Day 2 : Levain Boulangerie Patisserie, Departure Lounge, Vanilla Place, Gong Cha & Chilla Cup on Deliciouslogy | Wordpress.
3 items down, 9 more to go and this time I’m covering Levain, Departure Lounge and Vanilla Place, Gong Cha and Chilla Cup. So this is how I spent 31 August, our Independence Day.
2 - Ipoh: Restoran Ong Kee
2b - Ipoh: Ipoh Parade
3 - Ipoh: Aneka Selera Kam Wan
4 - KL: Levain
5 - Damansara Uptown: Departure Lounge
6 - Subang: Vanilla Place, Empire Shopping Gallery
7 - SS15: Gong Cha
8 - Mont Kiara: Chilla Cup
9 - KL: Restoran Keong Kee
10 - KL: Snowflake, Sungai Wang
11 - KL: Rakuzen, G Tower
12 - Damansara: Crumbs Macarons
Ezel decided to drag me out for a makan trip the day after I got back from Ipoh. Was exhausted after the 1 day trip but my enthusiasm always bounces back up once you mention food hehe...
When I woke up, my aunt brought over some buns from Levain and I picked one out of the stash.
It was some sort of egg and ham bun at first glance but when I bit into it I was in creamy heaven (or glutton heaven whichever you prefer)!
The bun was filled with hard boiled eggs and mayo and bits of ham. The bun’s texture was also oh-so-soft. I didn’t expect so much filling in it! Look out for this one the next time you visit Levain. Do note that I’m not responsible for any Levain bun addictions that occur after that. Also, this bun is really fattening, a giant NO for those on a diet.
I was then dragged to PJ Uptown where Ezel had recently spotted a nice, quaint place called Departure Lounge. It’s located directly behind the Uptown 3 building.
It’s designed to mimic the departure lounges of airports with bookshelves and tables with seat numbers.
The décor is simple - minimalistic with soft lighting.
You first order at the counter and you bring a ‘seat number’ to your table then the waiters will send your food to your table.
Because I was still quite full from the Levain bun, I ordered some pancakes and caramel laced milk. The caramel steamer is a pretty fool-proof drink, just steamed milk with caramel syrup and thankfully it was good.
The pancakes however were disappointing. Pancakes are usually light and fluffy but for some reason, these were dry. Every single piece was like that – really not worth my RM7.90
Ezel had the American breakfast-like dish and it tasted alright.
Our conclusion? We never seem to learn from our previous mistakes – pretty places =/= yummy food.
After brunch, we went to meet up with nerv to discuss some things so we dropped by Empire Shopping Gallery hoping that Whisk would be open and I would be able to finally try their macarons.
It wasn’t opened. While waiting for nerv, Ezel and I wandered around Empire and we found... macarons!
I was quite amazed as the macarons came in 3 sizes. They all had feet and generally they looked alright. So that I would be able to try all flavors, I went with the tiny macarons while Ezel bought a big one out of curiosity.
Ezel started munching on his big macaron while walking to the IT centre’s café and it was a big disappointment. It was dry and tasteless. I waited till we reached the café and took a few photos of the macarons before I started eating.
Macarons always look adorable hence the need to photograph them without fail.
The first bite was the black sesame macaron. It was crumbly and dry. Actually, it crumbled because it was dry. And to my surprise, it was full of air. There was empty space between the surface of the shell and the portion where the macaron filling was piped.
The macarons are about the size of a 50 cent coin. It was the classic 'colored shell with no specific taste and different tasting filing' scenario. Needless to say, I was disappointed. Here’s another macaron place to add to the 'Macaron Places to Avoid List'.
After Vanilla Place at Empire, we actually had the time to stop by Gong Cha at SS15 near Taylor’s College. At that time, I had never had Gong Cha’s drinks before and had only tried Cha Time’s.
And so I was again dragged to Gong Cha at SS15. Ezel had trouble locating the place because he had this illusion that Gong Cha was directly opposite Taylor’s College. Wrong! Subway and Pappa Rich is directly opposite Taylor’s College. To get to Gong Cha, you need to walk further up (with Taylor’s College on your right) and follow the row of shops pass Pappa Rich. Gong Cha is about 2 doors away from Pappa Rich.
At first glance, there’s not much difference between Gong Cha and Cha Time’s menu. Being competitors, they have similar drinks and tend to appear in similar locations (Midvalley & The Gardens for instance) but this particular one felt like it was in the middle of nowhere (to me at least).
I settled with a Lemon Juice with Aiyu & White Pearl while Ezel went for his favorite Signature Winter Melon Milk Tea.
I quite like the Lemon Juice as it comes with sweetened bits of lemon peel at the bottom of the cup. I have a dislike for citrus peel because it tastes bitter and has a weird texture but this one was bearable. The aiyu jelly was refreshing and the white pearls were interesting! I’m so used to having black pearls which have this slight herbal taste to it so white pearls were nice for a change.
Ezel’s Signature Winter Melon Milk Tea strikes me as a weird drink because Winter Melon Tea + Milk? You gotta be kidding me! But then again, nothing is impossible considering we have English tea with milk and even Green Tea with milk.
I was amazed at the winter melon milk tea.
The milk froth didn’t leave an oily taste in my mouth. It was creamy and delicious! And it went very well with the winter melon tea.
I was truly amazed.
Gong Cha’s signature milk teas also come with instructions on how to drink them and if you’re drinking it for the first time, I suggest that you follow the instructions. It’s fun to do and you really do get 3 different tastes.
Recently I was at The Gardens’ outlet for Gong Cha and I watched them make the milk froth out of whipping cream and milk. They use expensive Australian Milk! They cost about RM7-8 per carton and is the only milk that I don’t mind drinking on its own.
Later that night (very late that night), my dinner/supper was at Chilla Cup with Lee. My craving for green tea latte and mushroom was sated there. They’re one of the few eating places that are still opened at 11pm.
The green tea came with some pretty looking art and was good. More green tea powder compared to others that I’ve tasted so it had a stronger bitter aftertaste.
The mushroom soup’s croutons were slightly soggy so my guess is that it wasn’t crunch to begin with. The soup was creamy and very mushroomy – a taste that you can only get from using fresh mushrooms so that’s a plus point. I would have preferred it to have chunks of mushroom in it so there would be more bite but creamy’s good too.
I ate too much that day. Oh well, I’ll deal with the guilt later.