Swatow Seafood

We came here for the dim sum. As we didn't book and arrived during their last orders, the service was very fast and efficient. Food wise, I think the dim sum is acceptable. The reason for the not high rating is because pricing of the dim sum is similar to other Chinese restaurants but the taste wise did not match.

Food is great and the price is good, but there is only a limited selection for the high-tea buffet. Dim sum is brought around by a trolley so be sure to grab the good one before it is taken. Later on when less people are eating, they will stop the trolley but you can still call the waitress to order what you want. There is also a buffet table with a different selection of food and deserts. The staff is friendly but are all elderly so might have a bit of difficulty hearing you. There is a 1.5h time limit. We arrived at 3pm and at 4.15pm, they were going around asking if there was any last order.

I had the pleasure of dining at Swatow Restaurant, and it was an unforgettable experience! The Teochew cuisine was exceptional, with each dish bursting with flavor. I had the braised duck, cod fish, porridge, spinach and homemade toufu. What truly made our evening special was the attentive service from Eileen, the manager. She ensured that every detail was taken care of, making us feel valued and well looked after. Thank you, Eileen, for your hospitality! Swatow Restaurant has earned a loyal customer in me. 5 stars isn't enough - I'd give it 10 if I could!

Hi tea dim sum. Food standard dropped. Variety limited. Still like promotion before COVID. Wide variety include drinks. Now no drinks included. Price paid about $74 for 2. There is no taste of freshness of ingredients. Not worth the value.

We have been here several times during our past days but this recent visit, we were totally disappointed in the food and service! We will not patronise again. 1) BAD ATTITUDE SERVICE Today Sunday 3/11/2024 morning around 9.30am++, the restaurant totally quiet and no queue, saw many empty tables around but we cannot seat inside and eat first, due to 2 reasons told by front counter lady. 1) my elder sister is on her way and she needs 15 min to reach. 2) there is a limited dine in time max. 1 hour and 15min, that's why the lady does not allow us to get seated first. Ridiculously! Surely we can order and eat first, right? The most we will leave once the said dine in period(1 hour and 15min) is up. The lady just ignored us and told us to wait at the seat near the counter. Both my 78 year old parents have no choice but to wait another 15min with an empty stomach. (TO MANAGEMENT: Please see and check your CCTV. There are more than half empty tables in the restaurant. My aged parents total 4 of us seated at the counter with no queue.) 2) FOOD STANDARD DROP DRASTICALLY No more olden taste used to be. Very sad. Taste more like factory mass production make dim sum. Perhaps no sales today, the dim sum especially fried food like popiah, egg tarts and carrot cakes... Really cannot make it. They are served cold, and making the oil tastes horrible. We call 1 round of dim sum, and left to another place to fill our stomach.

Overall decent food at ok price. However CNY menu is over priced. $68 yusheng only give you smoked salmon. Abalone extra charge. Half roasted suckling pig set us back $168! Braised duck did not disappoint. Radish hor fun was kind of bland. Sesame Pork chop was not bad but a bit costly. Orr nee was ok, healthier version.

Updated Jan 2025: Today we went again today because we had a good time the previous round as below but we were very disappointed with the service. Even the leader (in blue) are very blur. And only half of the place is full. On top of that - we ordered the abalone yusheng and it was like a salad style with green western lettuce. The standard of almost half of the food has dropped. We will never go again. ========= Those born in the late 70s and 80s would know this place so well. Very old school dim sum on a pushcart and the go to venue for Chinese weddjng banquet. This place haven’t change a bit and I heard the quality had dropped some years ago hence it wasn’t our choices and for this visit - we went in with no expectations. However the food quality really amazes me. We ordered many food items ($390) as we have a family of 9 and every single item was good. Love the old school push cart style, so we can see what we like - I believe that really drive sales instead of just pictures. The food were also hot meaning they were fresh and have not gone round for long time. Food was all gobbled up before I remembered that this place deserves my review. They have this claw machine to entice the children after bill payment too.

Unpretentious old school dim sum & teochew restaurant, unlike its more so-called more atas competition, with generous portions and genuine service. WYSIWYG. Not considered cheap but worth what you pay for.

Swatow Restaurant is quite a popular with the older generation and it is well known for its teochew cuisine. On friday night, the restaurant also offers teochew opera show, which is quite rare to see these days. The restaurant is located opposite the library, on top of the supermarket. Although the building is quite old, there is a small lift to the restaurant which can fit 2 persons in it. This is great as a lot of people coming to this restaurant are quite old. The restaurant is decorated in quite the old school and no frill way, with traditional opera clothes at the entrance. As the restaurant is quite popular, it is best to make reservation before coming. Today the family is coming here for the hi-tea buffet which costs $22.80++ for an adult and $16.80++ for a child. Although the family have made reservation for hi-tea buffet which usually occurs from 3pm to 5pm, we have a rude shock when the staff tells us the last order for the buffet is 3.30pm. It seems that there is an event tonight. The restaurant will be closing the buffet earlier in order to prepare for the event. I am annoyed that the staff should have called up to tell us about the problem so that we could come earlier. The buffet style here is quite different from outside. There is no buffet counter or menu for one to look at. One just picks whatever one likes from the various push carts going around the dining room. Within a short time, the table is easily filled up. Kueh Pie Tee, Shark's Fin Soup and Duck meat roll are part of the buffet, but is limited to one serving per customer. The kueh pie tee is not filled with the traditional vegetable filling. Instead it is filled with calamari salad. Interesting. For the steamed dim sum, there is items such as xiao long bao, siew mai, bean curd roll, steamed pork ribs, crystal bun, chive dumplings, vegetable dumpling, seafood dumplings, chee cheong fan with assorted fillings and chicken feet. The crystal bun has savoury rice filling in it. Tastes not bad. For buns, there is cha siew bun (BBQ pork bun), pan fried pork bun, black sesame bun and everyone's favourite Liu Sha Bao (流沙包). The Liu Sha Bao (流沙包) is uniquely green in color, and the filling really flowing out easily. The black sesame filling in the black sesame bun is a bit too sweet for me. For deep fried items, there is shrimp roll, shrimp dumplings, seafood balls, goyza, and fried durian shrimp roll. The fried durian shrimp roll is covered with deep fried noodle like crust, inside filled with rich and chunky filling. Although one cannot smell the durian in it, the taste is pretty strong in it and surprisely well with the juicy shrimp. Besides these, there is also fried ee fu mee, century egg porridge, lotus leaf rice, chilled pork in jelly, chilled cheek in jelly, baked pork pastry, deep fried fish skin with salted egg and black sesame paste. The deep fried fish skin with salted egg sauce is quite nice with the mayonnaise, although I wish that the salted egg sauce could be thicker. The black sesame paste is quite rich and flavourful. Too bad that is the only hot dessert available that day. For cold desserts, there is ice jelly, almond jelly, herbal jelly and mango jelly. The herbal jelly tastes quite bitter. The ice jelly is quite refreshing with a hint of tea taste. Overall the food is not bad with quite a huge range although mother feels the various is less than the usual dim sum menu. Although there is a lot of staff running around, it is quite difficult to get their attention. Besides the hot tea served on the table, one can also help oneself to the ice lemon tea and ice cubes at the counter. Yes most of the times we seem to be helping ourselves to the various things around. Even when the staff has a push cart full of desserts in front of us and we request that we would like some, the old staff answers that it is not for us, but the tables behind us. Funny especially everyone is having the buffet too. The staffs here seem to be choosy in serving customers. Although at the end of the meal, one feels like having gone through a very fierce battle. Feeling super drain out.

There are few things more amorous than the runny yoke of a just-poached egg cut open. The Liu Sha Bow at Swatow seafood comes a close second with its gooey filling just ready to spill out in all its sweet and savory goodness. You NEED to order it if you're here. Swatow Seafood is an unassuming dim sum place away from downtown which means reasonable prices, little to no wait (we had no wait at all on a Saturday afternoon), and the charm of the old school push-cart dim sum experience. This culminates into a very satisfying brunch experience with minimal stress so you can focus on enjoying the food. I thought everything we had was good from the standard siu mais and har gows to the century egg porridge and fried shrimp rolls. And of course end the meal with afore-mentioned Liu Sha Bow. The sweet custard is nicly balanced with the saltiness of the salted egg yolk. Such a treat! They have a buffet for high tea which looked like a great deal but our meal wasn't that much either which makes Sawtow Seafood a good value, and a tasty one at that,

Had lunch at Swatow Seafood Restaurant in the heartland of Toa Payoh and i was pleasantly surprised. The old skool ambience of the place was really charming, with old skool ornate decorations at the reception. We ordered the prawn roe fried rice and it was really quite good. The different textures of prawn roe, crab meat and the vegetables created quite a stir in my mouth. We orderd the sharks head on the menu as it is quite an uncommon dish. It tasted really good but i felt really guilty for indulging in that dish with all the anti sharks fin campaign going around. The dim sum were good and overall it left me very satisfied. The prices are very reasonable and its alot cheaper than restaurants in town. I will definitely be back to sample the traditional Teochew dishes which I did not manage to taste this round.

Old school would be the right words for it. And this is the kinda thing I like. I went on a weekday but I was made to understand that over the weekend, the place gets packed and there are still push carts for dim sum service. We ordered a fair bit and finished all that was placed before us :) Siew Mai is my usual "standard setter" for a dim Sum place and they did their quite well. And most of their item came in 3s so it it was just nice for the company that I was with. Both their fried and steams items were good. We finished off with a big bowl of steamed mushed up yam (o ni or however you spell it) and it was great! All round good experience.

Don't be fool by the name ("seafood"). Swatow Seafood serves fantastic dim sum breakfast and brunches! Located in the heartlands of Singapore, this restaurant has been around for quite some time now. While the restaurant has not been advertising aggressively nor received the hype over some other star restaurant, it has been well patronised by those in-the-know. On weekends, this place is flooded with people, especially in the morning right up to noon. If you are coming as part of a large group, it is advisable to call ahead and make a reservation. While there has been a shift towards "high end" dim sum, i.e. ordering your dishes off a menu, Swatow Seafood still does it the "old fashion" way, i.e. service via a push cart. This is a nostalgic experience not to be missed (given that there isn't many such restaurants left). In addition to the old school experience, the dim sum served here is of a high standard comparable with many fine restaurants.

Our first dinner here and ordered a few dishes. Essentially the food here is not bad (like the Braised Goose) but the price tag of the dishes is a tad too high for me to return. I can easily find similar tasty food in other restaurants that won't cost me an arm and leg. But having said that, this Swatow Restaurant has been around since way back so I guess they have their own following. Just not me in that queue then. Heh...

My family went for the Swatow (which means Mountain Top in Teochew) Seafood Restaurant for the dim sum buffet. This place used to be Fortunate Restaurant and Lucky Restaurant before that.. so you can say it was a location where weddings and CNY reunion meals were held at when I was young. The only thing that remained the same were the toilet areas and those big curtains where they hide away the spare chairs and tables from public view. I remember playing hide and seek with my cousins there when I was young.. so it was really nostalgic. Anyway back to reviewing the food.. the way the dimsum buffet works is the trolley with piles of food and dimsum will be rolled away. Sounds reasonable but the problem lies with that. As this place is huge.. I personally feel that they are short handed.. so to the two dim sum trolleys that were going around.. it's like there's 30-40 tables waiting.. so sometimes when the trolley comes by.. it's nearly empty.. and the servers sometimes miss our table as we were seated in the middle. We noticed the chances of you getting your plate filled were higher if you were seated at the outside. Food came out one by one.. so we ended up spending a lot of time waiting for the trolleys to come by. Even the drinks were not properly organised.. if we didn't ask we wouldn't have known that we had to go to an area and get the drinks as the dim sum and the fried food were served by trolleys. Servings were depressing.. it's a buffet but the servers usually give us the exact headcount and said that she will come back again later if we should want a second helping since this is a buffet... but often the food runs out and we don't quite see the same food again. Food wise was so-so... I guess I only like the liu sha bao (salted egg yolk custard bun). That's about it.

This is a JIU LOU. Not ninth floor. It means a proper Chinese restaurant where big dinners and feasts can be held, especially for weddings. It was also the place of my childhood. Or more accurately, the restaurant that used to be there, formed parts of my childhood. The previous tenant was Xin Fu Lou, which formed memories of piping-hot dim sum pushed around in trolleys. Swatow also has dim sum, but only in the day time and we were there for dinner. The place was all white covers and folded napkins; sitting there I had an urge to give a $120 ang bao to a man and his wife. The Braised Slice Goose Meat in Teochew Style (~$17) was very savoury, especially the sauce. However the goose portion was too small, beneath the top few slices it was all tofu. The scallops and broccoli ($20) was fresh, but the portion was even smaller. Being hungry gluttons we ordered the oyster omelette ($8) from their Teochew Porridge just in case. Their signature Deep Fried Crispy Pig Trotter (~$25) is a must-try. The skin looked dark and the meat looked dark but it was GOOD. The skin was crispy and crunchy and yet easy on the bite. You know some crispy pork skin fried too hard until it tastes bitter and has so hard a centre it feels like biting on rocks? Not this. The meat was tender and flavourful. If you can only afford one dish, THIS IS IT. (Yes their dishes are pretty expensive IMO.) The oysters in the oyster omelette were huge and easy for me to pick out (I don't eat oysters) to give to my family members. The rest of it wasn't as starchy and gooey as I'd liked. A set of tea came with our dessert to clear our throats. I voiced out loud thinking it was syrup meant to be poured over the yam paste, asking why it wasn't poured. The affable head waiter corrected me, so yes, please don't embarrass yourself like me. I must also mention that Swatow refers to the Teochew province of China, and my heritage-proud father has claimed the food at Swatow to be quite authentically Teochew. Overall I feel the food is standard fare, and is overpriced; Swatow is evidently no Xin Fu Lou. I've heard good reviews about their dim sum buffets though.

Went there with co-workers for Chinese New Year celebration. The service was okay, typical Chinese restaurant standard. The food wise, I love their steam crab very much. It's fresh. The fried oyster with egg is one of their signature, I like it. Will go there again with my family.

What a disappointment! As a teochew nia, I expected a lot more of the teochew dishes in a restaurant like this. The chaipo kuayteow didn't have the wok hei I loved, and hardly had any chaipo! Sigh...

It's far and few left with such tradition that serve early morning Dim Sum with nice variety of choices. As written by others, they have good Dim Sum that we wonder how they have kept this tradition for such a long time. I have been there since my early years. It beats any of the modern names we used to know. The prices have kept to a reasonable level. Located at Toa payoh, it's easy access to everyone tuck away in a non conspicuous location. No frills though... We only head there for the food rather than the environment.

The dim sum buffet is value for money. I wish they could change it to an ala carte system though

We ate there 2 years ago and we were very pleased with the service, price and food. However, we went today and was extremely disappointed. The price for buffet lunch was about $27 including tax. We have 2 hours tome span to eat starting from 3pm to 5pm, however, the food was not out for us until close to 4pm. We will told to pay even before we had food on the table. The varieties were limited, in fact, we were repeatedly asked if we have to eat the same dim sum. I have seated below and air conditioner and it was dripping water on my head. When I told them about it, server just said move your chair slightly to the right. The red been soup was so sweet, is like eating sugar. A lot of their dim sum were not made by kitchen, tasted like either frozen or mass production ordered from suppliers. There were chairs & tables stacked up at the narrow hallway going to toilet. This could be a fire hazard if it by the fire exit door. The elevator was not working at first and had to ask the staff to turn it back on so that my 97 years old dad can get up to restaurant. One waitress just took a plate of dim sum from our table without asking ask just to show the next table that the dish looked like. We were discussing what is their marketing strategy to attract customers. I think they started the dim sum late so we we only have an hour to eat and therefore, won't be able to consume more. And we were provided with limited varieties of dim sum to pick, therefore, we will get sick of the same dim sum with will not consume more. All in all, their strategy is to make more money and providing less, perhaps they are struggling to survive, who knows?!?!? We will not go back there again and will not recommend others to do so. We will also inform friends and relatives who thought they were good like we did, that the standards and quality has dropped. We went there with high expectations and what we got was sub standards in terms of quality, service, quantity and we certainly did not get we deserve with such high price range. I hope the management is made aware of this so that they can work on getting the restaurant back to where it was.