Beard Brothers' BBQ

I received a few emails asking me to review Beard Brothers' BBQ, based on our recent trip as mentioned here.

Sooooo sinful.

Honestly, I'm no food blogger. But I do know how to appreciate good food. And Beard Brothers' BBQ certainly serves good food. Their beef ribs are so tender, your plastic (I repeat, plastic) cutleries will literally glide through the meat.

Beard Brothers' BBQ serves not just beef ribs, but also beef briskets, lamb, chicken and occasionally sausages during the weekend. Cornbread is good too. (Ian walloped two in one sitting!) The side orders are so-so. But trust me, the succulent beef ribs are the real winners here.

We managed to get a beef sausage during this round!

However, do note that this is not a posh place for a first date or anything special like that. Expect plastic tables and fold-able chairs, self serve cutleries and drinks, and canned drinks from a chiller. But don't worry, the food will make up for all these inadequacies. You're here for the good food anyway, not to impress your future better half.

The menu. Hubby and I usually share the Triple Threat. Price may slightly vary depending on the weight of your beef ribs.

Just after the table and chairs, you will see giant impressive meat smokers tucked at the far back. And piles of wood! I was told that the meat is smoked for a good 12 hours, and the whole process from start (marinating the meat) to finish (end of smoking) is a whopping 20 hours! Due to all the work that goes behind the scene, be prepared to pay a slightly hefty price for your beef ribs. But trust me, hands down - it is well worth it.

Weighing our beef ribs.

Rest assured, Beard Brothers' BBQ is completely halal. Heck, the name originated from the owners' facial hair - sunnah nabi, kan? What you do have to worry though, is how fast they run out. I have completely given up on going over on weekend evenings. They sometimes sell out as early as 3pm! If you need to go during the weekend, I suggest lunch (no air-conditioning, mind you). Or do weekday dinners.

Happy carnivore-ing!

Beard Brothers’ BBQ

PG-01, Tropicana Avenue

Persiaran Tropicana

47410 Petaling Jaya

T: 012-319 0962

Open Tuesday to Thursday: noon-2pm and 6-10pm; 

Friday: 6-10pm; Saturday to Sunday: 11am till sellout

Pancakes

Ever since I discovered BIG's 50% rack, I would always make it a point to drop by for a visit. Sometimes I go home empty handed, but sometimes I score BIG time (pun intended)!

Last week, I found this huge tin of pancake and waffle mix, going super cheap. Excitedly brought it home, and we had a pancake feast that weekend! So simple to make too - just add an egg and some water.

Half price!

Naked pancakes.

Drizzled with honey and sliced strawberries.

After such a successful pancake party, my hands itched for some waffles. Unfortunately, I don't have a waffle maker, and I found a Tefal waffle maker going for close to RM200. Scouted around in Lazada, and bought a pretty decent one going for RM79, brand Lebensstil.

Unfortunately, it arrived with a broken handle. *stress* And I haven't found the time to return it to Lazada. *sigh* I recently rechecked Lazada's return policy - it turns out to be in 14 days (I assumed it was 30 days). Oh well, welcome to our home, broken handle waffle maker!

Here's to many more pancake parties breakfast!

The Gazebo Makeover

I last wrote about our gazebo here. Back then, our gazebo was purely a place for us to place our outdoor furniture. Obviously we furnished it with the basic necessities i.e. a fan and lights. But that was just it! It didn't feel homely at all.

In an effort to make the gazebo more cozy with a class of luxury, we decided to embark on a mini makeover project. Inspired by the beautiful purple flowers growing just by our gazebo, we adopted a purple theme for the area.

Our ever flowering purple flowers by the gazebo.

To give it a touch of style, we started by sourcing for a carpet. We initially wanted a Moroccan designed rug, but we hunted everywhere - IKEA, Spotlight and even online. But we couldn't find a suitable rug that we could easily fold over for storage in case it rains. Everything was either not to our liking, or to our liking but just way way way too expensive. In the end, I suggested to Hubby for us to just recycle an existing purple motif carpet that we had in the house. Since it was going to stay outside in the rain or shine, why bother splurging so much? Hence we ended up purchasing a new carpet to replace the recycled carpet, which went to our guest bedroom downstairs. And we brought the purple carpet outside... Takdelah rasa ralat sangat if it gets destroyed over the years, kan?

Recognize the purple carpet?

Our willow tree leaves giving the area a tad sense of privacy.

For a touch of elegance, we added some purple pillows and even a purple throw to the seats. It matched the carpet beautifully!! Hubby even found an old painting in our attic, which complemented the whole look. So far so good - zero money spent!

Surprisingly, the painting matched the whole purple affair!

A place of comfort in the garden.

We love relaxing in the gazebo, enjoying the peace and quiet with a cup of tea/coffee. Kids enjoy playing there too!

Next up, despite the carpet being recycled, we simply couldn't leave it exposed to the rain. Nanti bau masam! We resorted to rolling it up and bringing it indoors during the weekdays. But it was no easy feat - berat ok! Hence we collectively agreed to source for some outdoor blinds to cover the open sides, to prevent the rain from coming in.

Initially we wanted to just go for IKEA blinds, but in the end we calculated just a slight top up to custom it to size. So glad we decided to go custom, especially since we needed a slanting blind for one of the sides (far end in above photo).

Last but not least, in order to give it a bit of rustic feel to match the wood decking flooring, we sourced for these beautiful lovebird storage seats and repurposed them into flower beds! We also planted more of those purple flowers in honour of the theme we chose. And every morning the flowers would bloom without fail - such a pretty and soothing sight.

Storage seats from IKEA, repurposed into flower beds!

So happy that the gazebo is now the main garden feature. Since it is so cosy, it is fully utilized both during the day and night. On weekend mornings, we'll have our breakfast or brunch outdoors. Some nights, we would setup our image projector and watch a movie on the big screen. We also use the area to entertain our guests with an outdoor BBQ, or even a romantic supper for two after the kids have gone to bed.

That's it for our gazebo makeover! We're happy and content with our outdoor space now (well at least until we find another spot to revamp yet again) *chuckles*