Mantis Shrimp Village Seafood Restaurant @ Bukit Tambun (Revisit)

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After getting a fair amount of bad comments on Mantis Prawn Village Seafood Restaurant in Bukit Tambun from the service to food to cleanliness, I decided to visit it again to find out if the comments were true.
One particular comment that made me LOL was that I was paid by Mantis Shrimp Village to write only good review for them, haha! I kept asking myself “Mantis Shrimp Village became so bad already? Why so different from the last time I went?”

carlsberg mantis prawn

First things first, I am not defending the restaurant but merely expressing my very own experience. Lets start with their signature dish – Carlsberg Mantis Shrimp. In my opinion this is a must try if you ever come to Mantis Prawn Village. If you are willing to pay, you can choose the biggest mantis shrimp they have to prepare this delicious dish.
Why? Because mantis shrimps already do not have a lot of meat.. and the meat will shrink a little after being deep fried. I always order this dish and it never disappoints with its sweetness and freshness.

makan said: I went there foo lunch also, so it’s open for lunch and dinner together. The calrsberg shrimp not bad, i like it…yummy…but too bad i don’t have photo.

Well, I have the photo now :)

baba steamed fish

For fish, do try their special Baba Steam style – a bit sourish and spicy. The gravy is nice to eat along with rice, very appetizing.

claypot taufu

Claypot Japanese Taufu. Nothing special about this dish.

abalone mushroom

Stir fry Abalone Mushroom with Broccoli. This dish rocks! Abolone mushrooms’ texture is really a bit similar to the real abalone.

salted egg flower crab

The Salted Egg Crab was a failure as we should have opted for meat crab instead of flower crab. It was our own mistake, flower crabs are only good for sweet and sour or curries.

dragon fruit drink

As usual, our drink would be a jug of dragon fruit juice. Based on this meal, I can say that most bad comments were unjustified. So unjustified I am starting to wonder if the comments were left by competing seafood restaurants nearby, lol.
And because I already knew about the bad experiences other people had before, I paid extra attention to certain details especially the service and cleanliness. Now, for the bad comments (my response in bold):

disappointed Man said: Firstly, the restaurant service. The person who served us is the captain of the restaurant. It was our first visit to this restaurnt. I would like the captain to introduce some famous dishes of the restaurant. She did but in a very rude manner. She was looking down on us. (Maybe because we are driving a non-branded car and only put on casual wear) She was not willing to introduce us about the dishes. She asked us just order whatever we want to eat. When we ask how is the taste of the dish, eg sweet, sour or spicy. Again, she answered us in a rude way. Some more, the way she serve us make us feel that she is forced to serve us. This makes us not comfortable to have food there.

We were also driving a non-branded car, also casual wear t-shirt and short pants some more lol. I didn’t notice anything rude about the captain.. she answered everything we asked just like a normal person would.

disappointed Man said: The most famous seafood of the restaurant – mantis, it is tasteless!! We ordered medium size mantis but we were eating small size mantis. For other seafood, they are acceptable (from the aspect of taste) but not fresh.

I believe the mantis shrimps are openly displayed in the aquarium tanks within the restaurant, and you can clearly see their sizes before ordering. Even the price for each mantis shrimp is very clearly stated. Having to know all these before you placed the order, I don’t understand the complaint.

disappointed Man said: Thirdly, about the price. Dear all going-to-visit consumers, this is a kindly remind to you. Please make sure you have credit cards. If you are paying cash, please make sure you bring more. Mantis Shrimp Village Seafood charging is extremely expensive!!!! If you try to compare their price with other seafood restaurants, you will find that this restaurant is charging at medium size price (in fact, they served us with small size dishes). Furthermore, if you compare taste + service Vs price to other restaurants, it is not worth to visit at all.

I don’t know about you, but Mantis Shrimp Village’s prices have been fair for me. If you looked back my previous post, my meal cost a little more than RM110 including beer! Try ordering the same food in other restaurants, I am sure it’d cost much much more.

pipi said: salted egg yolk crabs = for those fans of salted egg yolk crabs, you would be disappointed, that was too less salted egg yolk but too much sugar added.

Yes I do agree their salted egg yolk crabs is not a good choice already.

pipi said: calrlsberg prawns = tasteless, couldnt tell what was that tasted like.

They taste sweet and fresh :) Seriously, they are not tasteless!

Quan said: NO! NO! NO!
THis restau serves good Salted egg yolk crabs, but NO!! no!!! and NO!! THIS RESTAU IS SUPER DUPER DIRTY!!!! Full with FLIES!! and the waitress are SUPER RUDE!!! cannot tahan with them, must boycott!!!!

This comment is certainly a whole load of bull****. The restaurant is one of the cleanest you would find in Bukit Tambun. During my entire meal, I didn’t even notice a single fly!

After receiving so many bad comments I won’t recommend anyone to go to Mantis Shrimp Village anymore. Honestly, I don’t dare. But I would still continue to patronize them because my dining experiences with them so far have been positive!

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15 COMMENTS

  1. Good investigative work! I too am suspicious of over-the-top negative reviews of restaurants which do not match up to my own experiences – perhaps it’s a case of one man’s food is another man’s poison. But it’s scary to think that unscrupulous competitors’ mudslinging is taking place in our flogging backyard… whatever next?!

    550ml jar of faith’s last blog post..Siew Fong Lye and Little Vietnam, The Gardens and Mid Valley

    vk: Yeah, kinda surprised actually to find out so many bad comments.. I have friends working in Penang who went to the restaurant.. their feedback was good, just that they didn’t post any comments only.

  2. as u all aware of, food tasting is very subjective…. and experience ppl had might not be the same like ours,

    there is nothing to judge….

    about serving, it is depend on ur faith with the person.. it is just like u feel the girl is pretty and nice.. but some may feel she is rude and looks ugly…

    a lot of thing need to put into consideration sometime, don’t feel upset at all. there is nothing right or wrong at all… is depends on your own expectation

    even 3 of us also having different experience when go to the same restaurant…. some can huge and chit chat like old fren… but he or she might treat u differently… see how you approach them too…..

    don;t worry too much about that…..this is what we learn after the previous experience

    PenangTuaPui’s last blog post..Contest: PenangTuaPui 6th month Anniversary

  3. after reading this post, i was so anxiously wanted to go and have a try, and went to bkt tambun in the past months. we ordered all the same food as you do, and the outcome was fabulous and unexpected. My family was so happy + enjoying themselves, we even revisit again 2 wks later. Our favourties are the salted egg crab, baba steam fish and the carlsberg prawn mantis.
    But true enough, the time we went for the 2nd visit, there’s plenty of flies that are death on the tables..still we are not bother of that because as long as the food is delicious and worth the money that we paid for.

    Is a must to go and try this restaurant :)

  4. I went to Bukit Tambun for few times but I have no idea the name of the restaurant, I only know to eat and eat. Hahaha.

    From your introduction and recommendation, the dish seems so nice wor….. Maybe next time I will go there and try it out.

    Oh, btw, people will have their own perspective or point of view over something. As long as we like it will do, right? :)

    allenooi’s last blog post..Obake-Ya Restaurant

  5. Quan said: NO! NO! NO!
    THis restau serves good Salted egg yolk crabs, but NO!! no!!! and NO!! THIS RESTAU IS SUPER DUPER DIRTY!!!! Full with FLIES!! and the waitress are SUPER RUDE!!! cannot tahan with them, must boycott!!!!

    This comment is certainly a whole load of bull****. The restaurant is one of the cleanest you would find in Bukit Tambun. During my entire meal, I didn’t even notice a single fly!

    p/s : VK, To be honest, i personally loves the Salted Egg yolk crabs, but, Do trust me, Go in the afternoon… u’ll see flies… plenty of them… check their kitchen.. look at the Groundnuts on their Table before the waitress grab to serve u, FLIES are hopping on the GOUNDNUTS before u got served!! and when i mean FLIES means more than 20 flies.. no joking.. try there for lunch.

    vk: Hi Quan, fair enough :) I didn’t go there for lunch.. thinking back, I was never at Bukit Tambun for lunch before.

  6. I would like to comment the pictures quite nice looking. However, after read all the post, I will be more careful to choose which kind of restaurants to fill up my stomach. Cannot get cheated by the beautiful demostrated pictures. hehe…

    vk: Yes, you are right. Pictures may be deceiving, but if they look bad, then most probably they are not that nice either right lol.

  7. Well. Visited the mantis prawn last Sunday. 27 ppl when there, 3 table.

    Not much choice there. No scallop, lala, balitong..etc. Gred B mantis prawn cost RM12 each.

    Order (each table= x3): 2 noodle. 1 <500g grouper. fried chicken(mami), 7 mantis prawn (RM12), kangkong sambal, claypot tofu, sotong goreng, 3 crab. 6 Jar fruit drinks. No alcohol.

    Total cost: RM880++

    Worth it? You do the math.

  8. Vkeong, i on your side, i just visit few week back and dont have such bad experience as our fellow reader encounter. is a person with big camera will really get a better experience? i think it purely based on your luck!

  9. One thing i notice is most food blog has the best experience compare to readers. Could it be that we need to bring huge dslr to dinner to indirectly tell the restaurant we are food blogger too? That way we will get the same service

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