Su Sum is perhaps one of the most famous Chinese vegetarian restaurant that's located in Ipoh Garden, Ipoh. I first tried this restaurant sometime in the year 2000 and the food was decent. I would not say that it was all that great but modestly nice. After that trip, there had been a few more times that we happened to have our lunch here. Since we were in the vicinity this afternoon, we decided to drop by again. One major problem here is the parking and do ensure that you get those parking coupons from any of the grocery stores along this stretch as the city hall guys seem to be very actively issuing summons these days. Fortunately, we managed to get a bay not too far from the restaurant and did not have to go in circles looking for a spot to park.
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| Su Sum in Ipoh Garden |
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| Air Conditioned Restaurant |
It is not a very large restaurant. Just a simple one with minimal tables but I believe that that is generally sufficient for their crowd. The entire restaurant is air conditioned though.
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| Mixed Rice Concept |
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| More Dishes To Choose From |
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| Coca Cola |
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| Chinese Tea |
For lunch, they do have the Mixed Rice concept where one could choose the dishes that they would like to have. If you would like to go for other dishes, then they also offer a full menu option. Since it was just a quick lunch for us, we decided to stick with the previous. The choices seemed good although some of it seemed to have been sold out. I don't think that they cook in large volumes. We were here at around 1.30 pm and even at that time, it seemed that the stock level was minimal and there were no attempts at topping them up. At this hour, most of their customers seemed to be doing takeaways only with only a handful of dine-ins. I am not sure about the individual pricing of the dishes but would mention the total bill later on. Having selected our dishes, we returned to our table and ordered our drinks. This was sent away immediately. We had two glasses of Chinese Tea and two cans of Coca Cola.
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| My Lunch |
I was the only one who selected four different vegetables. The rest had only selected two or three veggies each. Now, time to taste the food and post my review here.
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| Sweet & Sour Mock Meat with Pineapples |
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| Sweet & Sour Mock Meat with Pineapples |
This was prepared with a large volume of fresh cuts of pineapples. The mock meat was not too impressive. This seems to be one that was made using more flour instead of mushrooms. The flavours too were not that great. Cooking wise, they had done just an average job and I would rate this at 7/10 .
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| Long Beans With Tofu |
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| Long Beans With Tofu |
Small cuts of Long Beans were cooked with Tofu, slices of Mushroom and Fungus in a thick spicy broth. Compared to the earlier one, this was way better. At least, this had a bold taste to it and not quite bland like the previous one. I would rate this at 8.5/10 .
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| Veggie with Sliced Ginger in Soy Sauce |
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| Veggie with Sliced Ginger in Soy Sauce |
In contrast to the earlier two, this dish really stood out. The veggie was very fresh and that's clearly visible from the colour in the above photograph. It was cooked with thinly sliced ginger and some Soy Sauce. Excellent it was. I would rate this at 9.5/10 .
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| Okra in Vegetarian Belacan |
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| Okra in Vegetarian Belacan |
The Okra used were not quite fresh and they were old. Would have been better if they had used younger ones. The preparation however was fantastic. If only younger Okra's had been used, this would have been an awesome dish. The flavours were just fantastic. Spicy and mildly salty. I would rate this at 9/10 .
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| Mock Char Siew |
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| Mock Char Siew |
Honestly, this was nothing great. The mock meat and the preparation itself was very average. I have tasted way better ones elsewhere. I would only rate this at 4/10 .
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| Fried Soy Cuts |
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| Fried Soy Cuts |
This was something that I took in a separate plate for all to share. The preparation was not so good and it was so stiff and hard to the extent that chewing it was a challenge. Even the flavours seemed like so lacking and at some point, it was like chewing rubber. Regretted taking this and I would only rate this at 3/10 .
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| Fried Vegetarian Wan Tons |
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| Fried Vegetarian Wan Tons |
This is another dish that we took to be shared among us. The Fried Wan Ton's were quite hard. The skin was too thick and that had caused quite a bit of hurt while chewing. The filling was nothing much too and it definitely had a lot of MSG. Nah, didn't quite like it. I would rate this at 4/10 .
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| The Restaurant Visible At The Background |
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| Lunch Time |
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| My Dad and Brother |
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| With My Aunt |
In short, I feel that the quality has definitely dropped at this restaurant. The price also is no longer cheap. Ipoh used to be known as a place for cheap and good food (food haven) and I fear that that landscape has changed. For the four of us, the total bill was RM 33.40 . That's expensive! That on average works out to around RM 8+ per person. I could have had way better food for the same price in Kuala Lumpur. Would I return.....maybe....just maybe....
Address: No. 59, Jalan Dato Lau Pak Khuan, Ipoh Garden, 31400 Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia.
Opening Hours: 1030 - 1500 & 1730 - 2100 Daily
Telephone: +605 548 2015
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