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As mentioned in an earlier post, there were actually TWO steamboat restaurants in Seri Petaling that offered porridge as a base. After a short break from steamboats, we finally found occasion to make another trip to Sri Petaling when my cousin visited from Australia. Strangely enough, it was once again raining which is essentially ideal weather.

Truth be told, the day we decided to try Tasty Hotpot Restaurant wasn’t exactly a good one for me. I was ticked off at the weather and the resulting traffic. It was half an hour through rush hour to pick WL up from the Taman Bahagia Putra LRT station. From that location, it was likened to being on the other side of the planet from Seri Petaling for all practical purposes. While I would have rather stopped for tea and wait out the traffic, we had an appointment to keep. Amazingly, the drive took only an hour. But regardless, we arrived hungry and impatient.

The restaurant occupies a single shop lot with space for two dozen tables. The decoration is sparse and simple. The interior is air conditioned. The thing about air conditioned restaurants is that you usually come out of it smelling of oil. Since we didn’t want that, we decided to sit outside. The nice shop owner arranged the seating for us in a jiffy, chatting with us as he did so. Strangely enough, my foul mood lifted. WL and I perused the menu while waiting for the rest of our party to arrive. It was a simple menu, with a relatively limited choice of items. I was disappointed as they didn’t carry the standard issue luncheon meat.

As we waited, the nice guy and a cute lady (WL’s opinion, not mine) kept coming by our table to see if we were ready to order or needed anything extra. We kept sending them away saying we needed a few more minutes, and they just stood by waiting patiently. That was nice of them to do so and I appreciate their effort and the service. After a long while, we finally decided on the porridge and tomyam stock, along with sets for two persons, as well as an order of bacon (WL and I were the only ones hungry). My cousin, my sister, and their husbands arrived a while later, just in time to dig in.

When the pot came, the first thing I noticed was that the porridge had ginger in it. On the other side of the pot was Tomyam. For the record, I HATE ginger and DISLIKE Tomyam. Also for the record, I enjoyed both the porridge and tomyam stock! The porridge was the right consistency without being overtly salty and I barely noticed the ginger. Unfortunately, they ran out of porridge towards the end of the meal, after two refills. That meant that I was forced to go with the Tomyam base which I would not have tried otherwise. The tomyam stock wasn’t the usual spicy sour watery stuff. Instead, it was rich and and slightly creamy, like a light and very tasty curry.

Although we only ordered two sets and a plate of bacon to be shared between the six of us, we were full at the end of the meal. Or at least I was. The serving for each set was quite large, each costing RM14.50, which includes a choice of two different steamboat base (porridge, tomyam, plain stock). Unlike most places, Tasty Hotpot doesn’t levy a surcharge per head for the porridge base (Farmland charges RM1.50 for the porridge and RM3.00 for tomyam per person!). The bacon slices was an excellent alternative to my usual luncheon meat. There was alot of bacon for RM6.00 a plate.

In addition to the food, we also had two rounds of drinks each, which included 3 lime juices (RM2.00 each), an Ambra juice (RM2.00 and don’t ask me what it was), a can of coke (RM2.00), and a pot of chinese tea for two persons (RM0.80 each). Towel wipes are available at RM0.50 each. We returned ours but I noticed that they charged us for it anyway. But then again, I don’t think it was intentional and probably my own mistake :(

All in, the meal for six cost RM50.50, after a 5% service/govt tax. I gladly paid for the food and the service. Overall, it was a good meal for me. Great people, good serving sizes, nice porridge even though they ran out, excellent tomyam, good company. Two thumbs up and definitely recommended. This is the better of the two steamboat restaurants on that street.

Side note:
For some reason, everyone fell in love with the restaurant’s toilet. It was amazingly clean, AND it was decorated. So clean and nice, in fact, that it impressed our Australian visitors. The fact that they put in effort to upkeep something as simple as the loo speaks volumes.

Tasty Hotpot Restaurant
No 8-G, Jalan 14/149L,
Sri Petaling,
57000 Kuala Lumpur.

Francis Yap: +6012-399 9553 (The cool guy?)
Nicole Chan: +6012-206 2707 (The cute chiq?)