Ocean World Seafood Market — Restaurant in Cairns North

In Cairns for the first time and was craving some fresh fish & chips. We looked up Googles suggestion for the best local and came up with OWSM. The shop looks clean and the staff are well presented with clean matching uniforms. We all ordered then slowly walked around looking at all the produce on display, one of the staff members called a number while looking at us and we said “not ours”. He then told us to go stand outside, I believe he said he didn’t want to call out numbers twice, because he had also slammed some containers on the bench earlier the tone he used sounded rude and abrupt. After getting home with our meals, the next road over we were excited to dig in, opening all the bags everything looked fresh and well prepared. Unfortunately all the chips were undercooked and soggy, the way they are packed didn’t help as the bags are rolled up at the end capturing moisture in the bag. Google reviews recommend the Spanish Mackerel so we all ordered it, the flavour of the fish was good but something didn’t taste right with the coating, we had a mix of battered and crumbled and all of us found it very oily/slickly and didn’t finish our meals. Our overall experience sadly wasn’t great starting with the customer service and the meals didn’t...

We ordered a dozen fresh oysters, half cooked lobster with 5 cooked prawns from the fresh seafood section. From the kitchen we ordered battered barramundi, crumbed prawn cutlets set, crumbed calamari set and chips. The oysters, lobster and prawns were very fresh and tasty but oysters & lobster was slightly icy/frozen where we had to wait for it to melt a bit. The battered barramundi was the highlight and is probably one of the best fish and chips we had. Batter was crunchy & crispy and the fish was extremely fresh. Most importantly, it did not feel oily at all. We have eaten many fish & chips, some of the best came from Geelong and Philip Island. And the fish and chips here (yes, the chips as well were crunchy and soft inside) was definitely rank top 3 for us. The calamari rings were good too. There were no tables inside just outside and it was getting a bit hot as we were having them for lunch. Couldn’t find toilets nor hand wash basin either. Definitely a place to visit if you are seeking top notch beer battered...

Food is great and always fast when ordered. Prices are very reasonable for the quality, although, I have noticed they used to have fresh calamari which has now been replaced with the processed bag frozen kind - a little dissapointing considering the price is the same. The biggest let down for this business is the staff service. It is honestly quite poor, very blunt and even encroaching on rude when ordering on the phone and I have yet to have one good exchange with the staff at Ocean World Seafood Market. It's pretty disappointing considering their food is good quality - but the staff always seem to let the experience down by being so rude! lighten up! perhaps some training to be a little better with their customer service skills - it's part of the job! Every time I order, the person writing my food down always seems to be in a bad mood or acting like they always have something better to do. Just changing your tone and being a little friendlier to your customers makes it a whole...