Sambal Shiok
Malaysian
171 Holloway Road, Highbury, N7 8LX
££
Sambal Shiok is run by Mandy Lin who grew up in Malaysia's vibrant and exciting capital, Kuala Lumpur. Lin takes her inspiration from her childhood there, and explores nostalgic flavours whilst putting a new modern spin on them. Sambal Shiok originally started as a street-food vendor, before opening as a pop-up and finally establishing itself at the Laksa bar we see today.
It is no surprise that her dishes go down a hit in the capital, especially in an area like Highbury. Permanently busy, Sambal Shiok doesn't take reservations for groups of any less than 4 people, and no more than 12. We went on the evening Arsenal were playing Tottenham, which meant that the whole of Highbury was awash with rowdy football fans and crowded pubs and restaurants. Luckily, we were able to sit on the end of a table of 6 blokes. Unfortunately, however, this also meant that someone sitting at the bar had no choice but to slightly overhang their bottom over our table - basically, it's quite a squash.
There is a choice of Standard Laksa, which consists of fat rice noodles, fried tofu puffs, bean sprouts and green beans. You can then add prawn, chicken, both, or the veggie option of aubergeine and sautéed potatoes. The broth for the Laksa has a strong shrimp base (apart from vegan option of course), and is based on a 'campur' style laksa found in Malacca, which is a cross betwen Kuala Lumpur's curry laksa and Penang's Assam Laksa. I was lucky enough to try both of these dishes in their original spots whilst travelling Malaysia at the beginning of this year, and I can honestly say that Sambal Shiok does it just as good (if not better).
I opted for the Prawn Laksa (£12.3), as did Tom, and we also got some of their Malaysian Fried Chicken to start (£8.5). The Laksa itself was delicious, with huge juicy prawns and flavoursome tofu floating in amongst the broth and noodles. The flavours which jumped out were intense, as was the spice: beware, as they ask you if you'd like it medium or spicy - we picked medium and this was absolutely enough for me (still tasty, but I did need a few napkins to blow my nose along the way). I was admittedly less impressed with the fried chicken, which wasn't as crispy as I'd have liked, and only had a very thin layer of batter and seasoning. Having said that, the chicken was gloriously juicy beneath, and this would have probably suffered if it was cooked for any longer.
Overall, Sambal Shiok is a different and interesting place to broaden your taste bud's horizons. Set in a very casual, diner-style restaurant: don't be expecting frills (or to be able to even get a table at peak times), but do expect some decently priced, honest Malaysian grub, which is just as good as the real thing.
OVERALL RATING: ****
https://www.sambalshiok.co.uk/
