Chiow Lin Steamboat (桥林重庆火锅) has been operating in Abu Siti Lane years ago, serving authentic Chongqing style steamboat. They are renowned for serving ma la (麻辣) soup and an extensive range of exotic soups, which every selection of it seemed tempting. The other ingredients were to be ordered separately and the price was affordable.
The moment we walked into the restaurant, we saw a few China customers were dining there, probably an indication on the well acceptable and agreeing of the taste by China customers. On our night there, we had to privilege to dine in a private room without interruption, and of course without charges as well.
They are offering a dual pot system, meaning the option to go for 2 choices of soups for your dining. We picked the popular Herbal Tonic soup (RM 9.50) and Dry Pot Frog (RM 58.00) with mild level of spiciness. We really enjoyed both selections of the soups, and somehow we thought all the soups here will be marvelous.
The herbal tonic soup was brewed with an assortment of herbs, tomatoes and etc, rendering it a simple with clarity of nice flavors. Best enjoy it when the soup is thick before requesting for soup add-on because the soup will be diluted. Meanwhile, the dry pot frog came with an enormous quantity of chopped frogs more than enough to feed 5 guys' stomach. Although the name was dry pot, it somehow came with some spicy soup. Nevertheless, we could not care much as the soup was delectable and the burning sensation was a true enjoyment.
Some of the meat dishes we ordered for the night. From top to bottom: Mutton Slices (RM 7.00), Pork Slices (RM 10.00), Fish Slices (RM 8.00), and Pork Fillet (RM 5.00). We specially enjoy the mutton slices, best when dipped into the spicy ma la soup.
Some other dishes we ordered included Homemade Dumpling (RM 6.00) and Minced Chicken Meat (RM 5.00). It was average but the taste could potentially be upgraded after dipped into the spicy soup.
The specialty noodles - Chong Qing Noodles (RM 3.00), Just something starchy to add on for the evening.
Kindly note that all the sauces here had to be ordered separately but the prices were affordable. We thought Lao Gan Ma （风味老干妈）was something extraordinary then we gave it a try, and it turned out to be douchi (豆豉) - salted and fermented black soybean).
Overall, we enjoyed the food here. We thought the prizes were reasonable as 5 of us were billed RM 196 (including 6% GST and 5% service charge) for mountainous quantity of food, which means approximately RM 40 per person. If we substitute the premium dry pot frog with other cheaper soup, the entire bill would have been lower.
Chiow Lin Steamboat 桥林重庆火锅
30D, Abu Siti Lane, 14000, Penang
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