Ikan Bakar Tampin @ Johor Bahru in Malaysia

The GRAB car correctly dropped us at the corner of the Italian restaurant we wanted to visit but the corner of my eye caught the signboard from another eatery that I thought looked darn familiar. 

Ikan Bakar Tampin - I ran a check on Google Map and it dawned on me that this was the eatery said to be super crowded on weekends! A dilemma arose; should we give up Italian cuisine for this?

At a review rating of 4.3 from over 1,100 reviewers, and that we were fortunate to have no queue; I think it's a no brainer for us to have our dinner at Ikan Bakar Tampin. Of course, I had to secure consensus from the rest too! 

Secured a table and it's time to order! Don't bother waiting for people to "serve you". Just get your ass up from the chair and walk over to the counter with the sign "order here".

It can be daunting deciding what to order, given the buckets of seafood placed right in front of us! There's a board stating the price but I am lousy in estimating the weight of seafood.

What we did was to rely on this board which we assumed would be list of recommended food to order and eat at Ikan Bakar Tampin. Since there were just four of us, it made sense to choose a few instead of ordering all nine dishes! 

Ordered! 

We didn't ask to weigh the seafood, and just ordered based on portion. 

Hope the eventual price wouldn't give us a scare! 

A picture before our food arrived! 

Balonglong Juice and Honey Pandan with Grass Jelly - former had an acquired taste with a spicy aftertaste which I found refreshing whereas latter was an aromatic thirst quencher that could have do with more ice! 

Sambal Spicy Noodle - this felt a bit like those fried noodles you can get from those Chinese nasi lemak stalls, albeit slurpy and spicy; two factors that made eating them very enjoyable.

Before we start with the seafood, do proceed to this counter next to the cashier and prepare your saucers of ammunition that would complement the seafood; the chinchalok relish! It would be the ultimate enhancer that combined freshness with crunch and touches of sourness and sweetness! 

Original Tiger Prawns - fresh and sweet tasting, there's nothing to complain about this plate of prawns that were cooked, stir fried style. Most expensive dish for us though at RM 51.00

Salted Egg Sotong - 'crunchy' and covered in a thick sauce, this would be much better if I were to eat them with a bowl of white rice! p.s. a tad salty but hey, this is salted egg sotong!

Sambal Ladyfingers -  the rare occasion whereby I felt that the sambal can be eliminated so that I could for the original good flavor of these well steamed ladyfingers. The sambal tasted different; not very spicy yet with an intense savoriness. 

Sambal Stingray - these came out top on the things to eat at Ikan Bakar Tampin and it's been a while since we last had stingray. Smeared with the same kind of sambal as the ladyfingers, the taste just didn't match with the meat from the stingray! 

Speaking of stingray, the taste of the meat also seemed off and there didn't seem to be much meat. What came to mind after the meal was that we have had much better stingray at Chomp Chomp hawker centre in Singapore.

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Before and after. It's sad to say that the one thing that impressed us was the chinchalok relish and it was a lifesaver when we didn't want to 'waste' the disappointing stingray! Would I return? Don't think so. 

Address

94, Jalan Dato Sulaiman, Taman Century, 

80250 Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia

Map

As above. 

Operating Hours

5pm till 11pm

(Closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays)

Menu

As above. 

Pricing

Balonglong Juice - RM 5.00

Honey Pandan with Grass Jelly - RM 4.50

Sambal Spicy Noodle - RM 8.00

Original Tiger Prawns - RM 51.00

Salted Egg Sotong - RM 29.00

Sambal Ladyfingers - RM 16.00

Sambal Stingray - RM - 40.00

(Subject to Taxes)