Category Archives: Asian

U2 Beauty Health Center & Rohan Lounge

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So I had an interesting experience today at the U2 Beauty Health Center. It’s actually place that specializes more in foot reflexology but I wasn’t in the mood for a foot massage. Instead I requested a body massage, 1 hour for $45 + tip (cash only). The place itself is not really fancy and not really private. The room I ended up in had four massage chairs but I was the only one in it. The other rooms I saw had two to three other chairs in it as well. The massage was relatively inexpensive and if you like sports massages then you’ll likely like this place. It really helps if you speak Mandarin too so I’m glad I went with friends who spoke it well.

Afterwards we went for dinner across the street at Rohan Lounge. It’s another soju bar in SF but the flavored soju was much more expensive than Spot Lounge. I have to say though that they have interesting soju infusions: pineapple, Skittles, asian pear, etc.

For dinner, we ordered the wasabi fries. I couldn’t taste the wasabi though.

But I still happily stuffed myself.

Chicken wings. Quite tasty, very saucy.

The spicy beef wraps. You wrap up the meat in lettuce leaves with garlic, jalapenos, and spicy bean sauce.

Sweet potato croquettes. The sauce was weird but without it, the croquettes were a bit bland.

Susan needed to de-stress so hence the massage and eating and drinking.

The plates were a bit small so we had room for dessert (at least I sure had room for dessert)… we ordered two!

Coconut flan. Very yummy. Not to sweet and nice touch with the shaved coconut.

Fried banana with green tea ice cream. The bananas are breaded with panko bread crumbs and topped with a fruit sauce (I think raspberry). It was really delicious. I think I ended up eating most of it…

A good Friday.


U2 Beauty Health Center
3940 Geary Blvd

Rohan Lounge
3809 Geary Blvd

Spices!

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http://www.yelp.com/biz/spices-san-francisco-2

I went for a workout at the UCSF Mission Bay Bakar Fitness Center. The gym is so nice and new, I wish we lived closer to it. I wanted to try out the Samba class and convinced Tiffany to go with me. Man, we felt inadequate 😛 It was our first time and the class was full, there were a lot of other people in the class who were really good. Surprisingly for flailing around, we broke a sweat and had a pretty good workout I think. Not sure if I’d try it again but I won’t rule it out. I just wish there would be more direction on how to do the dance moves rather than just watch it once, then do it. The next class to try will be hip-hop.

Since the class didn’t end until 8:30pm, we didn’t really feel like going home to cook so Ron and I decided to visit Spices! but the other store on 8th Avenue because we heard they had stinky tofu.

We ordered a rather healthy dinner for the two of us, some stir fried green veggies with garlic, the stinky tofu, and sticky rice with mushrooms. Surprisingly we ended up with a vegetarian dinner. I’m sure Ron is going to eat a hot dog or something tonight.

So here is the fried stinky tofu served a a garlic sweet spicy sauce and pickled vegetables. Ron commented that the tofu was cut well, in that they were not huge cubes that could not soak up all the sauce. We’ve eaten it at other places where you have to double-dip because not enough sauce stays on the tofu.

This is the sticky rice with mushrooms. Something to fill us up rather than eating proteins.

Ron says, “can we eat stinky tofu every night?”

I wouldn’t say every night but once in a while is good. They have a large menu but they don’t always have everything on the menu so we’re likely to go back soon. We’re slowly finding the good Taiwanese restaurants in the area.

Spices!
294 8th Avenue

Poleng Lounge

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http://www.polenglounge.com/

Tonight I went out with Vicki and Joyce for dinner. We hadn’t had the chance to catch up before the holidays so this was our chance. I found Poleng Lounge on Opentable and it seemed to have good reviews and it was easy to make a reservation.

The restaurant was pretty empty at 6:30pm but then that is pretty early to have dinner. It seems like they have music in the evenings and a pretty mellow atmosphere.

We ordered some yummy appetizers, roasted edamame, roti, and sweet potato fries with banana catsup. The edamame was salty and smoked, yum. The roti was nice a hot but the accompanying curry was a bit cold. The sweet potato fries were delicious and the catsup was unique.

We ordered the shaking beef. The beef chunks were a good size and the dipping sauce complimented the meat well.

The garlic lobster noodles were a bit greasy but very yummy. The noodles a bit chewy and lots of garlic. Don’t order this on a date!

They have delicious cocktails too! I’m sure you’d be happy with whichever one you order.

We had a bit room left for dessert (probably I had more room than Vicki and Joyce…) and ordered the bread pudding.

One of the best bread puddings I’ve had. There was a slight burnt crust on the bottom because of carmelization and the rest was moist and delicious. It was served with a taro (I think) tapioca with a bit of black sesame seeds. That was really yummy.

I’d like to go back again on a weekend and see what the night scene is like… it’s pretty close to where we live so I think this may be a nice place to frequent. Here we can have the cuisine we miss from Singapore.

Poleng Lounge
1751 Fulton Ave @ Masonic

Koi Garden – fresh lobster

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http://www.koipalace.com/….html?page=home

I spent the day at my parents’ house in San Ramon. They kindly let me use their washer and dryer to do my laundry, saved me from using all my quarters 🙂 We went out together for dinner at Koi Garden because my parents had just recently been there for the delicious lobster. The restaurant was experimenting with a lobster “three-ways”: sashimi, rice, and stir-fried.

The sashimi was delicious with a bit of lime, wasabi, and soy sauce. The texture is a bit crunchy but also like fish.

My parents were already experts at this so they asked for a pot of hot sharkfin flavored broth to poach the lobster and lettuce. The soup was tasty and warmed us all up. I preferred the lobster meat raw though, the fresh flavor was more pronounced.

My dad compared the rice dish to a Spanish paella, except this was curry flavored and very much Asian.

I didn’t care for it as much, a bit too many onions, not enough other vegetables, and not enough sauce for all the rice.

My phone camera went on the fritz and I couldn’t take a picture of the last “way” which was stir fried with green onions. Tasty but a mess to eat.

A very satisfying dinner with my family.

Koi Garden
4288 Dublin Blvd Ste 213
Dublin, CA

@ Spot Lounge once again

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http://www.myspace.com/sfspotlounge

We seem to be frequenting this place quite a lot… I guess we just have to finish introducing our friends to the yummy soju cocktails then we’ll stop going there as often… although the yogurt mix wasn’t very good this time around. Very sweet and a bit too thick.

We ordered something new this time around, a sort of stew with beef, tofu, ramen, rice cakes, and spicy broth. If you want it really spicy you have to ask for it or else it comes out kind of bland.

We also tried the seafood pancake but it wasn’t as good as the one we had down the street at Shin Toe Bul Yi.

The stew is something pretty easy to make at home as long as you have some sort of crock pot, electric wok, hot pot, etc. The broth can be bought and you can buy spices and all the ingredients you want.