Thong Lok Seafood Restaurant — Restaurant in Perak

The 50+min ride from Ipoh town was not too bumpy and well worth the drive just to eat the medium sized prawns steamed in chinese wine. It was so good we had two rounds of 500g between four adults. I can wax lyrical about these meaty, well-toned prawns with roe. They may be fresh-water prawns, but the texture, the sweetness, the smoothness without any brackish taste is simply out of this world. And every single prawn I ate did not have a dirty tract along its back or bottom! It’s so easy to eat a whole bowl of rice just drizzled with the wine sauce. It’s that good-not salty at all. You can eat the orawns just as it is or dip it in Thong Lok’s signature chili sauce: it’s like hainan chicken rice chilli sauce crossed with ginger, lime and plum sauce. It goes very well with all seafood.

Naturally we had to have a plate of their sambal pacu (wild fern). Why not sambal kang kong? Because pacu is crunchier and sweeter and less likely to get stuck between the teeth. It’s also a wild fern that’s hard to source in SG as it’s deemed a non-chinese veg. So when in Ipoh where it’s bountiful, must eat until puas, so no regrets!

We came early to lunch as the fresh fish are kept in tanks until it is ordered. Lucky us, the fish of the day was the rare and very delicious bujuk or forest snakehead. It was the most expensive category today, given the difficulty in catching this wild temperamental fish. Ugly as hell, but it tasted like manna. The flesh was so sweet, firm yet tender, no fresh water fishy smell at all. And not too many bones (very easy to separate the flesh or spit out if you inhale a large chunk of fish). It is easily rated as one of the best tasting fish we’ve ever eaten. Better than pating and sultan fish.

The Royal Jelly Lime Juice (ordered from a separate stall outside the resturant) is the most popular locally made drink and it really complemented the seafood, cleansing the palate nicely.

Today was a public holiday in Ipoh. The first day of SG school holidays. And we were told the 3rd long weekend in a row. So traffic was light, parking wasn’t a headache and we didnt have to compete with a crowd even though it was a Saturday. Yes, I can definitely come again.

Although the locals order using Cantonese, there is an English menu and you can ask the boss lady what’s the special fish of the day (this isn’t listed anywhere). Unless you are a fishing enthusiast and can recognize the different species in the tank outside. And if you come early, you can get an indoor sir-conditioned table. Sitting outdoors is fine in the evenings but kinda hot...

We were brought to this sleepy town thanks to the reviews. It seems that most of the crowds flocking to this restaurant compares with the others, judging by the number of car. We were there at 1230pm, the traveling crowds came at 130pm though there were 6 tables in air conditioning room, 2 in open air.

Technically called prawn instead of shrimp because they were rare in fresh water. Aquariums of swimming prawns decorate the entrance of this restaurant ensures that we will be indeed served live prawns.

We got 4 large prawns, she recommended steamed heads, dry fried the bodies two cooking. We got ourselves a steamed cat fish weights 1.2kg and garlic lettuces.

Given the freshness of the prawns, the texture was firm and sweet. The freshness of the prawns is the reason for it. My advice, don't waste time on smaller prawns given a long journey to there.

The cat fish was a little overdone I'm afraid. A tip, use the soy sauce of the prawns as doing sauce is a good idea.

The look of lettuces were not that inviting proved us wrong, they were the sweetest lettuces I ever had.

This is the place if you craved for...

Took us about 30 mins from Ipoh to get to Tanjung Tualang. It seems this place has turned into a tourist attraction with tour buses making a a stop in this small town. This place was PACKED. Might be due to the restaurant being small but the aquarium out there was a great time killer. They are really efficient as before we even got a seat they started taking our orders. Less than 5 minutes after we got a table, our food arrived. The food here is scarily cheap, we even thought the cashier must’ve made a mistake but NO! It was RM250 for 6 people with 5 dishes! One small complaint i have is the flies at this place, the flies are rampant in touching every corner of your food indoor and outdoor. We chatted with the owner about it, she says that people have been growing vegetables here and using fertilizers that attract flies by the dozens. Several flies unfortunately took the plunge into our sauces and candles lol. To end, this place is definitely the most popular and underrated restaurant in Tanjung Tualang. Should’ve tried more dishes tbh since you cant go wrong with this price. 9 🪰...