7 Floor Malaysia Tea Room is a Malaysian hawker-style stall inside Holborn Food Hub, a compact food hall just a few minutes’ walk from Holborn station. Specialising in Malaysian comfort food, it has built a following for its Penang-style assam laksa and prawn mee, with both dishes proving particularly popular among Malaysian diners looking for familiar flavours in central London.
The setting is deliberately casual and forms part of the experience. 7 Floor shares a small dining area with the food hall’s other vendors, so meals are eaten at communal tables in a set-up reminiscent of Malaysia’s hawker centres and market stalls. Its Holborn location also makes it a handy lunchtime option for office workers in the surrounding streets.
Assam laksa is the obvious place to start. This Penang speciality pairs thick rice noodles with a sour, fish-based broth sharpened with tamarind, delivering plenty of tang without relying solely on chilli for flavour. Prawn mee is another of the stall’s signatures, with a deeply flavoured broth made by boiling prawn shells for hours to extract their savoury richness.
There’s plenty beyond the headline dishes, too. Curry mee and Singapore curry noodles offer further options for noodle fans, while beef rendang provides something heartier. Those with a sweet tooth should look out for Malaysian kuih, an assortment of colourful, bite-sized cakes and sweets. At weekends, the selection expands to include tau fu fa, a silky tofu pudding.
Drinks keep things equally informal, with Thai milk tea alongside familiar Malaysian canned options including 100 Plus and Yeo’s. For a quick introduction to Malaysian hawker-style cooking in central London, 7 Floor Malaysia Tea Room is an appealingly straightforward place to start.