Restoran HLS | Kuantan's Best Restaurant — Restaurant in Pahang

You see, as a Kuantan-born boy I am clueless on what and where to eat. Sure I moved to another district when I was 7 but I still go back to my town of birth once a year (sometimes twice or thrice) because most of my relatives live here, and my dad still has a house. Most of the time, I rely on my aunt to tapao food for me or my dad would bring us to eat nearby. With such convenience, who would actually explore places to eat?

Now that I'm old enough (quite old), I started to look for good food whenever I'm back to the capital of Pahang. Based on my friend's recommendation, I made my way to this restaurant along Jalan Beserah (few doors away from Tan Chong Kuantan).

◾This restaurant is helmed by award-winning chef.. quite impressive medals and trophies displayed on the wall in the restaurant. ◾They used to operate in Taman Tas but has moved to the city centre. ◾Oil blanched squid - slowly blanched with oil to retain the texture of the squid (overdone it and it'll be rubbery and hard).. the squid was quite bland but you could taste the original flavour of the seafood. Just dip into the sauce or go with the pickles. ◾Dong po yuk - classic Chinese dish with perfect 4-5 layers pork belly. Fork tender with awesome sauce. ◾Deep fried fish skin with salted egg yolk - generous with the salted egg yolk which coated literally every piece of the skin and further enhanced with curry leaves. Century egg on the side. ◾red spinach in superior soup (siong tong yin choy) - another comfort food for me.. love soup when having meals.

It's a bummer that I could not order more because there were only 3 of us - me and my customers. Based on the favourable first impression, I reckon that their other dishes are worth trying too. Price-wise it's a bit on the high side but the quality of food made it worth the money paid. Best bet will be lunch time as it is more packed...

We arrived at 5:30pm, which was the opening time for the evening session. Since we arrived on 17 Dec 2021, we were right smack in the rainy season.

We couldn't order a few signature dishes that included the fish and standing chicken (this could only be crispy when placed under the hot sun) but one dish did stand out; the soup with rice and chicken. I don't always drink soup during meals but this was excellent! Some rice bits were crunchy and the soup really captured the taste and essence of chicken.

The spare ribs and signature tofu were okay. But nothing that I'd reorder if I were to come back. The chef apparently won several awards from Hong Kong, or something along those lines.

UPDATE: We revisited the restaurant again on 15 May 2022. We ordered the soup with rice and kampung chicken (RM68), fish (fried fish head and soft fillet slices) in soup (sui zhou yu) (RM108) and paku (a type of fern) with egg (RM22). The first chicken soup with crispy rice bits was as delicious as we remembered. The fish soup was less complex in taste with a milk-based but less heavy texture. It was also delicious but if I had to choose only one soup to try, the chicken soup is my must-have. The paku with egg was interesting but seemed to have predominantly more egg than veg. We reached by 6.30pm and some tables were reserved. We got the last table there. But by 7.30pm, there were empty...

We came to try this restaurant after reading the reviews and it didn't disappoint us. There were just my husband and I so we only ordered two dishes - the chicken soup with crispy rice and potato leaves fried egg. There are a lot more interesting dishes on their menu. The chicken soup was absolutely delicious, and the kampung chicken they used to cook the soup were so tender and flavourful. We also liked the potato leaves fried egg, but there was this one hiccup about the dish - a burnt dead fly. I believe the chef didn't realize it and they sincerely apologized and replaced a new dish for us. I would have given a 5-star review if it wasn't for this. Anyway, we enjoyed our dinner throughout and would definitely recommend this restaurant to...