Ikan Bakar at Teluk Tempoyak

When it comes to matters of food, my friends and I are pretty spontaneous. Memories of our last seafood excursion still fresh in our minds, we found ourselves heading to Teluk Tempoyak for a Malay-styled seafood dinner. This transpired after 15 minutes of Zin telling us about the place and us deciding to have seafood dinner there.

The seafood restaurant is in a village, Kampung Teluk Tempoyak, right beside the sea. Upon entering the restaurant, I knew the owner was not pretentious about what he offered - a seafood gastronomic experience. The tables and chairs were sticky, quite possibly from the remnants of many past feasts. I was a little uncomfortable, but at least the floor was clean. And in retrospect, not a fly in sight.

shutterjam and Zin had the honours of picking our dinner. The day's catch was so fresh that some were still alive! Zin chose 9 large prawns, their sizes perhaps only a close second to those my father normally get from the jetty in Kuantan. shutterjam followed closely with a large siakap and 3 crabs.

While waiting for our food to be prepared, we ordered our drinks - a large jug of iced coconut water. It was a refreshing treat after spending a day at work. Then we noticed our neighbouring diner having a strange creamy white drink with a generous ice cream topping. Even before our food arrived, we had already ordered another jug of drink - coconut shake. The drink had coconut milk, shredded coconut flesh, several large scoops of ice cream and maybe coconut water. It was a hearty drink. It reminded me of "ais krim potong". I prefered the fresh coconut water.

My favourite dish had to be the "ikan bakar". The sambal was exquisite, but the portion was much too small. We'll have to remember to ask for extra sambal the next time. The fish was expertly baked with the outer skin charred, but the flesh still moist and tasty. There was no denying the freshness of the fish from the texture of the flesh.

The prawns were splendidly baked over the barbeque pit, the shells slightly charred and their flesh still succulent. The accompanying sauce was tangy and I thought matched very well with the prawns.

I didn't really enjoy the baked crabs. However shutterjam and Zin were almost giggling with glee because the crabs were packed with crab eggs. So much so that there was hardly any meat. I prefer my crabs cooked in a sauce.

The place is run by a En Adnan Bin Hassan. They're closed on Mondays, and only opens for dinner from 5.30pm to 10.30pm. We arrived around 6.30pm and that's probably the best time because not long later, the crowd started pouring in.

According to Zin, there's another village on the opposite road. He said the place is a little pricier and he felt the food wasn't as good. But anyways, perhaps we'll try that restaurant next month.