JB Botak Asam Pedas Curry Fish @ Jalan Lumba Kuda (Near Hotel Suria & Hotel Grand Blue Wave)

This asam pedas fish head is the signature dish at Kedai Makan Jadi Baru Botak at Jalan Lumba Kuda which is about 10 minutes walk from JB Sentral (central bus station) which is at the ground level of the CIQ building in JB.

If you walk from the CIQ, take the escalator down to the ground level (if you are unsure, ask the friendly police officers for directions). When you are at the ground level, walk in the direction of Singapore. You will see the flyover and an elevated walkway above your head. Walk about 5 minutes, look to your left and you will see a cluster of old shop houses. The coffee shop you are looking for is over there.

This famous dish in the popular coffee shop is served piping hot in a clay pot. The dish is made from fresh Ikan Merah (Red Snapper) cooked with lady’s fingers, tomatoes and onions in asam (tamarind) pedas curry.

The tamarind gives the curry a spicy hot plus sweet and sour flavour. The sourness of this dish is the gentle, subtle kind that is pleasant to the taste buds, not the sharp, biting kind that makes people (like me) cringe.

Besides sourness, the curry also tastes mildly savoury salty but I did not feel thirsty after drinking the curry. The curry is so good that I actually drank it. The saltiness seems to come from kiam chye though I did not find any shred of the preserved cabbage in the curry.

I saw that most tables ordered the asam fish head and there were also some take away customers. A Malay family at the next table actually ordered two asam curry fish heads - one for dining in and another to take away.