5PM Lalapot (Sutera) 五点炭炉火锅 — Restaurant in Iskandar Puteri

Summary: 没有对比没有伤害

Been wanting to try out this lalapot since the other famous outlet at Austin has a long waiting time (but I did try).

Food The soup was lacklustre. Not sure if it’s because of the garlic but it’s not as fragrant (as big head). The size of lala was super inconsistent (while big head is legit big).

Service When the crew serve the pot, they left the pot burning for quite some time before frying the garlic. We saw another tables pot burning with huge smoke. The crew ignored only until the customer pointed out. They slowwwwwly walk in & took out water to cool down. Their 不慌不忙值得敬佩 🫡

I see reviews saying the service very efficient & prompt. I don’t think so? If the pot can be left burning for so long (and nobody did anything) + my pot was drying up for quite some time (and the crew told me must tell them cos will burn). Wah they have been standing around my table for so long y’all didn’t even bother asking if need to add soup / can stop the fire. And YET they tell me the pot is burning. 😮‍💨 我是来吃的 不是来帮你看火的…

Variety of food Eh sorry, I had trouble ordering vegetable at 6pm. Ordered tong hou, don’t have. Re-ordered spinach, also don’t have. You have an online menu, cannot update? And mind you, they don’t have a lot of vege variety. 那你開店 gam pui?

Queuing system I didn’t queue but I see people queue, quite messy tbh? You can let people order first then wouldn’t that be faster?

Atmosphere Ventilation also cmi. Not a lot of fans blowing (ok maybe could be fire hazard). But the inside feels like oily 仙境.

谢谢 不要再见 👀

In response to owner (apparently owner can’t take criticism that well lol):

Wow, thanks for the detailed explanation~ I especially loved the part about the pot needing to “burn awhile” before cooking and the way your ingredients are “so fresh” they actually vanish before 6 pm.

As for “blowing my temper,” don’t worry—it takes more than some smoke and a side of sarcasm to get to me. But thanks for the offer! Sadly, I’ll take my temper and appetite elsewhere next time. Wishing you all the best in keeping up the “live cooking...

June 2025 An update after 3 months. I am very happy that the restaurant put in effort to improve their service after my/others' feedback.

Servers continue to be very attentive in adding soup. And they now will ask for permission to cook the lalapot or mala pot at another station to avoid oil being splash all over you unless you want it to be done at your table.

Music a little too loud but i guess others like it. So i can still accept it.

This time during our dinner, there was no disturbance. So i have changed my grading for their atmosphere.

Feb 2025 Food was reasonably priced. Lalapot soup base was flavourful but lala happened to have sand (just a few not cleaned properly). Hope they can improve on that. Prawn paste was good.

Staff are attentive. A few servers running around were alert to topping up soup and checking the charcoal. Also fast in responding when we top up our food orders.

Table and sofa were oily and even though their staff clean it once before we took our seats, using tissue to clean it again and you'll see a coat of brown stain. Soya sauce was too salty for my liking.

I graded Atmosphere one star was because a couple of people will walk-in to the restaurant to sell their fruits. We bought strawberries and guava from different sellers (one group of them were actually same family as they brought in the same fruit for sale just taking turns to ask around). However, one meal to be approached 6-7 times was a little annoying. Upon rejection, the young girl will stare at us without any expression and mumbled away, stand still at our table. We got to ignore her which makes us feel very bad as well. It left me with very bad dining experience over all.

Coming back? Not sure. Will not be my first...

THIS IS MY FAVOURITE RESTAURANT EVER!! I have been back twice and it’s very consistent. There’s dinner and a show to start (with the fire). After the soup is made, it’s so delicious and flavourful. You get to taste the clams, garlic, ginger and chinese wine in the soup. Also, the amount of clams that they give you at the start is very good, like 40 clams? The quality of the clams themselves are amazing! so creamy and delicious! Also, throughout the meal when they top up the soup, you can ask for a bottle of chinese wine to add on that delicious flavour into the soup. The toilet is also so nice! They even have toiletries for their customers.

The only downside is that each portion of the ingredients is very little? We have to order 2 of everything for a group of 4 people. And!!! Make sure to come earlier because there is always a queue.

Overall, an amazing experience. I will definitely go back and continue to recommend it to...