Let me enjoy the sweet sweet period, at least for now;)
A month before my wedding, we arranged for our food tasting session at the restaurant in the hotel which will be serving our reception dinner on our wedding day.
Our hotel is one of the prestigious hotels in Penang, but I didn't choose it for that reason; I was just in love with the entire setting and ambience of the ballroom the moment I visited the place during my wedding planning.
As our reception will be held in the hotel ballroom, we were still fortunate that there is a Chinese restaurant within the hotel which will be serving the food.
Therefore, we were invited to the Golden Phoenix Chinese restaurant for the food tasting session; there was an approximate of 8 pax on that day :)
We were served orange cordial juice and Chinese tea upon arrival.
The first dish was the appetizer; the Golden Phoenix Four Season
From far left: Crispy Vietnamese prawns with mango chili sauce, wok-fried dice chicken with lemongrass and dried chili, wok fried celery with top shell, and kerabu jellyfish with mint leaves.
This was the best; the Crispy Vietnamese Prawns with mango chili sauce as the taste was just delectable!
The outer coat was slightly deep-fried to a light golden brown color and the prawns were just succulent. There was a taste of freshness upon a first bite; accompanied by the sweet and sour taste of the mango chili sauce :)
We didn't like the celery with the top shell as there was a weird odor which came from the shells that the kind chef recommended these money bags as a replacement.
The money bags were deep fried wantons wrapped with seafood and chicken meat and was pretty tasty.
Thanks to the chef for making this for us to try too!~
The soup; Braised Shark's Fin Soup with crabmeat
I have a statement to make; I am not a fan of shark's fin nor do I advocate the practice of consuming braised shark fin's soup BUT this is a dish which is often found in most Chinese wedding dinners and is a favorite among the elder generation.
This is considered a luxurious dish in a wedding dinner, and they will typically judge the soup by the amount of shark's fin and the thickness of the broth which tells the amount of ingredients invested in the bowl of soup.
The amount of crabmeat in the soup was rather generous as well :)
For the Chicken dish, we opted for the Oven-baked chicken with abalone and mushroom sauce.
The chicken were baked to perfection; leaving the flesh rather tender and juicy and at the same time, the sauce complemented the chicken well.
I am a big fan of vegetables and fish, and honestly, I find it hard when it came to the next three dishes which were the vegetables, fish and prawns.
For the vegetables, we opted for the Taiwanese Cabbage with Pacific Clams and Bai Ling Mushrooms.
I was skeptical about this vegetable initially; but it turned out to be so good and it went really well with the clams and mushrooms, YUMZ! :D
Look at how fresh and juicy the clams are and also, how big the mushrooms? :D
The Fifth Dish: Prawns
Our choice: Wok-fried Tiger Prawns Gong Bao Sichuan Style
These are real big and succulent TIGER prawns; our favorite!
The amount was generous and the sauce used just complemented the juicy prawns very well! This wins our votes as one of the best dish ;)
The 6th dish: FISH (yeah, my FAVORITE!)
Steamed Snapper Fish Pak Thai Sauce
We opted for this as this is a rather unique style for the fish compared to most of the way the fish is prepared for Chinese wedding dinners.
I enjoyed this sweet and sour and slightly spicy taste of the fish; which by the way, was really fresh:)
For the rice and noodles, we opted for the Braised Ee Fu Noodles with Mixed seafood
There was a generous amount of seafood with the noodles, and it was hit with everyone. Needless to say, this dish is also staying on our wedding menu!;)
(well, since the wedding was in the past, it definitely stayed and WAS in the menu that night ;)
The finale was graced by the sweet and chilled Honeydew with Longan and sago with ice-cream!
We were filled and stuffed to the brim at the end of the session; but we enjoyed ourselves to the max.
Just to fill some of you in on the wedding tradition; especially in the Chinese culture (Asian).
Typically a Chinese wedding reception is held after the marriage ceremony (this is similar to most wedding cultures around the world), and there is usually a course of eight to even 12 dishes to be served which includes all the luxurious dishes or food which are considered festive to mark the joyous celebration of uniting two people.
The reason for the many dishes in a Chinese wedding dinner reception is also mainly due to the Chinese viewing food with utmost importance, they take pride in serving only the best delicacies.
Well, serving delicacies does not mean that you need to be rich or to have a grand venue; but rather the sincerity from the hearts of the bride and groom and the hosting families, and all that they would love to treat their guests who came all the way.
We took our time and effort to select the dishes, and to think of the different ages and backgrounds of our guests who came all the way.
We hope they have enjoyed the food, and we are pleased to be able to host them :)
Hope you enjoyed the food photos too :)
