Mandy Yin says she poured her heart and soul into making Sambal Shiok a success, after opening on Holloway Road back in 2018

A MALAYSIAN restaurant in Islington has served its last bowl of laksa, as its owner spoke of the “volatile” trading climate that has forced her to shut up shop.

Mandy Yin first opened the independent Sambal Shiok in Holloway Road in 2018, which has remained a popular destination for residents ever since.

Just like its laksa dishes, Sambal Shiok was built from scratch by Ms Yin, first opening as a street food stall in the early 2010s and continuing to grow until she moved to its final home in Holloway Road in 2018.

Reflecting on the past eight years, Ms Yin said it had been a “happy but bittersweet” chapter of her life, and that she had poured her heart and soul into the business.

She explained to the Tribune that the reason for closure was twofold: a cost of living crisis that has hugely impacted the public’s budget to eat out, coupled with the “relentless” rise in costs for small businesses.

Ms Yin said: “All restaurants lost a lot of money from Covid. I’ve tried to keep going and growing but unfortunately every year since there have been rising costs.

“Then with the Ukraine war and now Iran, there has been an incredible increase in energy prices – people have less money to spend and its been virtually impossible to keep my prices as accessible as they once were. Sometimes, that is just what life throws at you.”

Ms Yin moved to London aged 11 and began her career as a corporate lawyer, before suffering from burnout and deciding to pursue the hospitality industry.

“Being Malaysian, I’ve always loved food, it’s my passion. I decided to do something with food because at that time Malaysian food was really underrepresented in London,” she said. “I’d like to think I helped to increase the understanding of Malay­sian food in London, and hopefully have given people the confidence to open laksa-focused rest­aurants.

“We were popular with critics and locals alike when we started, it was amazing.”

Ms Yin said that high rates of VAT in particular were impacting small, independent businesses like her own, as along with business rates and increases to minimum wage there was barely any opportunity to make profit and keep the restaurant alive.

She said: “I am in no way knocking minimum wage going up, but I’ve had to inject 10 grand over the past five years because of VAT. It’s not something I’m willing to do anymore.

“I don’t think that is only limited to restaurants – it is all small business.

“High streets are dying, at least half the shops are shuttered.

“I sound like a broken record on this because I’ve been saying it since 2020, but if the government does not do anything about VAT, it will only be the corporate restaurants left.

“Because for smaller business, it seems more and more futile trying to do your best. Lots of ­people are just thinking ‘what is the point?’”

A series of high-profile chefs including Yotam Ottolenghi publicly called on the government to cut VAT by 10 per cent to bring the rates closer to levels across the rest of Europe.

The Treasury has announced that this summer VAT will be temporarily slashed by 5 per cent on children’s food.

Ms Yin said: “They’re willing to do it for children’s meals, but unless the government is willing to think outside the box, it’ll be too little, too late.”

She added that after announcing the restaurant’s closure online she has been showered with an “outpouring of love” from members of the community who expressed their sadness over the closure.

She said she had a “phenomenal” team behind her during the eight years the restaurant was open, and was currently working to find alternative arrangements for the staff, who were “shocked” when she told them of the closure.

Ms Yin said she plans to continue working in the food industry through writing and advocacy work.