Ochaking Tawau

We might be back to our regular programming but all I can say about this next eatery was that I started became a fan of them when I was in KK. This franchise has several branches in and around KK but had only landed in Tawau sometime in 2021 (at the Perdana Jaya Commercial Centre, next to Han's Bakery and in front of Kenny Rogers Roasters). Needless to say, I welcomed their presence in Tawau since I had always enjoyed their selection of drinks (such as their Chips Milo Volcano and Peachy Green Tea) and onigiris (like the Nasi Lemak Onigiri and Plain Seaweed Onigiri that I had recently). But I've also discovered recently that I also enjoyed having their ramens and udons, like their Miso Ramen and Tsukumo Udon White Curry below. I especially like the latter since the combination of the sweet and sour udon soup together with the onigiri was just really tasty to me. 

But if there's one thing that I think the place needs to improve on is the staff manning the shop. I went their 2 to 3 times already and the all male staff seems to be in the same 'we're not in the mood to serve you' vibes everytime. Some of my questions were also met with blank expressions and 'nak tak nak' kind of answers, which can hurt the business in the long run should it continues.

** Current status - Still in operation (as of Jan 2023) 

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Aishah Kitchen Vietnamese Restaurant (KK FoodieVenture #196)

I was looking through a few FB pages that promotes various eateries in and around KK (and simultaneously noticed that there are A LOT of new cafes mushrooming everywhere in KK) when I found out about this place. I mean, Vietnamese restaurants are rare as compared to Thai restaurants. So off we went to find said restaurant, which is located at the far end of Lintas Jaya Uptownship, Kepayan (an area that is not that familiar to both me and my husband - at least we got to discover a new place this time around). Mind you, the place is very popular so we were somewhat lucky to get a table inside their limited spacing eatery as we'd arrived. Some other patrons even willingly waited outside of the premise for available tables and the owner (the lovely Aishah I presume) even served them with free teas as they're waiting. 

I don't know whether the cook is actually Vietnamese or not but the food seems legit (but then again I don't exactly had that much experience with Vietnamese food apart from Peppermint so...). We'd ordered their Chili Crab with Bread, Stir Fried Cockles and Greatest Fried Chicken Noodles for lunch and all of them were delicious. My husband is a bit picky when it comes to seafood so him being happy with his dishes were pretty much an indirect thumbs up from him. I also can't resist ordering their Banh Flan (caramel pudding) for dessert and it was just soft and refreshing. It is no wonder that the place is highly recommended by all. Hopefully they can keep up the quality of their food in the long run.

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Osbel Centre Point (KK FoodieVenture #195)

Although I have intended to drop by this beverage cafe (located on the lower ground floor of Centre Point shopping mall, right next to the side entrance's stairs) and sample some of their cakes and pastries, it was quite unfortunate that I always seems to be full in the stomach whenever I walked past them. And I'm also not too sure whether the bakery that occupied the front part of the shop (called Mr Bread - which again... I had no idea whether they're related to the now-closed bakery at Jalan Gaya of the same name) are from the same company as the latter, but the 'merger' did intrigued me as you can munched on some buns instead of cakes with your drinks.

But since I'm still very curious about the blueish looking place, I decided to try one of their drinks and had ordered their Refeshing Fruits Green Tea (yup, I surprised myself when I did not pick drinks from their choco selection instead) and it was err.. refreshing indeed and quite generous in terms of portioning. I'll be updating you guys with new pics in the future since I have every intention to go back and try some other stuff from them.

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Cinnamonkins (KK FoodieVenture #194)

As I've mentioned in my previous post, my confusion with the ITCC Penampang Mall does not end at the aforementioned eatery. A buddy of mine was hyping this particular cinnamon roll specialty shop so much on his posts that I just had to try them out as well. Unfortunately for me and my hubby, it took us around 15 minutes (no joke) to finally figured out their exact location (which was at the backside of the 1st floor shops, on the same row as the Majlis Datuk-Datuk Sabah office/conference room) after circling the same floor a few times. 

Since I had never tried an actual cinnamon roll before, the size of the bun took me by surprise. Though available choices were quite limited when we were there (apparently some other customers had pre-ordered boxes upon boxes of said rolls to go) I was satisfied with my Hershey's Chocolate and Oreo choices of rolls. Both were just fluffy and surprisingly not overly sweet which was good. Definitely worth the minor 'disagreement' that me and my hubby had over directions to the store 😅

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Kiss My Bowl ITCC (KK FoodieVenture #193)

It was mainly because me and my hubby had parked directly facing this eatery that I'd managed to finally tried them out. I had intended to try them out before but I never seemed to be able to spot them (a recurring experience within this particular mall I assure you - as seen in my next post as well). It never occurred to me that they're actually sharing an entrance with the ITCC Manhattan Suites on the back side of the ITCC Penampang Mall at Jalan Pintas.

But we entered yet another confusion as we made our way into the cozy fusion eatery (see what I did there?) as their menu were entirely online. Nothing new of course but still hard to master, especially for someone with (very) basic IT skills such as yours truly. Thankfully we'd managed to soldiered on and made our order (after a good 20 minutes at least) of Teriyaki Chicken Rice Bowl, Korean Toast, Mini Chocolate Indulgence Cake and some tea drinks. I was still quite full from a hefty breakfast before that so downing the sizeable Korean Toast was pretty challenging. But nevertheless it was pretty delicious and succulent. My hubby seems to enjoy his rice dish as well and their mini cake was just lovely and tasty. Overall, a very good first experience for us.

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Nasi Anje 1 Imago (KK FoodieVenture #192)

I have read about the name Nasi Anje in passing from other posts before so when me and my husband were checking out the 2nd floor food court of Imago Shopping Mall (also known as Food Street) for any new vendors, we were delighted to see the Nasi Anje 1 stall in operation. From what I can gather from my internet sleuthing, the stall originally opened a shop somewhere in Inanam Sentral before branching out to KK. 

The name of their dishes amuses both of us so we ended up ordering their Nasi Anje Single set and Kahwin set (one guess which one was my pick 😆). Obviously the single set refers to the single fried chicken, with the rice drenched in curry sauce plus a side of sambal. The only differences with my dish were the choice of chickens; one fried chicken plus one curry chicken. In all honesty, the fried chicken was just ordinary tasting but I do think that their selling point were the curry sauce and sambal. Having both of them together definitely elevated my dining experience of said dish even more. We also had a helping of their Sayur Sutera as a side order and even though the portion was quite generous, it was just so-so in taste in my opinion. 

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