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2014-09-05
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The place is comfortably and quietly tucked away in a corner of Poho just a street or 2 away from the glamourous area of Soho. I heard that the chef once worked in New York and Sydney and developed his own creative French-Japanese cuisines. The place serves an eclectic fusion of Japanese and International tapa-like dishes, which for someone like me who is a "fusion-confusion" phobic, can be either a hit or miss. The earth-tone of the woody interior generates a chic yet comfortable ambience. It m
The place is comfortably and quietly tucked away in a corner of Poho just a street or 2 away from the glamourous area of Soho. I heard that the chef once worked in New York and Sydney and developed his own creative French-Japanese cuisines. The place serves an eclectic fusion of Japanese and International tapa-like dishes, which for someone like me who is a "fusion-confusion" phobic, can be either a hit or miss.
The earth-tone of the woody interior generates a chic yet comfortable ambience. It makes a relaxing and warm and still trendy and cool place to chill out.
As at the day of our visit, there was no alcohol served and the customers could all bring their own wine with no corkage. While this was good news for the wallet then, now it is even more exciting that it has brought in the entire line of Hitachino Nest beers and draft on the tap.The menu was divided into 4 categories: sea, raw, land, soil which was self-explanatory in nature. It sort of gave me a transcendent feeling of "Zen" (don't ask me why). It was interesting and "calming" to just glance through the menu with creative surprises kept popping up.
Twice-cooked ox-tongue - I am a huge fan of ox-tongue and I won't miss it for the world if they appear in the menu. The ox-tongue was stewed and then grilled for extra flavour. The tongue was thick and was cooked to just the perfect texture, though it was not my ideal way of enjoying ox-tongue.
Spicy waygu tartar - Another thing I won't miss was raw meat. This dish is the most reminiscent of french cuisine with a hint of Korean touch - chopped tenderloin mixed with a range of condiments including pickled onions, capers, chives, sesame, raw egg yolk, spicy miso sauce etc., I was hesitant to mix in all the side bits lest the natural meat flavour would be over-shadowed. This dish just couldn't go wrong if the meat was fresh and sweet. The meat was beautiful with just the egg yolk and the spicy miso.
Then came my favourite dish of the night - baked scallops with foie gras, button mushrooms, lomo and parsley. At first glance the dish might look clumsy and taste confusing, yet the taste of different ingredients melted harmoniously in the mouth, not to mention the scallops were cooked perfectly. We especially enjoyed the mushroom-garlic mixture. We happily coupled it with the crunchy rice cakes which were served with the waygu tartar.
We had a second order of scallops and asked for more rice cakes, and they were served eagerly and happily by the friendly staff. Sweet corn tempura - I am not a veggie person but was tempted by the positive comments of this dish here so we decided to give it a try. The dish was tasty but not impressive to me. I found it better for the dish to do without mozzarella (which was sandwiched between 2 layers of cut corn and sprinkled with green tea sea salt) as the melted cheese had nothing to "absorb" into, it just felt runny on the corn. Thus the final result tasted kind of awkward and the two ingredients just felt odd together.
After dishes of protein the carbohydrates was calling us. There were not many choices and we ordered all the carb dish avaliable. (except for the bowls of plain rice which I saw some gentlemen having with the 24-hour rib Nikomi.)Sloppy Joe - The buns with roast pork leg, BBQ sauce, cabbage slaw was "safely" and decently made - the bread soft (perhaps a bit too soft to my liking) and baked hot (but a bit moist on the top), the meat plentiful (but not flavoursome enough) - you had certain expectations for the dish and the dish just delivered the expectations, no more and no less. It was quite tasty but not stunning. I felt the price tag a bit high for this reason.
Mud crab okonomiyaki - It may look the Japanese way, but one bite into the savoury pancake of crab meat, cabbage and yam flour defied the pre-conception. The taste of crab meat was subtle and thorough though the texture was a bit too hard and mushy. Still it was quite an amusing and memorable dish.
I appreciate the place for showing great respect for the food and ingredients. The food was not mind-blowing but still it was a fascinating experience to dine there. As the name of the place suggests, it is like taking a trip to new places where new ideas and surprises are in-store for travellers to explore. I also applaud them for offering unpretentious fusion which is not confusion.It is a pity though that the place offers two seatings: 6pm and 8:30pm. It would have been a great hideaway place to unwind without the time limit.
Some day I will sure go back for the range of Hitachino Nest beers, and I hold a humble hope that 2-seatings issue will be resolved.
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