Tu-Long, Midvalley KL
We are frequent visitors to Midvalley Megamall as it offers convenient parking at lunchtime when we're not in the mood to walk the distance to Petaling Street only to sweat it out in the unbearable heat over a hot bowl of wantan noodles. When you're in corporate clothing, airconditioning is a premium, and so it made sense for us to look out for airconditioned restaurants whenever we went out.
We had noticed Tu-Long a long time ago. We called it the Red restaurant, primarily because the entire facade was red! I must admit that I am attracted to anything shiny, so the long row of chandeliers lining up the centre aisle of the restaurant felt very welcoming. Tu-Long is located in the Boulevard Offices directly across from Starbucks.
The first thing that caught our eyes was the shanghai steamed meat dumpling (siu long bao). The two young men in the glass cage skilfully and intently produced the dumplings like a factory line, unperturbed by the nosy glances of the curious patrons. We were pleased with the dumplings (RM8 for 4 pieces). Despite the rather salty broth enveloped in the prettily wrapped dumpling, it was full of flavour and passed all tests. The skin wasn't too thick either.
The other "performance" which I thoroughly enjoyed was the solo la mian (noodles) puller. I also found out that the Master Chef got his name in the Guiness Book of Records when he made 8192 Noodle Strings from a single piece of dough in 59.29 seconds! Well, naturally, if they were promoting la mian, I was going to try it. My order of la mian in hot & sour soup (RM12) was nice, hot and sour (but of course!) and I certainly have no complaints about it. Perhaps, at RM12, I was expecting something extra, but it felt very ordinary.
If you have lost all your tastebuds due to a recent illness, then the la mian with dried scallops and chicken soup (RM14) is perfect for you. The noodles were nice, but the soup in which it came was so plain, it made hot water look good. One would have thought that the accompanying bowl of dried scallops and chicken soup would be some compensation, but try as she might, Bouncing Barbie was unable to recognise any taste of scallops in her soup. Digging all the way in, she found a few slivers of scallops, but that didn't improve her mood. She ended up drowning her noodles in FOC chilli paste which she said tasted a whole lot better than the RM14 she paid.
Pretty Pui's shanghai fried rice flour cake (RM14) was the best tasting dish among all that we picked. The rice flour cake was sufficiently cooked with a soft bite to it and the sauce complemented it well.
Our order of deep fried durian pancakes (RM12) arrived early. Like Christmas morning, we wore wide grins on our faces at the anticipation of biting into the durian pancakes. Pretty Pui took the first bite, and said nothing. I was curious, and took a bite. My expression changed. Barbie looked at us, concerned. "That bad?", she asked. Barbie took a bite. The decision was unanimous. It was horrid and absolutely TASTELESS. Every tourist's dream....smell-less durians. My worst nightmare. I wished Nigel would appear at that moment with his lovely chocolate durian cake. Service was good. They apologised and took it away. I was more concerned about the fact that the chef didn't recognise that the durians were tasteless. What happened to quality control anyway?
As a replacement, we ordered the souffle egg white ball with red bean paste and banana (RM9 for 3 pieces). This was a lot better. The white dust that you see on top of the balls is icing sugar. Biting into the marshmallow-like texture, I found a very small quantity of red bean paste and a small slice of banana. Despite the rather measly ingredients, the entire dish tasted lovely.
Also check out Pasankia's review.
Tu-Long
25G, 25-1, 27-1, The Boulevard Office, Midvalley, KL.
Tel: 03-2283 3115
This is totally unrelated, but I felt that after such a negative review of food, I should feed you with something better. Photo taken at the Attic last Thursday.
Introducing the conjoined twins of KayEll.
Bald is the new black, folks.
30 comments:
Mmm....don't see a second visit in the near future (or ever?). But of course the last pic put all in a good mood! :o)
Hee hee, two bald eagles make the review so much better. I've tried the food at Tu Long when it first opened and must admit I wasn't impressed to even blog abt it! Can't wait for Din Tai Fung to open at the Gardens and hopefully we get decent Shanghainese food there!
haha! great pic at the end saved us all from disappointment. Must admit ate almost exact same thing at dragon-i near Citic at megamall but no dessert. The hot and sour wasn't even hot or sour!
wmw: no second visit EVER.
boo: I'm swearing off Shanghainese restaurants in Malaysia for awhile. Just too many bad experiences.
msiagirl: yup...they all serve about the same stuff. I like the pic at the end. They both look so cheeky. :-)
lol the last pic indeed is the saving grace. both of them looked great there!
Hahaha...last picture the best. So far, I just couldn't find a place offering nice hot and sour soup. :(
hv never tried any shanghainese houses b4 altho was hoping to. the ordinary chinese restaurant always wins me over during "decision time"! LOL.
tu-long sounds very vietnamese tho. there was a looong lost french-viet fren whose surname was 'du-long'..LOL.
babe_kl: haha...I agree! They're both so adorable...two of my favourite men in my life. hahaha.
precious pea: sad that a non-food pic is still da best. lol. I haven't found good hot & sour soup either, but that's becoz my makan club refuses to order that soup, and normally it's hard to find portions for just one person.
k.t.x: don't bother trying any! lol. Stick to the familiar. I know I will. I'm not sure what Tu-Long means. But even saying it makes me cringe. Hmmm.
my family has been tempted to try this..but i was put off with some negative reviews..looks like its been confirm eh? still putting it on par with dragon i? since they are the only xiu long bao players in midvalley so far?
i got a solution..lets go shanghai in jw marriott..i m still dreaming of their xiu long baos..
I want my money back! :-( Burnt a hole in my pocket (and my tongue) for that bland soup. I still think it was more chicken soup than scallop with chicken.
Such delicious pix. Thot it'll be a good place to try. What a pity.
Haha. Was wondering when u'll post that pic (if ever).
It's important to blog not just the good food, but the not so good and the bad as well. Thanks for your warning! ;-)
ooo.. nice pic! :D and i didn't know bout this tu-long restaurant! nvm.. no good food, won't visit! ;)
joe: You're on for JW Marriot. Name the time.
barbie: ya lor..we shud have vomitted everything and demanded for a refund. :-P
tummythoz: I got a good pic of u, u know. But cannot post la, since everyone shy shy one.
tankiasu: I tried very hard to find its redeeming qualities. hehe. But we have to draw the line, especially when they charge so much and the food's not good.
meiyen: loads of other restaurants to try, rite? :-)
I love the pictures. Too bad they don't reflect the quality of the food!
wokandspoon: thanks! the food certainly looks good....for that matter, the fake displays in japanese restaurants also look good. :-P
Easy parking at lunch? Is this the same Midvalley?! Hehe ;) What time do you come? I always end up circling round and round looking for parking.
Thanks for the writeup on Tu Long. I was wondering how its business is since it started in such a grand way, chandeliers and all!
sorry we noticed the 2 glaring botaks more than the scallops, so is that why we have been thinking too much of you lately.
If you as usual think we bananas are joking again dun blame you but do check us out today to say you do !
( or as they say... OR your money back !)
kawaii!
I know the hot and sour la mian is only going to be good because I've tasted my la mian in hot and sour soup before and simply love it! Maybe I'm just a sichuan hot and sour soup person, tt's why ;p
If you say it's no good, I believe you! :)
Just came back from Din Tai Fung and Crystal Jade down south... their pork dishes are FABULOUS!!! The siew yoke at CJ was .... OMG... fat and thin layered like those red-and-white layered kuih and the skin was crispy crunchy lip-smacking good! Heck, even the siew yoke from the nearby hawker centre tasted better than a lot of places here!
Bald is good... dreamily thinks of Bruce Willis, Vin Diesel and Jean Luc Picard..
Wow, luckily I didn't visit the Tu-Long restaurant cause I've been eye-ing on them. After reading this post, ermm..I wanna say thank you lemongrass! :)
pink elle: Park in H. Guaranteed got parking. I normally find parking within 3 minutes. But guarantee doesn't apply to school holidays, public holidays, Jusco sale. :-P
team bsg: obviously the feeling's mutual since I was compelled to leave two comments on your latest post!
teckiee: u referring to the food or the botaks?
tigerfish: ^5! I love hot and sour soup too. Got recipe ar?
jackson: one man's meat is another man's poison. Obviously, some people like the food there since there is a decent crowd at lunch time.
wow, kat, you make the food sound so delicious. U referring to Singapore, right? Mmmmm...gonna try to check it out this weekend then. Thanks for the tip! And yah, bald is beautiful. ;-)
cookies_cream: we felt the same way too...coz the exterior looked quite inviting. We should have resisted! lol.
The red bean paste dessert, I am going to make them this weekend...oooh, I love them so much
RM: Can't wait to see yours. Bet they look better than the ones in my pic! hehe.
Well, hmmmm... what shud I write..., let me start this, Tu Long's leading chef now was the lead chef of Dragon-i who was started by Jun of Bread Story. The leading chef left and join Tu Long. Dragon-i revamped and managed by new management then brought in a lot of new front line chef. Jun of Bread Story started SOHO at Old Wing One Utama. All of you should try SOHO. I find SOHO very expensive for the food that you order. I was annoyed during my visit when they newly opened. They promised that customer will be given free buns when dining in, we dine at 7pm and was told about the free buns promotion and by the time we were served with food we were told that the buns were all finished. The manager dare to tell us to come the next time for the buns. What a cheap scape restaraunt it was!!!!
Hot and sour soup is easy to make, due to that I don't order them. What is inside of this soup? Dark soya sauce, soya sauce, vinegar, sugar, hot chilli paste, bamboo shoot, chicken bits,egg and chicken stock. :)
Eating in bad restaurants inspire me to cook because there are not many other restaurants to hop to. Shanghai Xiao Long Pao is a hard one to make. The skin has to be thin but enough to hold all the meat and its juices without breaking.
p/s the photo at the end was refreshing...
Lee Ping,
Hehehehe...the skin of the Xiao Long Pao is not difficult to make. It all about the type of flour you use. Different type of flour gives you different of elasticity. Also different type of flour gives you different type of colour, white or yellow.
when is comes to Siu Long Bao, my fave is stil at Marriot hotel shanghai restaurant.
Nice sexy bald photo! hahaha... hillarious!
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