes me wanna sing!

This hot pot with simple yet delicious ingredient like prawns, 

scallops, tofu, mushroom, vegetables are then cooked with miso soup. 

Served hot, this dish completes our dinner with a warm warm tummy... :)

Feeling satisfied with the sukiyaki... singing... 

"It's all because of you... I'm feeling sad and blue.. 

You went away.. Now my life is just a rainy day..."

 I guess this blog post didn't really help me tonight.

Dinner is three beautiful pears given by the office for the Health Week. 

Am looking forward to visit Zen again.

Heard they've got buffet too! Hoorray! 

yummylicious!

Address: 3 Jalan PJS 11/15, Bandar Sunway, Subang Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia

Phone:+60 3-7492 4922

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Tao Authentic Asian Cuisine & Sushi @ Sunway Giza

My dear readers, I would like to declare that I AM OFFICIALLY BROKE! So if any of you want to food-hunt, please do not invite me because I will be very tempted to join! I would need to ikat perut for the rest of the month because of the food spree I had recently. *sigh*

Today we had buffet at Tao Authentic Asian Cuisine & Sushi @ Sunway Giza. This is the meal that have ripped off what is left in my purse.

About Tao, we had buffet lunch which is from 11am - 4pm, but we arrived late because buddies are working half day. As this is a buffet lunch, the food displayed outside is self service. But what attracted me the most is that we are free to order as many dishes / plates we want from the ala carte menu which offers alot of varieties!

The waitress is kind enough to introduce us the TOP TEN dishes in the ala carte menu. In total we had about 20 different dishes including ala carte and from buffet line.

I took tons of photos but had just uploaded a few photos featuring either the best or worst dishes we had. Fair rite?



Buddy Chew ET came back from Doha and we bring him around to fulfill his craving for food! It is actually because of him that we went to Tao..

Sashimi - Chew ET said the scallop is not so fresh but the rest is okay.



Abalone - In my opinion, the slices of abalone is thick and juicy, accompanied with the sauce that makes it so flavourful till the last bite! This is actually my favourite dish and we had two plates of it.


Grilled oyster with cheese. For those who love oyster, I bet you would like this dish! The cheese is very creamy and thick. And guess there is some salad underneath the layer of cheese too.



Salad cheese prawn which is another favourite of mine. The prawn is big and crunchy. If there is just a littleeee bittttt moooore spaaaace in my tummy, I would have order another plate of this dish.



Grilled scallop. I'm not very sure what is the topping but it sure taste like a combination of cheese and otak-otak! Although the topping is delicious, I have trouble tasting the scallop because it was overcooked and thus shrink into a tiny miny 'something' (because it does not taste like scallop).



Self-picked teppanyaki ingredients and cooked on the spot by the chef. Barry and Alicia picked the ingredients and I think this is actually not bad!



Tako - big disappointment to me because the crust was so hard that when I tried to cut it, it rolled from the table to my bag on my lap! Creating a messy stain on my Longchamp! I seriously would prefer the tako kiosk in Jaya Jusco or wherever it may be. There is no filing inside this tako too. Not even a small tentacles of a octopus!



One of the top ten ala carte dish! This lamp chop is yummy and I just hope there is more flesh than the bones.



Self-picked assorted seafood. I love the grilled prawns. The teriyaki chicken is not bad too. The rest is just so-so.


My choice of soup ended up to be another disappointment. Abalone soup as claimed, but abalone is no where to be seen. Instead, there are chunks of chicken and a quail egg. The soup does not taste like it have been boiled with an abalone... :(



Steamed lala - my choice too. I am not very good at locating good food because this dish proves that I have failed in ordering food. First of all, a steam lala should have lala. This plate of lala is so tiny meanie that I could not taste the supposedly-fresh-seafood. It was cooked with too much chilli making the gravy very hard for us to telan.



A bowl of fruits to call it a day.
And not to mention, Joyce self-proclaimed "JY's tomato choco fondue!!!". I saw the chocolate fondue mountain and could not stop myself from looking for something to dump inside the mountain! Look left, look right, nothing... nothing... (talking like Russell Peters and his Indian accent)... yeah nothing... No strawberry, marshmallow or whatsoever.. so I find whatever I could at the salad bar which is the baby tomatoes! Cucuk everything in the satay stick and yessshhhh there it goes inside the mountain of slurp slurrpyyy!!!

Well now I am broke because we spent RM70 p/pax... but I have got a very satisfied tummy! If there is gonna be a next trip to Tao, I will fill my stomach with the abalone slices, grilled prawns, ebi tempura, lamp chop and the cheese shrimp!

Yuuummmmmylicious! :)

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