kazu

i always find it difficult to decide on a place for a meal when i'm in the orchard road area. for its size, orchard road has a surprising dearth of decent mid-range restaurants; most of the time i'll end up at 翡翠拉 面小笼包 ordering my 担担面 and/or 清炒虾仁. or maybe 鼎泰丰. or toast for a quick bite. forget about any french, or even italian place that serves a decent meal for a decent price. the situation is slightly better for japanese, with kuriya at shaw house, and to a lesser extent, akashi.

however, when craving hits, it's off to kazu, a tiny, wonderfully cozy sumiyaki place located on the fourth floor of cuppage centre. extremely popular, it enjoys the patronage of both japanese and locals alike; never has there been a time that i was there when it wasn't full. the-one-formerly-known-as-j chanced upon it on a website (nookie i believe) about two years ago, and i've been patronising it ever since.

kazu is also my sister's favourite restaurant; this was her third time there. not wanting to spend too much money this time round, we skipped the big-ticket items, (thus no grilled fish, plus she doesn't really care for fish(!)), and decided to stick with what both of us liked - sticks and sticks of aromatic grilled meats and vegetables.



we ordered the pork kimchi, white asparagus tofu with tomato puree and ikura, wasabi leaves and wakame, warm-style edamame, and a selection of yakitori sticks: kurobuta, wagyuyaki, fatty pork with apple, sanzoku (free-range chicken) with salt, asparagus rolled with bacon, shimeji rolled with bacon, and tako okonomiyaki.

the pork kimchi is a staple when i come with my sister; it was her favourite dish the previous times (yes, even beating the yakitori). however, the kimchi this time is rather letdown-ish; overly watery, resulting in much of the spices not remaining on the cabbage when the kimchi was picked up, rendering the dish weak-tasting. definitely not one of the better dishes that night. the white asparagus tofu was better; a firm yet creamy block of tofu with a hint of asparagus, and perhaps a little cream cheese. it went very well with the ikura, the saltiness of the ikura lending contrast to the sweet tofu. and the edamame, of course, was nicely buttery, though i must say that i prefer the cold version of this dish.

what really shone that night, though, were the yakitori sticks, in particular the kurobuta and wagyuyaki. the kurobuta was very juicy, due to the good proportionment of the fatty and lean parts, and totally held its own without any superfluous sauces (unlike our local version, known as satay, where the meat becomes a receptacle for the peanut sauce most of the time). the grilling imparted a subtle smoky flavour which augmented the flavour of the pork. similarly, the wagyuyaki was excellently oily, with again a good mix of fatty and lean parts, and only the honest taste of beef, complemented with the smokiness of the grill. i particularly liked that it was neither hard nor stringy, but melt-in-the-mouth tender.

the sticks rolled with bacon were also quite good. the asparagus was firm and sweet; the shimeji nicely "crunchy" like how fresh mushrooms should be. and the bacon provided the aromatic oiliness which really completed the dishes. the fatty pork with apple was also not bad, though outclassed by the kurobuta. still, the sweetness of the apple was quite refreshing when matched with the meat.

what were disappointing were the sanzoku and the tako okonomiyaki. the sanzoku, though not too bad actually, paled in comparison to the previous version a few months ago; this time round, the chicken was a bit dry. but it was still better than the okonomiyaki, which was too hard and dry; definitely much worse than previous times.

still, i must say that my sister and i highly enjoyed ourselves (as was the case the previous times), and if standards remain, it will continue to be one of my favourite restaurants in singapore.