The Westin Desaru

Location. Location. Location. It’s been said many times before, but when you’re looking for that perfect staycation spot, it’s certainly all about location. The Westin Desaru Coast Resort boasts a prime location, with direct beach front access, sweeping ocean vistas, just a short commute from either Johor or Singapore, and also not too far from Kuala Lumpur. For us, currently based in Johor, it’s the obvious option for a weekend away and has become our regular ‘go to’ beach escape from every day life and the busy city. But this 275 room Marriott International property offers even more than a prime location and first rate amenities, with their super friendly staff team always on hand to ensure your stay is everything you expected it to be and more.

Many of the rooms benefit from South China Sea views, which for us is an essential when staying here, if we are staying near the beach, we really want to see the beach! We happily ‘waste’ hours on our spacious balcony watching the changing vista of the seemingly never ending ocean and skies, being next to the ocean really is our happy place. Our 42 square metre King Bed Seaview room is well appointed with a huge and comfortable bed, large flat screen tv, and a stand alone bath tub that is the perfect place to relax and rejuvenate, which is exactly what we done during our stay.

The Vegan Food

The breakfast buffet available at Seasonal Tastes is vast and has everything you could want and more. There are veggie and vegan options if you know where to look, or if one of the staff team assist you. But if you’re ’in the know’ (which you are now) you can request the vegan menu which has plant based dishes that can be ordered a la carte for breakfast, lunch and dinner. So whilst we were enjoying our oat milk lattes, chef prepared a selection of dishes on each day. So whether you fancy avocado toast, uttapam or idli with curries and chutney or a healthy vegan bowl for breakfast, they’ve certainly got you covered here at Seasonal Tastes.

We’ve always enjoyed pizza no cheese and spaghetti arrabbiata at Prego, with a salad on the side it’s always hit the spot. The menu also has a vegan ravioli which is good, and the minestrone soup is also vegan. Various combinations of these above dishes have always kept us happy. So on this recent visit, when Chef Zaki and his team offered to prepare a vegan set menu we were excited and intrigued. What they created was absolutely outstanding, a combination of flavours, techniques, ingredients, presentation and passion that fused to deliver a truly memorable meal. Ravioli like no ravioli we’ve ever enjoyed previously, which was delicate, delicious and delightful. We loved everything about it, especially the rich flavours from the confit tomato at the heart of the pasta parcel, superb. The creamy, smooth and velvety avocado soup with roasted cauliflower florets for extra flavour and texture was sublime, and the healthy and nutritious wild rice dish with mixed mushrooms including our favourites, earthy morels, made us smile. Just when we thought the meal couldn’t get any better, we were served a beautiful dessert with chocolate cake, coconut cream, berries and tropical jelly that was heaven on a plate.

Our other meal was enjoyed back at Seasonal Tastes, the all day dining restaurant that offers both a la carte and buffet options. The main menu has a vegetarian section which includes vegan options, but these options (and others) are also on the vegan menu which is available upon request. There are salads, soups and Indian delights to choose from, but also a vegan burger, vegan burrito and various stir fried dishes on offer. We each enjoyed a delightful bowl of freshly prepared soup, one of us selected mixed mushroom with truffle oil for me, and the other choose tomato and basil, both were excellent. We followed this with stir fried soba noodles and vegetables, and a supremely tasty kung pao tofu with cashews and chillies that was absolutely perfect. We have had the kung pao tofu dish previously and it’s really good, so much so that we know we will be ordering it again when we return!

The Vegan Essentials

The large glass water bottles were regularly replaced in our room, and the shampoo, conditioner and shower gel were all in refillable dispensers which is in line with Marriott International sustainability standards. But there was still loots of single use plastic used for the other bathroom amenities which is a shame, and something we hope to see reduced over coming years and hotels and resorts work hard to lessen their impact.

The Vegan Food Quest Verdict

As Arnie once said “I’ll be back”, and that’s an absolute given for us, as we never fail to enjoy our stays at The Westin Desaru. We will never get bored of the beautiful beach and ocean views from our balcony, and we will certainly never get bored by the excellent staff team who have always looked after us in each and every stay. And the vegan food? Well, now that they have a vegan menu that’s available upon request, we will never get bored of the vegan food too!

We were guests of The Westin Desaru but please rest assured that their generosity in hosting us didn’t influence our views.

The Westin Desaru
Desaru Coast
Johor
Malaysia

Telephone: +14 07 838 3333
Email: sales.westindesaru@westin.com
Cost From: £120 / $150 (July 2024)