After a long day travelling around Sabah for work, nothing made us happier than when it was finally time to have a hearty dinner as a job well done for the day. Again, we trusted our local Sabahan colleagues as they drove us to a nearby restaurant - but when we arrived, we needed to (1) take a number from an employee sitting at the restaurant's entrance, and (2) join the mini crowd of other people waiting for a table at the restaurant.
A full house restaurant? On a Tuesday night? Where we needed to wait for a table of 8 people? How rare even in KL, and only when the food is really great and value for money! We ended up waiting 30min in the open air, in which we were grateful it rained earlier in the day because it was still humid and hot even then. What were the great dishes that everyone was willing to line up for?
One of the first dishes was curry crab - I don't even need to explain much, how attractive the visual of the dish looks like is exactly how good it was. The curry flavour was strong but complementing to the crab, and was well absorbed in the crab meat. Crab was meaty too, which made this a real treat to enjoy.
Hilltop Restaurant also offered a variety of fish dishes, and while I could not remember what my colleague ordered, this was yummy to eat as it did not taste too fishy and was complemented lightly by soy sauce. Meat felt fresh - which is exactly what you should be expecting from Sabah's finest restaurants.
Next, prawns with fried butter! It was nice to have something more crispy or crunchy given that the other dishes are a bit more wet. The fried better gave the prawns a light taste, and was well absorbed into the prawn meat. Portion was generally quite generous, and enough for the table.
Another delicacy unique in Sabah, we also had ordered a clam omelette. While the overall dish portion looks small, don't let it fool you - the clams were so meaty that even if I took a bite with more egg, I could only taste the overpowering flavor of the clams, which were fresh and not fishy even for someone like me who doesn't really enjoy clams. If you prefer a slight kick, you could try it with the chili sauce provided.
The next dish was something I did not quite dare eat, but thoroughly enjoyed by my colleagues, were the steamed snails. A very simple savory dish that's as simple as it looks, is really just steamed snail meat with something like a peanut sauce (?). If you're feeling adventurous while in Sabah, FYI Hilltop Restaurant offers them for you to try.
Lastly, a staple in almost every Chinese meal, tofu - never fails to complement the other more savory dishes with rice,
For drinks, I chose limau ais (again) - there's just something about ordering a sweet limau ais to clean your palate after a yummy savoury seafood meal in Sabah.
So if you're looking for a tried & tested, CONFIRM DELICIOUS seafood restaurant to try in Sabah, do drop by Hilltop Restaurant. Don't say I didn't warn you to arrive early, or you'll have to line up for 30min during peak dinner times.
Hilltop Restaurant
📍 Lorong Hilltop, Kolam Centre, Jalan Lintas, 88300 Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia.
⏱️11am - 11pm (Closed on Mondays)
📱+60 11-3143 7989
Got a food spot or travel gem worth shouting about? Share your discovery on Newswav and you could win prizes worth up to RM2,700!
Find out how to join here. Don’t miss out! T&Cs apply.
C Chai (crystal.chaijeecheng@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
The User Content (as defined on Newswav Terms of Use) above including the views expressed and media (pictures, videos, citations etc) were submitted & posted by the author. Newswav is solely an aggregation platform that hosts the User Content. If you have any questions about the content, copyright or other issues of the work, please contact creator@newswav.com.
