Roaring Forties

March 5 – Picked up Gopal from his hotel and was cracking my head where to have lunch. Gopal, my friend from Chennai like most Indians are not too adventurous with their choice of food. The last time we had a meal was at the Bombay Palace which was a truly gourmet dream. It would be tough to top that and I decided to check out The Spice of India at the Pavilion.

The restaurant has lasted since the opening of Pavilion so I thought that it must be good. Secondly with the extremely high rentals at the Pavilion, I reasoned that they wouldn’t have lasted if they were bad.

We were promptly seated when we entered Spice of India and were given the menus. It was another 10 minutes before we could catch someone’s attention that we were ready to order. It wasn’t exactly filled. There were only four occupied tables and there were three waiters in all.

Our orders were Tomato Shorba, Butter Naan, Tandoori Roti, Garlic Naan, Dhal Palak, Murgh Tikka Masala, Mango Lassi and mineral water.

Two bottles of mineral water was delivered with one glass. I had to ask for the second glass.

The mango lassi tasted like sour mango juice with a small part of milk. I was used to rich sweet creamy mango taste and not a sour mango.

Then came our Tomato Shorba. My verdict would be that it is Campbell Tomato Soup mixed with some spices.

Fortunately, the roti, naan, the Murgh Tikka Masala and the Dhal Palak were credible. Not exactly the best but passable.

Service was very bad. The waiters were not attentive and did not look out for the customers. Instead, the customers had to call them time and again. 

Finally, when Gopal asked for finger bowls, he was politely told that there were wash basins located at the end of the restaurant. Some may think this is more hygienic than guests dipping and washing their fingers on the table in tiny lemon water bowls but this is an Indian restaurant and not having finger bowls is akin to not serving papadams.

Lastly, the bill came to RM 140 for two. Not cheap! Not expensive for an establishment on the upper floor of Pavilion but for the poor service and for the not so fantastic food, I rather pay more elsewhere.

My Take - Will never go to Spice of India again.

March 5 – Met up with an old friend and had breakfast at the coffeehouse ( called Kopitiam but nothing resembling one) in Radius International Hotel, Kuala Lumpur.

The first impression was that the place looked pretty cramped up and the breakfast buffet spread looked pretty bad. The Teo Chew porridge did not have enough condiments. The fried keow teow looked underfried.

I settled for the local favourite which is the nasi lemak. On appearance, it looked okay. They had freshly cut cucumbers and half boiled eggs to accompany the rice. The sambal looked a bit watery.

Overall, it looked much better than the taste. The nasi tasted like normal boiled rice. The sambal which makes or break the dish was absolutely horrendous. It was such a put off that I felt like nauseated after the tiny portion which I took.

My Take - Absolutely bad. Forget about having breakfast at the Radius International Hotel.

March 1, 2009 – It was the battle for the Carling Cup. Sir Alex fielded four youngsters, Ben Foster, Jonathan Evans, Darron Gibson and Danny Walbeck while leaving Wayne Rooney, Dimitar Berbatov, Michael Carrick and Edwin van der Sar in the stands.

As it turned out, Tottenham Hotspurs, the defending champions proved to be worthy adversary and Manchester United just couldn’t score despite 23 shots and possessing 53% of the ball. Tottenham Hotspurs had their run which was spearheaded by Roman Pavlyuchenko, Aaron Lennon and Darren Bent keeping the Red Devils’ defense busy. Goalkeeper Ben Foster was forced to make several saves while Sir Alex had to send in reinforcement in the form of Nemanja Vidic.

At the end of 90 minutes, there was still no score. Another 30 minutes, the teams were still tied.

It was then down to the lottery of penalties. Ryan Giggs, Carlos Tervez, Cristiano Ronaldo and Anderson all converted their penalties perfectly. The hero of the day was Ben Foster, 25 years old, third choice at Old Trafford rose to the occasion and stopped Jamie O’Hara’s first spot kick.  The save obviously pounded pressure on Tottenham Hotspurs and David Bentley succumbed to the pressure when he kicked his penalty wide.

Manchester United – 2009 Carling Cup Champions