Tawau/Semporna - Day 7 (Tawau Town)

It's our 3rd day of Tawau food hunting and in order not to spoil my appetite I decided not to eat hotel breakfast today. However, I still went down at 9.30am to check out their menu and had some fruits. They serve nasi briyani, mee goreng mamak, ayam masak briyani, acar (pickled vegetables), sausages and baked beans. 

Coffee or tea and bread section

Orange juice

Breakfast

Fruits

We took a Grab car to Kedai Kopi Yuan Yuan, 12 minutes drive (5.6km) from LA Hotel. (Grab fare - RM 7). We reached there around 10.15am and there's a long queue right in front of the restaurant. What a coincidence! We bumped into two guys that we met in Kapalai Dive Resort. They were about to leave the restaurant and saw us. They told us that this is one of the best Soto they have had so far. It's so good that they came two days in a row!

I ordered Soto chicken with prawn ball and fish ball while my partner ordered Soto with prawn ball, prawn and beef. Soto is a traditional Indonesian soup mainly consist of broth, meat and vegetables. The taste reminds me of MAMEE instant vermicelli chicken flavour! Their fish ball looks more like fish paste and it's good. Prawn is fresh and succulent. However, shredded chicken came out a bit dry. Beef is chewy and tough. I like their chili too. Spicy and best eaten together with the fish ball and prawns. As usual my partner ordered Teh Ping (iced milk tea) with less sweet and it turned out to be slightly bitter. Rather slow service and you need to pay before getting your food. 

Total bill: RM 26.40

Kedai Kopi Yuan Yuan

Teh Ping and iced water

Chili

Soto beef, prawn and prawn ball

Soto chicken, fish ball and prawn ball

Address:

Kedai Kopi Yuan Yuan

TB 10749, Lot 8, Batu 3.5,

Jalan Apas, Taman Megah Jaya,

91000 Tawau,

Sabah, Malaysia

After brunch, we decided to check out a car wash service near Bataras Hypermarket which is just 4 minutes drive (1.1km) from Kedai Kopi Yuan Yuan. However, Google gave us the wrong location and we have to make a detour. Instead of dropping us at the wrong location, the Grab driver was kind enough to bring us to the right place. Finally we found the car wash. (Grab fare - RM 9). Bataras Hypermarket is just within walking distance from the car wash. So we took a quick stroll at the hypermarket before taking a Grab car to Kedai Kopi Hong Hong.

Bataras Hypermarket Tawau

Kedai Kopi Hong Hong is just 3 minutes drive (900m) from Bataras Hypermarket, Tawau. (Grab fare - RM 4). The restaurant was quite empty and the lady boss wasn't very friendly either. We ordered one bowl of vermicelli salted vegetable tomato soup with fried fish and fresh fish. Fresh seafood but at first sip of this soup it tasted bland. When we dig a little deeper, we can taste the salty flavour of the soup. However, the vermicelli soak up all the broth! Overall the food is pricey but not that impressive.

Total bill - RM 19

Kedai Kopi Hong Hong

Iced water and chili

Vermicelli salted vegetable tomato soup with fried and fresh fish

Address:

Kedai Kopi Hong Hong

Jalan Perdana Jaya,

Taman Megah Jaya,

91000 Tawau,

Sabah, Malaysia

Next, we decided to try 2nd branch of Indo Cafe located at Unijaya. It's 10 minutes drive (5.3km) from Kedai Kopi Hong Hong. (Grab fare - RM 6). This time we ordered strawberry smoothies and pisang chocolate kacang (banana fritters drizzled with chocolate sauce and peanuts). Strawberry smoothies is nice but slightly sweet. Just like their mango sago, they use frozen sago which gives a nice texture in the mouth. This is the first time we had pisang chocolate kacang but I don't really enjoy it. The chocolate is a little too rich for my liking.

Indo Cafe II

Strawberry smoothies (small) - RM 5

Pisang chocolate kacang - RM 4

Address:

Indo Cafe II

Unijaya Commercial Center,

KM 5, Jalan Sungai Tanjong,

91000 Tawau,

Sabah, Malaysia

After tea break we decided to head back to our hotel to take a break. (Grab fare - RM 5 from Indo Cafe II to LA Hotel).  We decided to have seafood for dinner and Kam Ling Seafood Restaurant is located at Kubota Square, 9 minutes drive (4.9km) from LA Hotel. (Grab fare - RM 7). We ordered steamed grouper fish, butter tiger prawn, spring onion & ginger scallops and salt & pepper mantis prawn. My favourite dish of the night is the salt & pepper mantis prawn. Seafood is fresh and absolutely delicious. We love the steamed fish too. Perfectly steamed and the texture is tender. It's a simple dish but packed with flavours. Tiger prawn on the other hand is fresh and succulent but the sauce is a bit too sweet for my liking. Spring onion & ginger scallops was less impressive compared to the rest of the dishes.

Total bill - RM 199

Kam Ling Seafood

Live seafood

Fish

Restaurant ambience

Chili

Drinking water - RM 1

Salt and pepper live mantis prawn - RM 44

Creamy butter live tiger prawn - RM 30

Spring onion and ginger scallops (small) - RM 44

Steamed live grouper - RM 64

Address:

Kam Ling Seafood Restaurant

TB 316 Kubota Square,

Jalan Kubota,

91000 Tawau,

Sabah, Malaysia

Tel: +6019 - 883 2511 / +6017 - 898 2511

It's time for dessert hunting and we walked over to Kubota Sentral and saw Ice Idea Dessert Cafe. This cafe is just 3 minutes walking distance (900m) from Kam Ling Seafood Restaurant. My first choice was mango shaved ice but they ran out of mango. Ended up I ordered dragon fruit milk snow ice comes with dragon fruit and longan. It turned out to be good. Fluffy piles of smooth shaved ice with cubes of dragon fruit and longan. If it's not sweet enough to satisfy your cravings you can always add condensed milk. There's a bottle of condensed milk on every table. After dessert, we took a Grab car back to our hotel. (Grab fare - RM 5).

Ice Idea Dessert Cafe

Dragon fruit milk snow ice - RM 13.90

Address:

Ice Idea Dessert Cafe

TB 24, Lot E1, Ground Floor,

Kubota Sentral,

91000 Tawau,

Sabah, Malaysia