My 29th Birthday

One of the things that is different about this year's birthday party is the relative calm about it. Yea there is the FB wall post spamming and the few late well wishes and the whatsapp and sms. However this year everything still seems to be calm and cool. The best thing is my birthday falls on a Sunday and there is no one better to spend it with then...

We decided to go low key this year and not get any present but just dinner. After much consideration and also me picking between A,B and C, we finally ended up at...

Dirty Nelly's is basically a small and nice pup in Damansara Jaya near the old Atria and on the same row as Maybank. People have been telling me about how good the burgers are and we decided to give it a try.The place is nicely decorated to look like an english pub and it even has a beer mat for each of the tables.

So first up to be healthy before the unhealthy we ordered some greens....

We have been ordering alot of Caesar Salad recently and it is pretty much established that both of us like Caesar Salad. That is what came along...

Me and Caesar Salad

Now this Caesar Salad is interesting for a couple of reason. 

•  It is the first time we ever had Caesar salad with "Tartar like sauce" and with an option for Balsamic vinegar. The saucer with 2 sauces there? Top is "Tartar like sauce" and bottom is Balsamic vinegar
• They used quail eggs instead of standard chicken eggs
• There was no anchovies in the salad at all

Over all it was still pretty good but it is not a Caesar Salad for sure. After 5 min...

Next to come was something warm and milky and creamy. We ordered a soup to warm up our tummies for the main course.

It is called Yellow Vanilla and it is a pumpkin & squash soup combined with some nutmeg. This took a while to come because they only had 1 cook that night. So.....

Should I order a Guinness?

Or should I not?

Nah I will order it on Arthur Guinness day

Unfortunately after the previous night of drinking, we decided not to have any alcoholic drinks today and went for normal warm water. The soup took a really long time to come so Amy ordered a very unhealthy bar snack. It sounded interesting on the menu but it almost gave me a heart attack. Now what was crazy was the starter came before the soup did.

We ordered the Angels & Devil on horseback and it is prunes wrapped with streaky bacon and fried till crispy and to finish it off a sprinkling of cayenne pepper. This is a very surprising combo. The sweetness of the prunes gelled very well with the savoury taste of the bacon. The streaky bacon was very very very fat and since it was fried, oil was basically dripping off. There was no spicyness of the cayenne pepper though. 

That last piece seriously almost gave me a heart attack. Finally after all the unhealthy goodness, the soup arrived and we could wash down some of those fat and "try" to forget about it.

This soup was not too bad as well, the pumpkin they used was sweet and buttery. Amy said it wasn't creamy enough but I thought it was ok as any more creamy and it would be very "jelak". Half way through polishing off the soup, the big mamma arrived. We ordered their most famous....

Dirty Nelly's which is a burger that has PORK, BEEF and LAMB, English Cheddar and Jalapeno peppers combined into a big thick burger patty. The patty has a couple of friends in tow as well in the form of bacon, mustard mash and a Duck egg sunny side up. On the side we have a bowl of chili, crispy white bait, coleslaw and wedges. On the menu it actually say "As the name itself, not for the faint hearted or the health conscious". What does it look like you might be thinking, well here it is. I give you Dirty Nelly's Burger....

This is how it looks like on the cross section

Starting to drool yet? This burger is quite interesting for a few reasons. The patty was absolutely fantastic. I always believe that beef and lamb burger patties give you a better flavour compared to pork because it has a more meaty feel. It crumbles better then pork to give you a nice more "fluffy" patty. However the burger patty was so tasty that is actually masked the taste of the bacon and the duck egg completely. I took a piece of bacon and ate it alone and it was tasty. So means the other flavours totally masked out the flavor of the bacon.

The mustard mash taste more like mash potato and I couldn't really taste any mustard in them and there wasn't any hint of spicyness from the Jalapeno peppers. The chili on the side WAS FANTASTIC. It goes well alone, with the burger or even with the fried white bait and wedges. It was really good tasting and it could be made into a nice dish of sloppy joes.

I think they tried to make too much out of this burger that each of the elements were fighting for my attention. I think maybe the better way to eat this burger is using the more civilise way of fork and knife compared to just packing it on top and chowing down. It was still a great burger never-the-less just that some of the flavours was masked or lost out to something else.

After dinner, we couldn't walk or do anything, so just sit around taking photos lor

Now after every good meal, I believe in the western way which is to sooth the stomach with some coffee. Most western dinners if you go for the full course it will be coffee right at the end. We decided to skip dessert and head straight for coffee and Antipodean Bangsar.

Apparently this is the hottest place for coffee nowadays and they even roast their own coffee. Amy and I being coffee drinkers, we decided to cap the night off with a good cuppa coffee. The decor at Antipodean is very chic and classy.

Something about black board with the menu on the blackboard makes me like this place instantly. Maybe it is because those western restaurant overseas usually do it. They do actually have a coffee roaster at the back the shop and man this place must smell good when they start roasting the beans. I usually do not go for anything fancy but just a simple cuppa cappuccino and Amy ordered the cafe mocha.

Cappuccino

Cafe Mocha

The coffee to my taste buds was a little on the bitter side. Usually I drink my coffee milk without sugar but this one I couldn't drink it without sugar. The after taste was just too bitter for me. I didn't think it was a great cuppa coffee unfortunately. It could be that that is how the beans taste or they might have over roasted the beans or burnt the beans while making the cup of coffee. I had to put some sugar then it was more palatable. Even the cafe macho had the hint of over bitterness but it was masked out by the slightly sweet chocolate. Overall, I think the coffee was too strong for my taste. 

The coffee gave us a buzz so Amy came up with a cool shot...

Then I saw a nice shot to play around with the black wall they had at Antipodean. I tried but it not as what I had imagined in my mind.

The patch work didn't help the picture and also the fact there wasn't enough light made this picture not fantastic. Maybe I should have used a flash. Oh well. Next time.

Thanks Amy for the fantastic 29th Birthday Celebration. See ya 28 and welcome 29. Bring on 30 next year. Hehe