Rainbow Seafood Restaurant

I used to come here all throughout my childhood, but somehow in the recent years, this place has just gone downhill. We waited over an hour for our dishes to come out, service was horrendous. We got yelled at multiple times throughout our lunch, for asking why our food was taking over an hour to arrive, while other tables were served much faster. They also wouldn’t let us cancel the dishes that took the longest, and when it finally arrived, they were just short of tossing it on our table. Now, I’m from HK so I understand that service isn’t usually the greatest, but this was just beyond what I’ve experienced.
Food was good, but from my previous experiences here, it has been better. The one upside to this is that if you eat here, you get a sticker allowing you take a complimentary ride back to HK island or Kowloon on their ferry.

Certainly a fun place that is just as much about the experience as it is about the food. Open air fish market type of feel. Monsterous portions and a good variety of things on the menu. Salt and pepper calamari was a crowd pleaser. Mantis shrimp was probably the most unique thing on the menu. Good ambiance. Great service. It is perhaps a tad gimmicky, but worth the adventure out here to Lamma Island. Free ferry back to the main island.

Fresh and delicious seafood, with friendly waitstaff and the fifth star is for the awesome free ferry ride back to Hong Kong!
We tried the bamboo clams with black bean sauce and chili, prawns with garlic, fried squid and fried rice. The rice was decent though the seafood is obviously the star here. Fresh and really good.
What impressed me was also that the server didn’t try to upsell us, and she voluntarily told us the seasonal prices for the bamboo clams upfront. (We didn’t have fish but I’ve been warned that fish is particularly expensive).
HK$ 8 per person for sauces (you can decline if you don’t partake), and HK$ 8 per person for tea. All reasonable and clearly stated on signs at your table.
After the meal, our server told us about the free ferry back which we didn’t know about. Free! And it was waaaaaaaay nicer than the regular ferry! I mean WAAAAAAY nicer and not crowded! That made my day :)

So, we took the ferry from Central to Lamma Island to eat at one of the many seafood restaurants.
The food is very good and the staff is very friendly especially if you speak the language. We ordered the pissing shrimp, the mussels and the grouper (fried and fileted WARNING: super expensive for the grouper)
I will urge caution with regards to what you end up ordering, it is very easy to get carried away and end up spending a fortune so just be practical especially if you are a tourist.

we definitely got owned in terms of the pricing. paid a ton of money for 6 shrimps that were small as heck and halved, steamed in garlic. then we had a plate of mantis shrimps. their ordering methods are not clear and although its one of the more well known restaurants i definitely did not get the value out of it. the only thing good was we were in a rush to catch the ferry not knowing that the ferry is included in their pricing since they have their own that shuttles to Central and makes another stop at TST. they then also get you to pay even more by charging you for the sauces on the table and possibly the tea. i was pretty upset at this meal!

Wow! Super fresh seafood at it’s best. Take their complimentary ferry from Central or the ferry from Aberdeen and have extraordinary seafood prepared perfectly and then go for a hike around the small island.
Incredible were the little clams with black bean sauce, steamed prawns with garlic, steamed grouper with soy and scallions and mantis shrimp with salt and pepper. Very friendly, clean restaurant area and bathrooms. Some of the best, freshest seafood i’ve ever had.

This was my second time at Rainbow Seafood and it continues to be the place everyone recommends when going to eat at Lamma Island.
Food:
Everything was very flavorful and seasoned well.
–Sweet and sour pork: well-​fried before adding the sauce so we could really taste the crispy undertones
–Tea flavored chickened: had a good, unique flavor and was very moist
–Salt and pepper calamari: really, really good
–Deep fried tofu: pieces were larger than expected. Just wish this one had a bit more flavor
–Steamed fish: fish actually was very smooth and was a bit meaty, in a good way
–Black bean sauce razor clams: excellent
–Black bean sauce clams: excellent
–Garlic over steamed shrimp: excellent
With rice to complement the food, this was the perfect amount for the 8 of us.
We were one happy bunch when we were done. My tummy was happily filled with very yummy seafood. They provided complimentary pineapple and cantaloupe as well.
Service:
They were there when we needed them to place our order, give us info about ferry service, help us take a picture, handle the bill. They were also careful to scoot some of our items around prior to serving food so that there would be space for us to sit and for them to serve. They were also attentive to moving our items from large plates to smaller plates to make room for us for our other dishes.
The bonus of this place is that they have complimentary ferry tickets they give you for their own ferry that can take you back to Central or Tsim Sha Tsui.
There is a phone number (2982 8100) on the side of the boat, so I believe you can call it to get a complimentary ride to the restaurant if you wanted to go there for lunch or dinner. I’m just not sure where the pick-​up point was.
Overall:
Highly recommended and I’d return the next time I’m at Lamma Island.

Rainbow restaurant is one of the more well known restaurants on Lamma Island. I’ve been here 2 or 3 times and now they’ve always delivered on quality and service.
This time around, we had razor clams with black bean sauce, salt and pepper squid, steamed grouper fish, clams with black bean sauce, steamed shrimp with garlic, sweet and sour pork, tea leaf chicken, and salt and pepper tofu. All of the seafood was very fresh, tasty, and not over cooked. I’m actually not a big fan of seafood so the non seafood dishes were definitely the highlight of the meal for me. The sweet and sour pork was crunchy and it wasn’t over saucy. The tea leaf chicken was unique dish that I had never had before. You could actually taste the tea leaves! The chicken was also moist and the skin was crunch. The salt and pepper tofu had a very silky smooth texture inside and just crunchy enough on the outside.
Aside from the great food, Rainbow also offers their diners a free ferry back to Central and Tsim Sha Tsui! You just have to ask the servers to give you tickets.

Rainbow Seafood is the big daddy of seafood restaurants on Lamma Island, or at least certainly on the Sok Kwu Wan side of the island. It commands two large seafront sites, one right by the pier, and one a bit further into the «high street». Rainbow also runs its own shuttle ferry service, which is a stroke of marketing genius, as the «official» ferry company only runs a ferry every 2 hours, if it feels like it.
Once you get to Lamma, either by the slow running public ferry, or the Rainbow shuttle, you will have the chance to sample some local seafood. Regarding the food, is it the best in HK? Does its quality do as much for Rainbow’s reputation as perhaps the convenience of the shuttle ferry? Probably not. To be brutally honest, I think the seafood at Mui Wo, Po Toi, or Po Toi O is better. Don’t get me wrong, the food here is perfectly good, highlights including; deep fried salt and pepper squid, garlic fried broccoli. Unfortunately, the other dishes didn’t quite come up to scratch; steamed grouper was a bit small for the cost, sweet and sour fish didn’t have particularly well cooked batter, fried rice was a bit dry, scallops in garlic over cooked.
If you have an overseas visitor, it is hugely convenient to take them on an «island experience» here. You get the shuttle ferry from pier 9, the small ferry has an open top that feels totally Miami Vice, and the large shuttle has rainbow coloured strip lights that light it up like an Ibiza party cruise, the food at the other end is authentically local, and well enough cooked so that those who don’t know better will think it’s the best. For us locals, we could do better.
The restaurant is very busy (this is the main site), so it will also give visitors that genuine HK feel. You will be hemmed in from nearly al sides, so be careful getting up to quickly, lest you take out the table behind you. Interestingly, the other restaurants on the strip are all empty. Perhaps they should run a shuttle. The table settings do have table cloths (so not totally local), but do give the cutlery and crockery a rinse.
The staff are friendly and as attentive as they can be, given the business of the place. They can get a bit snippy if you «pester» them, but I don’t think asking for rice for a third time in 30 minutes, yes it took that long to get a bowl of white steamed rice, is unreasonable.
The cost is moderate, again you can find cheaper elsewhere. A recent party of seven cost HKD2500, with no alcohol.
If you are new to HK, give it a go. If you’ve been here a while, you’ll probably know better.