Hana Restaurant

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Make reservations about a week in advance, otherwise be prepared to wait about 1-2 hours in line. It's all just hype anyways. This place has potential but did not deliver.Service was slow and unorganized but they were all friendly. They ran out of menus once we were seated so we couldn't order for about 10 mins, but it was weird that people lined up outside were holding menus.The cold Flying Noodles Truffle Somen we ordered of course but there was nothing special about the taste or quality. Only presentation.The 3x3 Grid Sushi was just okay. A little bit of everything. Not worth $28.The Hana Maki Roll was just okay. At least the sushi rice was warm and soft.Overall, this place was just okay. I did not have high expectations coming here because of the bad ratings but I wasn't surprised either. I wouldn't come back. It's all just hype and for the photos. continue reading

Hana Japanese Restaurant is located on the ground floor of Forum, The Shopping Mall. They have gone through a revamp just two week ago and are now ready to serve customers Japanese food, with a modern and local twist. The owner Deborah, shared about passion she has for Japanese food in a comfortable and cosy setting where young families and couples could grab a bite and enjoy the taste and look of the food. Having said that, their desserts are also spectacular, especially since Hana and Benjamin Browns are owned by the same people, famous for their over the top milkshake, do give Hana's dessert selection a try! 1. Sushi Box 3×3 Grid $28++Instead of ordering all your sushi via ala carte mode, try ordering the grid boxes. This way you get to try a bit of 9 varied items. From cooked food, like fried tempura, octopus to sashimi to truffle chawanmushi was by the way is probably the best chawanmushi I've ever had. It melts in your mouth and the truffle flavour is distinctive yet not overpowering.2. Sushi TacoI've never had sushi in a taco before and this was an ingenious idea! With a crispy taco shell, you can choose between lobster, japanese egg mayo, prawn, and soft shell crab, all topped generously with tobiko.Lobster $15++ *highly recommend*On one side of the taco shell you will spot a golden slice of cheese, melted to the taco. At the bottom of the taco, you have some leafy greens, and sushi rice. The main star here is the lobster salad. What I adore the most, was how fresh the lobster was along with the crunchy tobiko. This was most probably the most guily-free taco I've ever eaten! The colour of the tobiko, lobster salad and greens added an appealing visual and pleasant satisfying crunch! For $15++, you will get TWO of these. It's a great deal to be honest, for the quality of food you're getting here. I would be heading there for lunch daily, if I worked in the Orchard region.Soft Shell Crab $15++Another Taco that I tried was the soft shell crab, the soft shell crab had a nice meaty flavour. It was slightly crisp golden brown on the exterior and lying beneath this golden layer is fresh crab meat. Flavour wise, the soft shell crab went well with the slice of torched cheese, sushi rice and tobiko. Definitely give this a try if you're a soft shell crab fan!3. Pitan Maki $18++ *Highly Recommended*When Deborah pointed behind me to tell me they were serving us pitan (century egg) maki, I was like, "Get outta here!". Mother of all Fusion Foods! This was it. This was the clear winner of the night for me. The century egg puree has a tinge of sweetness along with it's characteristic century egg flavour. It was flavourful and yet refreshing at the same time. I definitely appreciated the effort taken to plate this dish.4. Soft Shell Crab Maki $16++Another very interesting fusion sushi is this soft shell crab sushi served with a chili crab dip. You can see chunks of crab meat in the bright red sauce that brought about a sweet aroma. The chili crab sauce wasn't too spicy and I was say, it's kid friendly! The maki itself tasted great and tasted even better the chilli crab sauce.5. Flying Truffle Somen $20++ *Highly Recommended*Flying Noodles! This is the first time I've seen it in a restaurant in Singapore, so kudos to Hana for executing this menu item. The Somen is suspended in the air, looking like it's levitating by some divine intervention. But in actual fact, those noodles are really, al dente somen noodles garnished with little shrimps that provides the noodles a salty flavour, along with ikura. The dipping sauce provided is so addictive. I would double dip my noodles into the bowl of sauce! It had a tinge of sweetness and also a savoury aftertaste. This was my personal favourite amongst all the 3 flying noodle dishes.6. Flying Salted Egg Udon $18++Flying udon, this time served with salted egg sauce. The salted egg sauce was smooth with a shiok and fiery factor of salted egg along with some chili slices that was not too overwhelming.7. Flying Cha Soba with Spam Soba Sushi $16++I've never really been a fan of soba noodles but now that it's a Flying Soba noodle dish, I had to try it! Served with spam cha soba sushi, I must really take my hat off to the Hana team for this innovative sushi. Instead of rice, cha soba is used and since soba is rather bland on it's own. The spam sushi give the sushi an overall taste. Who would've thought that soba and spam would go well together. 8. Truffle Beef Fried Rice $18++The presentation of this dish was very interesting. The tempura flakes are in the glass bottle that is "feeding" into the rice. The truffle flavour and aroma could be tasted in the rice and with the added crunch from the tempura flakes, it was delicious. The beef however was a tad too tough for my liking. Even at Benjamin Browns, when I ordered a Sizzling Beef Chunk, I felt that the beef was too tough for my liking. Other than that, a very tasty rice dish.Overall : Hana has definitely gone miles to intrigue patrons tastebuds. Be it, an office lunch, after office hours chill out, or a family meal after spending the weekend at Toy’R us. There’s so many choices of Japanese food at Hana to cater to everyone!Restaurant InfoName : Hana RestaurantAddress : 583 Orchard Road, #01-17 Forum The Shopping Mall, Forum The Shopping Contact : 6737 5525Hours : 11:30am – 10pm Daily continue reading

Hana, which means "flower" in Japanese, is a modern Japanese restaurant situated at Forum Shopping Mall, away from the busy streets of orchard. Situated on level 1 and just infront of the lift, it's quite impossible for you to miss this restaurant. The interior of Hana was nicely decorated with koi fishes on the wall, drums of sake around the restaurant and a huge Sakura tree in the center. The whole ambience was romantic for some, cosy for many and somehow makes you feel like you're in Japan. Chef promised serving all customers with only the freshest seafood and using top grade ingredients. He said most of the time, they handpicked the freshest seafood themselves from Japan and flown back to Singapore the following day. *Wow* After hearing these words, our saliva already drooling~ Without further hesitation, we started our night with Chef's signature starters. Truffle Ikura Somen with Chef Special Sauce $15- A chilled appetizer before the mains. Infused with strong truffle taste, the cold noodles tasted so good! Together with the crispy shrimps, crunchy cucumber & salmon roe, it's a starter that you would love at first bite. My most loved food item of the night. Santen Chirashi Mori with Teapot Soup $28(Kanpachi Truffle Premium Kaisen Bara & Aburi Salmon Cheese atop Chef's Special Pink Rice)- This set of pretty rice bowls kept us going for more as they were so tasty. Totally no complains for the fresh sashimi but the highlights here were the pink rice underneath. I love the natural sweet aftertaste!! (Hack care about carbo overloading!!) Sip sip the teapot soup after the yummy bowls and its wonderland already! Soup was packed with seafood essence and tasted refreshing too after we added in the lime.And if you think I stopped eating after the carbo loading?? NOooo.. More food came as we ventured through Hana's *New* Tempura Omakase set meal. *NEW* Tempura Omakase Set $38.00++ per paxThis set comprises of 7 courses, each served individually on board.• 1 appetizer• 1 serving of Assorted Sashimi (3 types)• 4 Tempura (4 choices but seafood types subject to availability)• 1 DessertWe started off this set meal with a salad. (a) Sakura Ebi Salad with Chef Homemade Sesame dressing (Goma) & roasted cashew nuts- Maybe you could find salad anywhere, but one with nicely executed goma dressing, it had got to be here at Hana. This specially in-house made sesame dressing was so fragrant, nutty and not overly salty! It indeed brought up so much flavour to the greens. (b) Fresh Sashimi- We were served with 3 types of sashimi fish, choices varies everyday, depending on restaurant. Hana was so generous, look at the thick slices!! Fresh too!! Nomnomnom! (c) Tempura (4 types) All served with Green tea salt, Paprika salt, Teriyaki mayonnaise and Tentsuyu dipping sauce.(i) Tempura Jumbo Prawn w/ Shiitake Mushroom- Big! Huge! Woww! These were the voices from all of us when these prawns arrived. First time getting such jumbo ones compared to other restaurants. Fresh and succulent prawn in truffle infused batter, so crispy and yum. You heard right! "Truffle batter"!! Only at Hana's! (ii) Tempura Mekajiki (Swordfish) w/ Sweet Potato Chips- Swordfish meat was so fine and juicy while wrapped in the crispy tempura batter. The saltiness from the seaweed flakes made by Chef made this fish dish so savory, I completed it in quick 2 mouthfuls!! Sweet potato chips did bring up some sweetness in our palate after the savory fish. (iii) Tempura Scallop Skewers w/ Pumpkin fries - Texture of these tempura scallops were abit tough, needed more time to chew and swallow, probably because the deep frying dried out the moisture. It was a waste though, may be better off eaten raw. Instead, the companion pumpkin fries here became my preferred choice between the two. Love pumpkin's natural sweetness, even more love than sweet potato. (iv) Tempura Zuwaigani (Snow Crab) w/ Eggplant- I usually had snow crab legs in sushi rice rolls or seafood on ice, first time having it as a tempura item. Crispy exterior and having its seafood sweetness still locked within, it's quite a delicious way to enjoy snow crab too! Lastly, we rounded up our meal with desserts. Despite we were very full already, we girls still managed to wallop up every bit of the desserts!(g) Dessert Sherbet *ala-carte @$6.00ea*Yuzu sherbet- This citrusy dessert was so refreshing. Indeed suitable for clearing our palate after all the fried stuff. I strongly recommend this flavour to go with this tempura omakase set meal.Kyoho sherbet - Compared to the Yuzu flavour, this grape-ssi one was sweet, tastes like our childhood bubblegum and a girl's choice definitely!NOTE: This Omakase set was served with rice, onsen tamago and furikake (rice seasonings). Best of all, a bowl of umeboshi (Japanese plum) clear soup to clear off the oiliness after all the deep fried food. Tempura were all freshly fried upon order therefore whole course duration 2 hours, last seating at 8.30pm. Available only for Sunday dinner starting from 27th July, fast fingers get this good deal!! For $38.00++ per pax, with food served which worth more than $80.00, you won't wanna miss this place!📍 Hana Japanese RestaurantForum The Shopping Mall583 Orchard RoadUnit 01-17Singapore 238884Tel: 6737 5525 continue reading

Items tried: Hana Maki (Tuna, Yellowtail, Salmon & Tobiko) 16.00 and Rainbow (Tuna, Yellowtail, Salmon, Tobiko around California Roll) 16.00. For this roll, the gravy had a salty flavour and I felt that it masked the natural taste of the raw fish, and the gravy, upon contact with the sushi rice, made the sushi fall apart. The Hana maki, although it seemed like it was a signature dish of Hana, did not taste like it was a must-try and was disappointing too.Perhaps their omakase/kaiseki would fare better. Service was above average continue reading