Xip Wah Lau, located at The School Jaya One in Petaling Jaya, has quietly garnered a sizeable following for its Chinese banquets. And it’s not just the local audience that they appeal to—Singaporean foodies have travelled to dine here and loved it enough to return.

Despite being a Chinese restaurant, Xip Wah Lau offers an interesting dining premise: “omakase” in the most classic sense of the Japanese term. Name your price and the chef will curate an 8-course menu that suits your price tag and your appetite. There’s no knowing what you will get until you’re sat at the dining table and dish after dish is presented, usually to diners’ gasps and wows.

The per-person spend begins from MYR350++ (with a minimum booking for two people) and can go up to MYR800++, if you so desire. A higher budget will, of course, allow the chef to be more generous with premium ingredients: abalone, goose, fish maw, crab, you name it.

Three separate visits to Xip Wah Lau, and we firmly believe that the restaurant distinguishes itself from any other Chinese restaurant in the Klang Valley. Their quintessentially Chinese dishes in line with what one might expect in an upscale restaurant in Hong Kong.

Fun fact: we’re told that the chef tries to limit his visits to Chinese restaurants to preserve his unique take on Chinese cuisine.

In case you missed it: The best Chinese restaurants in Klang Valley, according to Tatler Best 2025

Chef Andy Ong presents his roast goose

Juicy and crisp, it is a labour of love

At the helm is chef Andy Ong, who is impressively self taught. Described by his partner as one who would religiously pore over YouTube cooking videos. Whilst he used to operate a chain of restaurants, the exclusive dining of Xip Wah Lau really only began and took shape post-pandemic lockdown in 2021. Since then, word of mouth has gotten so strong that the restaurant tends to be fully booked weeks in advance.

If you have read up to this point, we know what some of you are thinking: isn’t this restaurant Lammeeya? Quite rightly observed. Indeed, the business changed its name to Xip Wah Lau on 1 September 2025.

After sitting down with Ong and his partner, Pamela, for a chat, we learned the meaning behind this inspired name. “Xip” is a part of the Cantonese word for “photography”, being “xip ying”, which was Ong's first passion in life. In fact, he still runs a photography studio alongside his culinary business. “Wah” is Ong’s Chinese name, which coincides with the term for “Chinese people”. Very apt as a descriptor of the cuisine here. And “Lau” is a part of the traditional Chinese term for “restaurant”.

As soon as we heard it, we loved it. Feedback from previous customers included the slightly confusing concept of Lammeeya being a Chinese banquet establishment, but the story began when Ong and Pamela acquired and ran the business selling "lam mee"—a local dish of noodles in a gloopy, savoury sauce. That story is now etched in the history of the introduction of Xip Wah Lau into Klang Valley's dining scene.

The Japanese beltfish, cooked in a savoury glaze

House made cheong fun with snow crab legs

The most tender abalones, prepared just right

Perfect pairings throughout the evening for any dish of your choosing

The MYR600++ menu had no shortage of spectacle, and there were those of us who were torn between wanting to dig in and snapping the 100th photo of the same dish: see the vicious jaw of the Japanese beltfish, its body smoked and served in pieces smothered in a sticky, sweet and savoury sauce.

For us, the most memorable dish of the night would have to be the house-made steamed rice noodles (cheong fun) sitting in a pool of superior stock and topped with snow crab legs. The plating was simple, yet stately. But even if we were to be blindfolded and therefore unshaken by the sight of the dish, catching a whiff of it as the lazy susan turned was enough to make us drool. Some of you might look at the photo below and comment that it resembles a dish in a famous Hong Kong restaurant. We loved the silky, chewy cheong fun in the glossy, viscous sauce. The succulent crab leg was the icing on the cake.

Then there was a dish of abalone imported from Japan. Tender, with our knives slicing through with only the slightest pressure. But again, the star of the show was chef Ong’s sauce, which he brought to the table for further reduction in a claypot over a stove. Chicken flesh, bones and its skin, pork belly, Chinese ham cured in-house, the essence of the abalone and fish maw have all gone into the making of this liquid gold. To watch chef Ong stir and swirl the sauce as it thickened, to ladle it all over the abalone, to actually taste a spoonful of it was heavenly.

Intricate pieces of decor tell the history of Chinese cuisine

We also found a very imaginative cold pork trotter and beansprout dish, generously laden with sand ginger, to be refreshing and most addictive. It stood out amongst a host of rich dishes on the night, and we wished that there was more of this salad. We also loved a simple dish of green peppers stuffed with fish paste, unmistakably spiked with aged tangerine peel, lending a deep citrusy perfume to each bite.

An entire roasted goose was brought to the table and carved before our very eyes, with juices and oils oozing out from every insertion. This alone would have been enough to fill us up, so thankfully takeaway was an option.

Wood carving in the interior of the restaurant gives a feeling of grandeur

Dried ingredients lining the walls, giving way to old Chinese apothecaries

Hopefully, you now have an idea of what to expect when you dine at Xip Wah Lau. As we have pointed out above, chef Ong brings true meaning to the word “omakase”, taking inspiration from seasonal produce and expresses his creativity through his dishes.

It's impossible to predict what will be on your menu, and whether you will have the same dining experience each time. But if there is one thing we can guarantee, it's that you will walk away fully satisfied every time you dine at Xip Wah Lau. To have a restaurant like Xip Wah Lau in Kuala Lumpur is very exciting indeed.

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The transformation of Lammeeya into Xip Wah Lau, the spot for Chinese omakase