Category: Japanese

Japanese combines the best of raw and cooked food. Its Sushi and Sashimi are known worldwide for its distinct way to present food.

Sushi Tei Restaurant

Rating:

7 / 10

Taste: 7/10

Price: $150 for 4 people

Place: 7.5/10

Review:

Sushi Tei Restaurant is one of the few success stories in Japanese chain restaurants. To be honest, when the Sydney branch opened I did not give the credit they deserved because I felt the Indonesian branches were an average and with the slightly more expensive price tag in Sydney, I thought the fee was not justifiable. Luckily, compared to my first visit, this one was so much better Japanese Cuisine.

In this place, you can order boxed sets or Donburi-style plates. However, the best feature of this restaurant is its diversity of choices. You literally choose from more than 100 types of dishes here. It ranges from fresh Sashimi, grilled gyuniku, to soup-based ramen. To illustrate this, we ordered 10 different dishes from (almost) each of its menu pages.

We started off with a simple Chawan Mushi, soft boiled white eggs with a chockfull of fillings, including the ever-present Naruto (fyi, it’s not a manga title!). Next was Salmon Maki, six mini rolls of Salmon Sushi wrapped in nori. These first two were staple dishes in a lot of Sushi places around town. Unfortunately, my knowledge of good Sushi rice is limited, thus I can only say it was rightly vinegared.

Our next two dishes were Chuka Kurage and Chuka Iidako. It is a little bit difficult to explain, but essentially they were Jellyfish and baby octopus. However, some people might not like the slimy and squishiness of these dishes. Shortly after came Wakame Salad. It was a sea of greens.

Our first main attraction of the day was Shiretoko. 6 kinds of Sashimi Moriawase were beautifully arranged in a shell-themed plate. The main attraction of it was the Swordfish and Sea Urchin. There was no better compliment that a Sashimi could get except by saying they were incredibly fresh.

If you think that last one looked nice, you will be evenhappier with the next one. Aso Sushi was one hell of a Sushi Moriawase. 19 slice of Sushi (granted that 6 of them were the same kind) in pleasingly pretty colours. It was the most comprehensive sushi moriawase on the menu but unfortunately sea urchin was excluded from it. I would also really love to have scampi on the menu.

We also ordered, the always in good standard, Unagi Yanagawa. It was essentially, eel and eggs with burdock roots. It’s great when accompanied by rice. Meanwhile, there was another dare-to-be-different dish of Zaru Chasoba. It was an ice-cold, green tea soba with its clear soup. I liked the freshness that it brought to the mixture.

We saved the best for last, Gyuniku. Three lightly-grilled beef slices wrapped up generous serving of Golden Mushrooms combined in perfectly yummy teriyaki sauce. These elements gave us a crunchy mushroom texture and soft, tender beef. They were so good we actually ordered a second plate, enough said!

The final verdict: There are hardly any Japanese restaurants in Sydney as comprehensive as SushiTei. They could cater to just about everyone. In addition to that, the taste also did not disappoint, they were actually surprisingly better than Ithought. It could be a little bit expensive if you are not careful with what you order. Lastly, the one dish that you should always order is Gyuniku.

Did you know?

Sushi Tei originated from Singapore and is one of the most well-known restaurants in Indonesia. They provide nice and fresh seafood in a country where the products are notoriously hard to get.

Details:

1 Chifley Square, Cnr of Elizabeth St and Hunter St, Sydney 2000

+61 2 9232 7288

http://www.sushitei.com.au/

Oct 20, 2011
Zen Japanese Restaurant and Sushi Bar

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Unfortunately, Zen Japanese Restaurant has closed its doors.

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Rating:

6.5 / 10

Taste: 6.5/10

Price: $13 – $29

Place: 7/10

Review:

We decided to try this restaurant because we’ve always been impressed with its layout when we passed by. Zen Japanese restaurant looked very sophisticated, yet at a glance, the price was modest.

Our first menu of the day was supposed (at least that’s what I remembered my friend ordering) to be Nabeyaki Udon. However, when the dish arrived, it didn’t look like the usual nabeyaki udon. It looked kinda like a beef soup with Udon and fully-boiled half an egg.

Moving on, there was also Tempura Udon. This time, it looked like the usual tempura udon that we find anywhere, clear soup udon with four pieces of Tempura. Nevertheless, it was an ok dish.

Chirashi Don was definitely the better dish of the day. It looked jam-packed with nice goodies. The serving of the slices was also quite generous. Strangely, the slices looked fresher than the main dish of the day.

There’s no denying that Sashimi & Sushi Boat was both massive and incredibly eye-catching. They were the usual assortments of Salmon, Kingfish, Tuna Sashimi, Sushi and Rolls. However, taste wise, I think the Chirashi outdid it.

The final verdict: The good thing about this place is its layout and interior design. It is not your average under $20 restaurant. The presentation of the dishes was also nice. However, in terms of taste, unfortunately it’s just an average Japanese restaurant.

Did you know?

Zen is located at the heart of Randwick’s infamous The Spot. There’s a cinema that’s much loved by the students because of its price called Ritz. It was an art deco cinema, built in 1937, and is considered one of Sydney’s heritage buildings (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spot,_New_South_Wales).

Next to Zen there’s a beautiful cake shop called The Sweet Spots. You should try their Vanilla Slice and Raspberry Mousse. Yummy!

Details:

20 Perouse Road, Randwick, NSW 2031

(02) 9326 3855

Aug 14, 2011
Chikyu-Ya Japanese Cuisine

Update: Chikyu-Ya has closed its doors for good and I haven’t heard about the Chef reopening somewhere else / some time soon.

Rating:

7.5 / 10

Taste: 8 /10

Price: $15-$20 per dish

Place: 7/10

Review:

This week, we’ll travel to a restaurant next to my office, Chikyu-Ya Japanese Cuisine. I’ve known this restaurant long before I started working here and it has been my personal favourite. I think they have the best Karaage in Sydney! (and.. no, I don’t get paid for saying this!)

One of the good things about this restaurant is the simple menu. You are not faced with the dilemma of choosing from 100s of things. Simple pictures of dishes that you’d expect to get are shown there and another list of ‘Today’s Special’.

For the entrée, we went for the Sashimi. 12 generous cuts of Salmon, Tuna, and Kingfish were arranged beautifully with sides of seaweed, pickled ginger and wasabi. The Sashimi were as fresh as getting it from Fish Market, comparable to expensive Japanese restaurants.

For the main course we ordered three different dishes. The first one to arrive was Mini Udon and Karaage combo. Two small bowls, Chilli Karaage and Shiitake Udon, were the perfect dish for carbs-minded people. The udon was flavoursome and you can put chilli powder on it to enhance the taste.

The second one was my Karaage with Teriyaki Sauce (dinner size). Generous servings of karaage deep fried into golden brown of perfection. The teriyaki sauce created an added glossy effect and sweet taste. What I like about it was the crunch and the taste that came afterwards. For small eaters, there was also a friendly donburi size or even an entrée size.

The last one was French-inspired Demi-glace Hamberg. It was another classy display of plating. The hamberg was so tender and juicy. It was a dish that was seriously worth considering if you fancy beef more than chicken and/or fried stuff.

As a proof that I’ve always enjoyed their Karaage, here’s my happy face after eating it…

The final verdict for Chikyu-Ya Japanese Cuisine:

What else can I say? Karaage! They have sauces according to your preference: Teriyaki, soy-vinegar, chilli and even curry! You can ask for the entrée, dinner, or donburi size. In addition to that, the Hamberg was also nice.

Did you know?

Some of my friends prefer their curry dishes. They said it was one of the better Japanese curries in Sydney. Unfortunately, I am not a big curry fan.

This restaurant is very famous amongst Indonesians. Discounting myself as one, there is always a group of them in the restaurant every time I visited the place for dinner.

Location:

106 Ebley St, Bondi Junction, NSW 2022

They don’t seem to have one but this is the closest that can give you detailed information for the restaurant: http://www.sydneycafes.com.au/chikyu-ya.html

Jun 21, 2011
Sushi Tengoku

Rating:

6.5 / 10

Taste: 8 /10

Price: $20 – $30

Place: 6/10

Review:

Before I start this review, I must give you several advanced warnings when visiting Sushi Tengoku. 1. For your convenience, you MUST book in advance. 2. If you want to order Baked Scallops, you MUST mention it when you make the booking. 3. Be prepared to allocate 1 – 1.5 hours of dinnertime since the dishes will sometimes take a while to be served.

I have never found this restaurant to be empty during dinnertime, maybe if you arrived past 9 PM you would have better ambience. The tables were quite densely arranged. They had a very simple menu (a 2-sided list of food) and if you knew your Japanese food, you could order any Sushi, even they were not on the menu!

If you only exclusively eat the Sashimi or the raw Sushi then you might be able to blitz thru the night because they are always the first ones to arrive. With that being said, our first dishes of the night were (surprise surprise) Aburi Scallops and Salmon. These were not your everyday Sushi. They were gigantic! They were so big that you could not even see the rice below the fish (with the case of Scallops, they put two on one rice).

We then had the entrees dishes, Takoyaki and Crabmeat and Avocado Salad. The takoyaki was just average. The salad looked pretty bright and tasted nice. Both dishes were sort of a staple dish that you can get out of any Japanese restaurants in town.

The next dishes that came to our table were the Salmon Head Teriyaki and Sushi Rolls. The first dish might not be for everyone, but I do love fish head. This one particularly was fabulous. They deep fried the fish and dip it in Teriyaki sauce, creating a crunchy, yet soft, fish skin and meat.We ordered two Sushi rolls on this occasion, Soft-shelled Crab and Tamago Roll. The rolls were brilliant, and massive. The crab was crunchy and the tamago (egg) was soft and sweet.

One of our longest wait was the Baked Scallops. But I’m telling you it was worth the wait. It was a quite small dish of baked scallops and salmon on a bed of mayonnaise and fish roe. The real turn off was really the wait, but other than that everything was so perfect.

The final verdict: If you can get past a long waiting time, slightly above average price, and average table setting, then Sushi Tengoku is a good place to eat. I was going to give a higher rating for this one for the taste, but other factors dragged them down considerably.

The sushis are massive and baked scallop is just over the top. If you don’t mind a fish looking at you, then the Salmon Head is really a bargain!

Did you know?

Kensington is also one of the suburbs without an outstanding restaurant. There are several non-chain restaurants but I am not sure of their quality.

Location:

121 Anzac Parade, Kensington NSW 2033

May 11, 2011
Kobe Jones

Rating:

7.5 / 10

Taste: 7.5 /10

Price: $69 per person

Place: 8.5/10

Kobe Jones review

This week is another special week, because we are going to travel to one of the nice places in Sydney and it’s also a specially limited menu that they offered only for a day (maybe in the future they’ll do it again). Kobe Jones had this ‘Sentou’ banquet menu consisted of 12 dishes and a dessert platter. Minimum of three people must be present to enjoy this menu. Without further ado, here are the 13 of them, along with their formal descriptions. FYI, this 2 – 7 were served at exactly the same time, thus making our table looked like a total chaos. Then dishes 8 to 11 came at also the same time.

Number One Special – Crab salad with avocado wrapped in kingfish and baked with Kobe Jones’ secret sauce

I know the title might be a bit cheesy, but I think it opened the night with a bang. It resembled a big white chocolate with slightly burnt top.

Anago Scallops – Tempura Hokkaido scallops stuffed with crab salad and asparagus, drizzled with a bittersweet soy sauce glaze

This time, there was neither crab nor sweet taste, because of the overpowering bitterness of the sauce. It was really a dish to forget.

Sashimi Salad – Garden greens topped with fresh sashimi, crab salad and drizzled with ponzu dressing

They omitted seaweed from the list here. It’s a nice and refreshing salad with overabundance of greens.

Wagyu Tenderloin Tataki – Seared and chilled, served rare with garlice, ginger and ponzu sauce

I kinda dislike the combination of tataki and ponzu, it created a sense of uncooked beef satay.

Seafood Poke – Hawaiian-style sashimi cubes marinated in poke sauce

Another funnily named dish and intentionally left seaweed out of the description. This one was nice tho. There was a hint of sesame in the sauce and tasted kind of Yukke sauce, without the egg yolk and the beef.

Sizzled Scallop Carpaccio – Scallop sashimi, sizzled with heated extra virgin oil, and drizzled with wasabi pepper sauce

My favourite dish of the first wave of food!Fresh-tasting sashimi with a hint of wasabi were a great combination and a must for scallop lovers!

Hawaiian Roll – Prawns, cucumber, burdock root and pineapple chilli jam topped with tuna and avocado and drizzled with poke sauce

It was an ok dish without any visible ‘mistakes’

Volcano Roll – Oven-baked scallops layered on a crab salad and avocado roll, with our special cream sauce and a sesame seed and shallot sprinkle

Another crab salad in a sushi, but this time it was covered by baked scallops. This was more decent than any of the previous dishes.

Chicken Kara Age – Do I really need to explain??

Well, not the best kara age I’ve ever tasted… ‘nuff said…

Alaskan Crab – Grilled to highlight the sweetness, then chilled and served in the shell with fresh lime

Finally… A dish truly worth to mention! Described perfectly, the meat of this crab could pop out easily from its shell. It had a nice sweet taste and great to be served chilled.A little bit of advice for you: Do not use the sauce if you don’t want to lose the sweet taste.

Vegetable Tempura – Seasonal vegetables served with dipping sauce

We kinda feel full at this point and I reckon they were just another vegetable tempuras.

Wagyu Hot Rock – Self-cook your wagyu just the way you like it, served with seasoning and two dipping sauces

At this point we already lost hope of actually getting something special out of this place. Then came this solid and sizzling black rock (witha caution from the waiter: DO NOT TOUCH). He then demonstrated how to cook the meat ON the rock! For a real connoisseur, you should be well aware that wagyu beef is best served lightly grilled. The sauce just accentuated the great taste of Wagyu.

Ama Ozen – Kobe Jones’ famous selection of dessert samplers with chocolate chopsticks

The platter was served while the Brulee was still flaming. If we go clock wise from the top we had: Strawberry Cheesecakes, Dark Chocolate cake with Green Tea Ice cream, Berry Yoghurt, Mango Sago, Green Tea Brulee, Strawberry cream with fairy floss, Green Tea macaroons, and the Dark Chocolate Chopsticks. Most of them can be rated as better than the other dishes (except for the crab and Hot Rock)

The final verdict: I must admit that I was thinking of putting off writing this review, because for the first 7 meals, they were all pretty average. However, after the Alaskan Crab onwards, I was convinced that I needed to write this straight away. Highlight of the night at Kobe Jones was definitely the Wagyu Hot Rock. Best dish of the day (or maybe the Ama Ozen for the ladies).

Did you know?

King Street Wharf is located next to Darling Harbour. They have a big selection of upper-market restaurants. However, you might want to be careful not to be trapped in an overpriced-yet-not-tasty restaurant. Best way is to research these restaurants before you make the reservation.

Location:

King Street Wharf, 29 Lime Street, Sydney NSW 2000

Website:

http://kobejones.com.au/locations/sydney/

Apr 12, 2011
Sushi Samurai

Rating:

6.5 / 10

Taste: 6.5 /10

Price Range: $13 – $20 per plate

Place: 6/10

Review:

This week, we are going to explore one of the restaurants in Pyrmont that was recommended by my friend, Sushi Samurai. The restaurant looked kind of small but it’s full of people. I guess we wouldn’t make it if we hadn’t booked in advance. It’s a nice sizable restaurant but unfortunately my friend failed to tell us that there was a special menu that could be ordered one day in advance. It’s a kind of preset menu with an optional lobster.

Casting our disappointment aside, we ordered several dishes that I am going to write in the order of the timing appropriateness. I dislike the fact that our main Sashimi Platter was the first one to be served. We would have been happier if our Deep-fried Lotus Roots, Agedashi Tofu, and Tofu and Seaweed Salad were the first ones to arrive. The lotus roots were crispy but it’s kind of tasteless and bland, except for a bit of salt. Agedashi Tofu was nice, but unfortunately it’s too little of a portion for the six of us. The salad on the other hand was very fresh with silken smooth tofu. There were a rich variety of vegetables in it and it had a big portion.

On with the Sushi dishes… We ordered two sushi rolls this time, the classical California Roll and my all-time favorite Soft Shell Crab Roll. California roll was o, regular 8 pieces, but lacking in the actual quantity inside the rice. The other roll was much better presented and tasting, but it lacked the number of pieces.

In the grilled department, we ordered Teriyaki Wagyu Beef and Grilled Fish Head. The beef was certainly one of the best dishes of the day. Sizzling wagyu cuts on top of a bed of bean sprouts. Perfectly combined with the sauce! The fish on the other hand was a nightmare. It’s true that you got three gigantic fish heads, but they were really plain. I’d advise you to order additional teriyaki sauce for them.

The only other dish that’s worth mentioning is the Sashimi Platter. It was pretty, it had great assortments, and they were fresh! If it was the only dish we ordered, our judgment could’ve been slightly better.

The final verdict: There was nothing that made me want to return to the restaurant. Everything was a disappointment, except for the Sashimi platter. However, I am curious about the special menu that they offer.

Did you know?

Sushi Samurai is part of a restaurant chain, called Excellent Group, and there are several restaurants owned by this group all over Sydney. I had a glimpse of the one in Neutral Bay and it looked so much better and more spacious than the Pyrmont one.

Location:

Shop 1/16-30 Bunn St Pyrmont 2009

Website:

Feb 22, 2011