The Red Victorian's quirky decor makes it one of Changkat Bukit Bintang's most singular settings, though some might find it kinda kitschy. Do 19th-century ornaments belong in (A) a restaurant, (B) a museum, or (C) a haunted mansion?
The menu here features a mishmash of mostly Western recipes. This "Summer of Love" salad was supposed to contain cucumbers, red onions, boiled eggs, pineapples & shrimp, but the cucumbers were replaced with lettuce, while the shrimp was absent until we requested it (yep, missing ingredients are a pet peeve for us). Not a bad recipe, but forgettable.
Onion soup with beef bouillon & red wine. Flavorsome enough to mop up with the bread, though it could nevertheless have been richer. OK, that's nitpicking.
Sea bass with fennel & linguine. A thick slab of moist, meaty fish, with reasonably well-prepared pasta. Simple but satisfactory.
Pan-fried sliced calf liver with tomatoes, onions, garlic & bread. Chewy, strong-tasting offal. Not exactly a crowd-pleaser, but liver lovers should be OK with this.
Potato pancakes. Basically rosti, but pretty much perfect. Chunky potatoes _ crisp on the edges, soft and fluffy inside. Not greasy at all, the 'pancakes' worked fabulously with the creamy mushroom sauce.
Vina Maipo Cabernet Sauvignon (Valle Central, Chile). Medium-bodied and balanced.
The Red Victorian,
Lorong Sahabat, Off Changkat Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur.
another one on chungkuts.. wow.. can survive or not?! The Pan-fried sliced calf liver sounds interesting.. just how gamy exactly is gamy;)
ReplyDeleteAiyo. WTH? They missed out the shrimp?
ReplyDelete*squints* And WAH, the shrimp look kinda small!
hmmm... everything really looked English :)
ReplyDeleteThe Red Victorian. Hmm, could be a good title for a ghost story, ja?
ReplyDeleteSince it is called the red victorian, I was expecting to see a lot of offals.
ReplyDeletehttp://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071212091722AAgydKm
ciki: ya, the competition is stiff, but then again, the number of customers at changkat seems to be constantly increasing! hmmm, let's just say the calf liver is stronger-tasting than pork liver :D
ReplyDeletej: heheh, dried shrimp! but yeah, even with the addition of shrimp, the salad was still so-so only. some magic ingredients/dressing was missing...
leo: oh ya, the decor does seem quite english/british, though the food is ... gosh, it's everything from american to french to italian and german :D
lfb: a ghost story set in a haunted mansion in the english countryside in the early 1950s? i look forward to reading it in one of your future blog entries! :D
michelle: heheh, only got calf liver. i'm quite an offal-lover though, so i definitely wouldn't have minded some heart, kidney and intestines :D
Haha, you never know - I might just write it. But maybe not RED Victorian lah, nanti kena sue for copyright. What other warna har?
ReplyDeletelfb: how about the yellow-polka-dot victorian? that way, u can explain that the ghost died of yellow fever! (who says sean isn't the master of logic) :D
ReplyDeleteUhm... no?
ReplyDeleteThe Scarlet Victiorian? How's that? Same band in the spectrum but with a more nefarious tone?
U had that after yr Clive horrifying experience? ;p
ReplyDeleteMust be soothing to have some wine after tht .. hehhe
Lfb: scarlet Victorian sounds fine! That would mean the ghost died of scarlet fever! :D
ReplyDeleteTng: heheh, wine is necessary at least four nights a week! Kinda sad but true :D
the shrimp so small looks like udang kering jer
ReplyDeleteOr maybe with a scarlet letter hung around her neck? Or something liddat. Yup, definitely feels like a story worth writing in 2011.
ReplyDeleteI just need a certain cockle-loving food blogger to remind me of it lah... :P
june: heheh, i think u're right, it IS dried shrimp! :D
ReplyDeletelfb: a certain cockle-loving blogger? isn't every blogger we know a cockle-loving one ... except perhaps for a certain paul smith-loving, erratically infrequent blogger :P
I am sure I can find other supporters. Cis.
ReplyDeleteAnd Paul Smith is wonderful. Heh.
lfb: if i start a cockle fan club on facebook and you start a paul smith one, i'll have more members than you by the end of the month. heeee :D
ReplyDeleteWith Paul Smith, it's not the numbers but the quality that counts. :)
ReplyDeletei think the haunted museum is more like it! They should make this into a cigar smoking lounge!
ReplyDeletelfb: *wonders how many RM59.90 seed shirts i could purchase for the same price as one of your paul smiths* :D
ReplyDeleteeiling: heheh, ya, i guess it has that 'old-fashioned' kinda look that would work for a cigar-smoking ambiance! :D