Several weeks ago, we attended the Gala Launch of the Taste MIGF, held at the Berjaya Times Square Hotel Kuala Lumpur. This was the first time at this venue as previous years it has always been held at Sunway. The more central location certainly has its advantage and it seems that this year it’s also bigger and grander. Of course, we are also biased due to the awesome theme this time: Galactic Chefs: 2015 A Food Odyssey.

During the Gala Launch, we were given a few booklets to purchase tasting portions of food and I also had a little scoring sheets for various categories. So off we went looking around the stations to be enticed by all the participaing restaurants. These restaurants will serve special Festival Menus throughout the month of October, and this year there are 26 of them in total: Samplings On The Fourteenth, Iketeru, Graze, Dynasty, LTITUDE Restaurant Bar & Lounge, Imperial Rama, The Olive, Lafite, Shang Palace, Qba Latin Bar & Grill, Aliyaa Island Restaurant & Bar, Busaba Thai, Dewakan, Enak KL, Maison Francaise, Marini’s on 57, Minori, Neroteca, Nerovivo, Ruyi & Lyn, Soleil, Tanzini, The Oak Room, Vineria.IT, Yezi and Zender’s Restaurant & Bar.

So let’s take a look at some of the dishes we had the opportunity to taste:

You might have already seen these pretty miniature “sushi” on Instagram, that’s right; that’s indeed a miniature Nasi Lemak with all the trimmings. Gimmicky it might be, but the flavours are good.

We had the Foie Gras terrine from this station and boy was it good! Highly biased because we love our livers.

Some Molecular Gastronomy at play here. We had the duck liver terrine with port wine jelly (the brownish tube on the spoon).

For us the clear winner would be everything from Dewakan:

Each station also made plenty of effort dressing to the theme and our favourite would be the Tanzini Station, adhering perfectly to the Galactic theme:

The opening itself featured an MIGF spaceship, from which MIGF Organising Chairman Dato’ Steve Day and the Festival Master Chefs disembarked, amidst resonating applause from the crowd. “Fabulous food, fun, friendship and fellowship – this is what MIGF represents,” declared Dato’ Steve in his welcoming speech.

The Chefs participating this year also did a little on the stage and striked their poses before taking their place on the side of the ship flanked by stilt-walking aliens and galactic storm troopers. Festival Royal Patron, YAM Tunku Naquiyuddin Tuanku Ja’afar, Tunku Laxamana Negeri Sembilan and Guest of Honour, Dato’ Mirza Mohammad Taiyab, Director General of Tourism Malaysia, then joined the assembly on stage to officially launch the Festival under a magnificent explosion of confetti.

As per past year, we washed down our delectable treats with plenty of wine and it was a great session catching up with fellow foodies.