You know a marketing campaign is successful when people still remember the slogan after a long time. When you mention Chin Huat Live Seafood, chances are, people will think of the slogan “lobster bigger than little girl” used in their television advertisement years ago.
Chin Huat Live Seafood at Sunset Way, is of course, more than just lobsters. Besides the typical Sri Lanka crabs, they offer a huge variety of seafood and popular zichar dishes.
The restaurant was pretty full when we went on a weekday for dinner. As it was just a casual family dinner, we decided to play safe and order the usual stuff like chilli crabs, deep-fried chicken, and sambal kangkong.
Everyone knows that Chilli Crab is one of the must-eats in Singapore. But to be honest, I have a love-hate relationship with it.
On one hand, I really love dipping the deep-fried mantou into the savoury-sweet chilli gravy. On the other, the amount of work – from cracking a shell that’s as hard as a bulletproof tank; to trying to coax the meat out from the deep end of the shell – doesn’t justify all the work for so little flesh.
More than anything, I am a lazy person who doesn’t like to dirty his hands just for crabs. But fine, I did it anyway. Who can resist the temptation of Chilli crab with deep-fried mantou?
As much as I’d love to try Chin Huat’s signature Golden Sauce Crab, we only had room for another crab and we went for the Salted Egg Yolk Crab ($43 per kg). It was okay. I felt that the salted egg yolk crab would be better if there was more gravy.
I was trying very hard to concentrate when the Dong Po Rou ($16) arrived. They were magnificent – just look at the picture above!
The others commented that the sauce was a little too sweet, but I thought that it was just nice. Then again, I have a really sweet tooth, so don’t take my word for it.
The Deep-fried Crispy Chicken ($12 for half) was equally good-looking. It’s really difficult to breathe when you have Chilli Crab, Salted Egg Yolk Crab, Dong Po Meat, and Crispy Chicken on the table. I felt as though I was in a room surrounded by gorgeous babes.
Chin Huat Live Seafood at Sunset Way serves competent food at reasonable prices. Besides the usual zi char, they also have other unique dishes like Wagyu Beef on the menu. It is a great place to have live seafood if you are staying in the west of Singapore.
Singapore Food Blog Review
Chin Huat Live Seafood
105 Clementi Street 12
#01-30 Sunset Way Singapore
Tel: +65 6775 7348
For more recommendations, read my Guide to Sunset Way Restaurants