Chinese New Year Eve at Hardwicke

Ahhh.... Its that time of the year again, where every single member of a family will form a re-union to celebrate this grand occasion, the festival that most Chinese look forward for... The older generations hope to see the faces of all family members while most of the younger generations want are the most powerful item in the entire world, all wrapped up in red packets, handed upon by married couples...

Most families in the previous era would cook up a steamboat, enough to feed 20 hungry humans, on the eve of Chinese New Year. However, time changes everything. Families prefer to dine out on this day. Not only it might be cheaper considering the location, it save tons of energy in cooking and cleaning. Image, the amount of food your beloved mother/father/grandmother/grandfather had to cook to gain enough food for the entire family, and how many plates to be cleaned. Same thing happened to my family this year.

Instead of the traditional steamboat on the front yard of my house, we've decided to have our CNY dinner at Hardwicke, a bungalow style buffet restaurant, located at Jalan Sultan Ahmad Shah.

Most of you might be familiar with the place. It serves a great variety of food, ranging from Chinese to Western cuisine, for affordable prices. Lunch buffet is at RM18++ while Dinner buffet is at RM38++. Wanna know whats behind the building?

Heh, a famous trademark of Penang Island...

Northam Tower, of course...

The place was fully booked as usual, so we had to dine outdoors. Not a bad place, though.

Then, comes a special dish every family will order on the eve of Chinese New Year...

'yi sang'... Sorry, not familiar with the spelling...

Its a traditional dish for prosperity, rumor has it. All family members were to pick up their chopsticks...

...raise it...

...as high as possible...

...and let go... Voila! Time to dig in!

The food there was amazing, had a BIG plate of the main course, 2 bowls of mushroom soup with papadam and prawn crackers dipped into it, 1 plate of salad and 3 scoops of ice-cream. Did I miss anything? Sorry, no photos were taken, mouth was VERY occupied...

Well, in between dishes, I managed to capture a few photos as I was strolling around trying to get a hold of myself before I move to the next dish...

Well, I did manage to capture a picture of...

...this ice-cream...

...and this gluttonous lady...

After the chow, we stayed for a 'little' while longer to chat. Went and get myself a drink and this is what I get...

...mind guessing what this is?

At about 10.10p.m., reached home and... well... blogged about it.

Cheers!

Signed off,
Teng Aun.