Afternoon Tea @ Jim Thompson Tea Room, Cameron Highlands Resort

When the clock strikes four, everything stops for tea - Jack Buchanan.

Afternoon tea is served daily at the Jim Thompson Tea Room in Cameron Highlands Resort from 3pm-6pm. 3pm was a little early since we finished lunch an hour ago, but come 4pm, we were ready. We seated ourselves in the comfortable seats outdoors facing the koi pond... how blissful.

What sets the afternoon tea experience here apart from its counterparts in Malaysia is definitely the ambience. Surrounded by lush greenery and cool air, it almost feels like being in a country house in England.

Beautiful setting

The afternoon tea, traditionally known as low tea, is laid out beautifully in a 3-tiered stand, very much like the one in their sister hotel, The Ritz-Carlton Kuala Lumpur. Priced at RM60/2 person or RM35 per person, the afternoon tea here was very popular. We spotted many Japanese tourists stopping here in bus loads just for the afternoon tea.

The tea selection at the resort focuses on local varieties namely the finest Boh teas from Cameron Highlands. Once again, we settled for the Bukit Cheding no. 53 which went well with both savouries and sweets.

Service with a smile from this young chap

Tea selection - finest teas from Cameron Highlands

Tea for my lady

Reading tea leaves?

A nice cuppa

The 3-tier afternoon tea boasted a selection of freshly baked English scones, fresh strawberries, savoury sandwiches, and an assortment of delectable looking pastries and cakes.

One of my favorite parts of afternoon tea are the scones. Unfortunately, the scones here were disappointing since they were not light enough. I was really hoping they would be as good as the ones we had at Ritz. At least they were warm and a slathering of homemade strawberry jam and Devon clotted cream did do some wonders. The chocolate sauce served with the strawberries this time was of proper dipping consistency.

Strawberries dipped in chocolate sauce.. yum yum.

I did not think much of the tuna sandwich, but the other fillings (smoked salmon, egg and cress, cream cheese and cucumber) were decent.

Savoury sandwiches

The assortment of cakes were my favorite tier for this particular afternoon tea. I especially enjoyed the chocolate pyramid, a mixture of dark and milk chocolate and was rich and creamy inside. The cake topped with strawberries and cream was also very delicious. The lemon cake was light and tangy. The other two cakes were not particularly memorable, think it was fruit cake and something else.

Cakes galore

All things sweet and pretty

My favorite that afternoon - chocolate pyramid

Strawberries and cream cake

Lemon cake

Calla lily

Do check out the song "Everything Stops For Tea", it's rather amusing (lyrics here. ) Here's a few verses from the song:

Every nation in creation has its favourite drink

France is famous for its wine, it's beer in Germany

Turkey has its coffee and they serve it blacker than ink

Russians go for vodka and England loves its tea

Oh, the factories may be roaring

With a boom-a-lacka, zoom-a-lacka, wee

But there isn't any roar when the clock strikes four

Everything stops for tea

Oh, a lawyer in a courtroom

In the middle of an alimony plea

Has to stop and help 'em pour when the clock strikes four

Everything stops for tea

Full set of photos available to view here. Click here to read my other reviews for Cameron Highlands Resort, breakfast in The Dining Room and lunch in The Jim Thompson Lounge / Tea Room.

Afternoon tea is served from 3-6pm daily.

Service: Good.

Price: RM35++ per person or RM60++/2 person. The afternoon tea is complimentary for those under the YTL Platinum Package.

Location: Cameron Highlands Resort, By The Golf Course, 39000 Tanah Rata, Cameron Highlands, Pahang, Malaysia.

Tel: 05-491 1100

GPS Coordinates: 4.469834, 101.369433

Website: http://www.cameronhighlandsresort.com

Eat All You Can Sukiyaki & Shabu-Shabu @ Suki-Ya, Tokyo St, Pavilion Kuala Lumpur

*Update: Revisited in May 2012 and food/service is still good. Price is still the same, and the buffet time for lunch has been extended to 120 mins. There is an extra sushi selection for dinner. The soup selection has been increased to 4 types - shabu-shabu, sukiyaki, miso and kimchi. 

*Update no.2 Revisited in Oct 2014, wow no price increase and still as tasty as ever! And still a super long queue during peak hours. Sushi selection is available for lunch buffet now too. Taro soft serve ice cream is super YUMS!


The much anticipated Tokyo Street was recently launched in Pavilion KL and we finally made our way there last weekend. Inspired by Ginza and Shibuya's cityscapes as well the Imperial history Japan has to offer, Tokyo Street offers a mix of traditional townscape and modern scenery, arts, culture, and food trends. Here, you can find shops such as Daiso, The Click Shop, and HABA. There are also various restaurants here, such as Hokkaido Santouka Ramen, Mochi Sweets, Ochado, En Ginza Cafe and Suki-ya, just to name a few.

Tokyo Street on Level 6 of Pavilion KL

Suki-ya was our destination for lunch that afternoon. Known as the "House of Hot Pot", this was one of the more popular restaurants in Tokyo Street along with Hokkaido Santouka Ramen. When we arrived at the restaurant, it was still quite empty but come 12.30pm, the place was packed with diners. Service was excellent despite the restaurant being full house, our tea was replenished without us having to signal any of the waiting staff over and so was our meat. Definitely a satisfying lunch experience.

The restaurant setup is simple, though tables are placed quite close to one another. The ventilation was pretty good and the restaurant was well-aired , so we got to enjoy our lunch in comfort.

This mini guide to enjoying a delicious sukiyaki plus info and tips on how to cook the meat and vegetable proved to be very useful.

The menu itself is pretty straightforward, choose 2 out of 3 types of soup base to enjoy. The choices were shabu-shabu (a light clear savoury konbu broth), sukiyaki (sweetened soy sauce broth) and kimuchi (mildly spicy soup made with authentic Kimchi base, miso and various vegetable base). We went for the sukiyaki and kimuchi soup. There are also some a la carte items such as edamame, tempura, karaage, sashimi and unagi kabayaki but we did not try any since we wanted to concentrate our tummies on the hot pot.

There is a choice of 3 meats here, Australian beef, lamb and farmed chicken. The Australian beef and lamb are cut in paper-thin slices. My advise is to go for the lamb and beef and skip the chicken. The chicken was at best ordinary but frankly, too fatty to enjoy. The lamb was our favorite; both tender and flavoursome.

There is also a vegetable bar a.k.a Healthy Bar, which features a wide variety of greens, noodles, mushrooms and tofu. A firm favorite with most diners were the mushrooms; enoki, shitake and oyster mushrooms were available. The vegetables were snapped up quickly everytime they were refilled, but as I mentioned earlier, the service was really good here hence you would hardly see the vegetable bar empty.

Three types of meat to choose from

Healthy Bar

Vegetables galore

Help yourself to as much vegetable as you like!

Boil baby boil!

Chilled Australian beef - yum

Thin slices of lamb - double yum

Farmed chicken - give this a miss

There are 2 types of dips provided for the shabu-shabu; ponzu (shoyu with vinegar) which is suitable for vegetables and misotare (spicy bean paste sauce) suitable for meats. There is also gomatare (sesame sauce) but this is only available on request. We really liked the misotare sauce, it went really well with the lamb and beef.

Spring onions and grated radish is also provided and can be added to create your own dips

Suki-ya uses premium quality pasteurised eggs. The beaten raw egg is great as a dipping sauce for sukiyaki. Dipping freshly cooked meat into the raw egg was absolutely heavenly.

Just beat it... beat it...

On your mark, ready, set... GO...!

Shabu-shabu directly translates to "swish swish", the familiar swishing sound of the thin slice of meat in the broth is where this dish gets its name. We swished and swoshed plate after plate of meat. It was pretty fun, actually!

The lamb and beef cooked in a matter of seconds.

Once the meat is cooked, dip it in the raw egg. Pure indulgence.

And when you're all done with your meat and vegetables, add udon or rice to remaining stock and enjoy the rich flavour of the broth. Incredibly flavoursome.

On top of the free flow meat and vegetables, you also get free flow ice cream to end the meal. How awesome is that. Vanilla, chocolate or a mixture - take your pick and go wild!

And the price of the buffet? RM29.80++ for lunch (100 min) and RM39.80++ for dinner (120 min). Children under 5 eat for free. Very reasonably priced, no wonder this place is packed! We left 10mins before our 100 mins was up so I am not sure how this system is policed.

Long queue outside the restaurant at 1pm

Verdict: Good value for money. Do walk in with an empty stomach and eat to your heart's content. I did. :D

Full set of photos available to view here.

Opening times: 11.0am - 5.00pm (Lunch); 5.00pm - 10.00pm (Dinner)

Pork-free.

Service: Excellent.

Price: RM29.80++ for lunch and RM39.80++ for dinner. Children pay 50% of the adult price. Children under 5 eat for free.

Location: Suki-Ya, Lot 6.24.04, Level 6, Pavilion KL Shopping Centre, 168 Jalan Bukit Bintang, 55100 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Tel: 03-2141 4272

Join their Facebook page here.



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