Restaurant Kabaya — Restaurant in Penang

Sorry, not sorry — it was our first, and definitely our last visit.

Let me start by saying: hats off to the owners for the effort and investment in the renovation — the place looks beautiful and has a great vibe. I truly wish I could say the same about the food.

As a self-proclaimed foodie — and more importantly, as a restaurant owner myself — I knew from the very first bite that everything we were served was premade. The small menu isn’t “minimalist” or “curated,” it’s just the full catalog of whatever the frozen food supplier delivered. I wouldn’t be surprised if the chef back there is actually just three microwaves working overtime.

They didn’t even bother to pretend the food was cooked fresh. Everything we ordered showed up within 5–10 minutes. Lukewarm. Tasteless. Even the rice was cold. The presentation? Pathetic. Miserable-looking portions thrown onto a sad bed of lettuce. The chap chai looked like it had been sitting in the fridge for a week, the chicken was watery and borderline undercooked, and the only thing mildly edible — the otak-otak — was still bland and under-seasoned. If you're going to outsource it, at least get a decent supplier. Might I suggest Muar?

There was nothing spicy, aromatic, or remotely authentic about what they claim to serve. Quite the opposite.

And as if that wasn’t bad enough… how do you even mess up the drinks? A soda with lemon slices and a plum — somehow tasted like bland, flat water. No fizz. No flavor. How do you take strong ingredients like lemon and sour plum, and still manage to make it taste like nothing? What alchemy is this? Did the lemon die of boredom? Are you reusing the plum between customers?

When a restaurant serves food and drinks like this, it doesn’t just disappoint — it stains the very idea of what a restaurant should be. If this had been a bad chef having an off day, we could’ve understood. But no — this felt like a lazy, uninspired attempt to play restaurant using reheated factory meals.

And if you think I’m being harsh, just take a look around. The table next to mine — their faces said it all.

And finally — thank God for the option to pay over the phone. The thought of going to the counter and being asked, “So how was everything?”... I will tell you that this is...

In a nutshell, there are very few choices to order, the food wasn't worth the price (RM20-RM30 per dish), the taste was average, the portion is small, and the service was slow/poor. But to be more detail: Food and Taste: Honestly, the portion is small and each dish is suitable for 2-3 pax at most. There is no option to increase the portion, and if you come with a family of 5, either you take 2 portions of the same thing, or everyone does not have enough to eat. This can bring the price up to RM60 per dish. Choices: As you can see from other's pics, there are only 9 dishes available to order. This is extremely limited. Price: The price is on the high side for a NT restaurant. Even comparing to other places around, you're getting way lesser portion and food that does not taste as good. Service: We ordered everything via the app but the staff can still forget to deliver the most basic thing - that is the correct number of rice. How hard can it be? Atmosphere: This is a subjective matter. Some like it, some do not, so I will not comment much on this. We came at night, and what I do appreciate is you can park at the side of the shop. There's space for about 5-6 cars. Overall: There's lots of room for improvement here. Food portion, pricing structure, staff's...

My friend and I had an unpleasant experience with the staff service and we arrived at around 8:50 or 9 o'clock and before we came we went to check the time the shop was closed at 9:30p.m So we were going to ask if the staff is going to be closed ready? Then she told me I could still last order food.

OKAYY we sat for a while with ordering then we were informed that their restaurant had almost closed by the staff ??!!?!

I was thinking of why they did not inform us earlier when we arrived but began we had asked them also?!?!!!

Okayy fine 🙂 Beginning that it was obvious they were urging us to order food, and then said that the restaurant was going to close. After we ordered, we quickly finished eating the remaining drinks, just halfway through the staff came over and said that the restaurant was going to close, her behavior was very impolite and a little offensive, we also knew that the restaurant was going to be closed, so we ate it in the shortest possible time, I didn't expect the waiter to come and drive customers directly!!!!

This is ridiculous, I hope Your company to train your staff doesn't be double standard, while one staff member welcomes us and the other staff urging us. If you can't serve then directly tell the customer we are not accepting any...