Suraya Seafood Restaurant — Restaurant in Kuala Lumpur

Whilst visiting Kampong Bharu, we were drawn to crowd favourites at the local mile-long high street, where most services, shops and eateries are found. Suraya Seafood was one of the 4.

The queue was unending every time we passed the restaurant - even when the sky poured. We finally made it to Suraya Seafood after our third try, beating the crowd by getting there just before it opened at 1pm.

Being early, the inner kitchen wasn't quite ready, so we could only sample the food offered and cooked at the outside kitchen - Deep-fried Chicken Yellow Rice which everyone was going goo goo gaga about, all the grilled sausages displayed, Seafood Som Tum (papaya salad), Beef Bee Hoon Soup and Mango Smoothie.

Honestly, apart from the fantastic ice-cold Mango Smoothie 😋😋😋, Beef Bee Hoon Soup that tasted very close to Thailand's 😘😘, and one glutinous rice chicken sausage and one red-coloured sausage (no idea if chicken or beef) 😋, the others were disappointingly average.

The Deep-fried Chicken Yellow Rice that everyone rushed was accompanied by a Thai-like sweet chilli sauce, which I thought was hardly complementary. Rice was clumpy - a sign that it was overcooked, and it wasn't fragrant nor aromatic, which led me to wonder what the underlying purpose of having the rice appear yellow. 🥴🥴🥴

The Seafood Som Tum was wet and overtly sweet, lacking that quintessential fish sauce and garlicky pungency, herbal-ness and spiciness. The few bits of squid and unshelled small prawns didn't amaze, which kind of showed a sign of laziness. Should have asked for more chillies... 😒😒😒 Guess it's a Malaysian version.

Service, however, was impeccable. Staff members were polite and respectful. Top marks there... 👍

We will visit again to try the seafood, mindful that we have to come after 3pm for it. Therefore, the rating today was perhaps not reflective of what Suraya Seafood...

Decided to try this place and just went for the kuey teow celup and megi celup. Service was surprisingly fast, which was great. Also ordered kerang bakar and some lokcing sausages, had to order them at the front but they could deliver it to the tables, not many options though

Drinks came pretty quickly too, but even though I asked for less sugar, it was still quite sweet.

I had my celup with chicken and beef, the chicken was okay, but the beef was honestly a letdown. It wasn’t tender, looked dry and not fresh, and was really tough to chew. The pieces were also cut too big, which made it worse.

Taste wise, I wasn’t impressed. It wasn’t the best mi celup I’ve had. The flavour felt unbalanced for me, very tangy, which overpowered everything, and it was a bit too salty for my liking. The condiments were fresh, but they didn’t help much with the overall taste.

The megi celup was pretty much the same, just with that familiar thai megi seasoning flavour standing out more.

The kerang bakar was just okay. The clams looked fresh and were quite big. They didn’t overcook them, which was nice, but the green dipping sauce that came with it was pretty average.

The place was super crowded, like, uncomfortably packed. It’s not wheelchair or stroller friendly at all. I kept getting bumped into, and almost tripped a few times with people moving around so much.

One plus, there’s paid parking just behind the restaurant RM5 per entry, which made it...

Suraya Seafood Thai has always been our all-time favourite. But during our visit last night, things weren’t the same anymore.

They now have a new additional restaurant just opposite the old place. Still very crowded, and queuing is expected. The new spot is quite hot inside—definitely needs better ventilation or air-conditioning—but the toilet is clean, which is a plus.

Sadly, the food didn’t live up to what we used to love. The somtam and Maggi Kerabu weren’t delicious anymore. The taste has changed, maybe because the sauce recipe is different now.

Our go-to seafood kerang also disappointed us this time—no more grilled flavour, not as fresh, and the sauce was watery without any peanuts. Even the kampung fried rice was just average.

We really missed the fragrant chicken sticky rice they used to sell—it’s no longer available. We tried ordering mango milk and mango sticky rice, but both were sold out. Maybe we need to come earlier next time.

One concern: we saw a waiter wiping leftover food straight onto the floor instead of using a proper container. That’s something the owner should definitely look into for a cleaner dining environment. Also, the heat inside really needs addressing—air circulation and air conditioning would help a lot.

On the bright side, their boat noodles, sea grapes, and hotdog Nasi Pulut Ayam Bakar were still good—that’s why we reordered them.

Hoping that things improve on our next visit so we can raise this...