I find myself the in the mood for noodles very frequently these days. One of the best places for a big bowl of less-than-typical noodles is Canoodling. From the many varieties available on their menu, one in particular caught my attention: Red Curry Duck Noodles.

Interestingly, the noodles itself is black - it's charcoal noodles. Taste-wise, it's more plain and has a slightly coarser texture than regular noodles. I'm not sure why I would purposely pick these over regular noodles, but since that's how it's served, I just went with it.

The duck in red curry was very aromatic. I could taste and smell the herbs and spices! It was a whole duck leg, so it's very much worth the money, and the dish itself contained various ingredients that gave a lot of dimension to the flavour, such as sweetness from the lychee (which is quite an unusual ingredient in a noodles dish).

With the large number of gelato places in the Klang Valley, it has become increasingly difficult to set a benchmark. Every gelato place generally serves decent gelato. It's impossible for me to try every flavour at every gelato place.

This rule applies to every restaurant out there, and the same principles apply - if you taste something that's extraordinarily good, you know this place is worth a mention; and this is exactly what happened when I tasted the black sesame gelato at Gelatomio.

Of the many places that I've tried, most failed to even come close to being "good enough", and almost none are "good" in my books. Gelatomio's black sesame gelato is amazing. Rich, nutty, creamy, and very intense in flavours that didn't resemble most poorly-made black sesame desserts of any kind that I've tasted before.

This is the only branch that also makes gelato on the rocks, i.e. gelato folded in with toppings or other flavours of gelato on a cold stone slab, making the texture smoother while offering the option of combining flavours and mixing in toppings.

Who would eat salads as mains? Typically, I wouldn't. However at Ben's General Food Store, I would. Among their selection of salads include mushrooms with barley, cod fish with pineapple, and even pastas and noodles.

On this particular visit, I had Moroccan lamb meatballs with conchigliette (shell-shaped pasta) with peas and parmesan; a very good combination.

The rich flavours and natural acidity from the tomatoes balance out very well against the mild flavour and dense texture of the pasta and grated parmesan. The lamb itself was rich and juicy, and topped off with cheese.

Serving sizes are deceptively modest, but don't over-order, as we tend to do. We usually end up too full and our bill comes to about RM50 for two persons, after tax and service charge. Very inexpensive meal of this quality!

I really really love Gelatomio's black sesame. If it is available, I am having it. It smelled strongly of black sesame, so much that I was almost like eating black sesame alone. On top of the black sesame ice cream was hazelnut ice cream, I reckon this wouldn't clash too much as both were nutty. Hazelnut was less pungent but still enjoyable.

Salted caramel is one of my favourite flavours ever. Whenever there's an option for this flavour, I'm sure to have it. In fact, I liked it way before it became "cool" (no pun intended). The ice cream is thick and not airy, and the flavour is rich and smooth. One of my favourite brands for this flavour.