Olivenz Steamboat, Bandar Puteri Puchong, Petaling Jaya, Malaysia

I do not normally go for steamboat in this weather. It is just too hot to sit in front of a boiling pot of soup. Anyway, it was a raining Thursday evening and what the hell...it's been so long since I've had steamboat. Drove past this one called Olivenz in Bandar Puteri Puchong. Looked clean and it had customers which is always a good sign. The other next door did not have much people so we decided that we should not go in as less customers less fresh their seafood will be. (My theory)


The price per head here is pretty reasonable RM 22.80 per person - All you can eat. They had a few soup choices namely Chicken Soup, Herbal Chicken Soup, Tom Yam, Porridge and I think it was some Sze Chuan Ma Lat soup.
I always try the most basic soup which is the chicken soup. My opinion is that if they cannot get the basics right then they're screwed. The boss ordered the tom yam. She just likes it hot and spicy.
Once we ordered the soup, off we went to inspect the food counters. Yup, there was ice cream, seafood, vegetables, chicken, pork (No Beef?), mushrooms, noodles, egg, drinks and some cooked stuff. The cooked stuff sure did not look too appetizing. Fried noodles that looked like the noodles suffered a lot while it was cooked and dark looking chicken wings.
Did not bother with the noodles. Tried the chicken wings which was crap. It was marinated with dark soya sauce, a little soy sauce and honey. Not salty, not sweet. Don't know what the hell it was.
As for the steam boat, I got an assortment of seafood - little clams (la-la), big clams, prawns & squid. Did not want to take the fish as I had no idea what fish it was and it looked like crap.
They had some chicken meat too and they sure looked small. Cut in such small pieces, they're probably go missing in the pot later. Pork wise, they only had pig stomach. What happened to some fatty pork slices? None to be seen and none coming.
Soup wise - The soup tasted pretty normal. Sweet chicken flavor and heaps of MSG. I knew I was in trouble. (Will be downing the drinks later like when the Japs used to torture people during the war.) 
One thing to note is that I realize that most Malaysians claim that the soup is not that important as the more they add the seafood, meat and vegetables, the better the soup will taste later. Hogwash! You're just boiling the soup for maybe another hour and what can you get out of it. A little taste maybe but getting better soup? Bullshit!


Another thing that I noticed it that people are just so lazy. They will pile up their plates with everything, then just pour it all into their soup along with the liquid that's accumulated on the plate. (Seafood "water" has got this really fishy smell and taste. Please don't kill the soup.)

The only thing that was really fresh was the prawn and maybe the vegetables.

I just do not like the mass manufactured fish balls and whatever other balls restaurants serve today.

These clams were pretty huge and not bad. Good thing there wasn't any sand in it. Proves that they actually washed them.

Now tell me does that look like noodles that were treated with care?

Seafood counter that does not look right? Empty tray?? Crab that looked crap too.

They had a grill section. Lamb was not bad, just a little too salty and really small sweet potato.

They have a cool name - Olivenz. Whatever that means. Maybe the Chinese dude boss's name? All in all the place is just like any other steamboat restaurants you get in Kuala Lumpur. Nothing stands out. Soup very normal plus too much MSG. (Tom Yam was not too bad but you know that it was just some Tom Yam paste mixed with water.) Chilli was very very normal. It is reasonable though and I seriously wonder how long they will last. I do not think I will go back after having to down glasses of water due to the over consumption of MSG!


Points - 0.5 because they are quite cheap.