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2012-02-16
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The husband and I were walking around the Japanese Food Street at Nex and I suppose it was the short queue and freshly made soba on display that lured us into the restaurant.Truth be told, I was not too impressed with the variety of soba mains offered - it appeared that it was the same options either served warm or cold. A somewhat hasty decision was made, fueled by a rumbling stomach, and I ordered the warm Ume Ten Oroshi Soba ($17.80, buckwheat noodles topped with grated daikon, Japanese plum,
Truth be told, I was not too impressed with the variety of soba mains offered - it appeared that it was the same options either served warm or cold.
A somewhat hasty decision was made, fueled by a rumbling stomach, and I ordered the warm Ume Ten Oroshi Soba ($17.80, buckwheat noodles topped with grated daikon, Japanese plum, wild Japanese vegetables and mushrooms). The husband went with the recommendation of our waitress and ordered the chilled Tenchirashi Soba ($15.20, buckwheat noodles topped with tempura of prawns, vegetables and mushrooms and a wobbly poached egg).
Thinking with our stomachs rather than our heads, we also ordered some side dishes - a plate of Salmon Yukke ($9.80, strips of salmon sashimi mixed in a spicy sauce and topped with a quail egg yolk) and Kamo Shio ($10.80, grilled duck with salt on the side).
Now on to the pictures and verdict...
The duck tasted pretty good, with a smoky flavour and an unexpected yet delicious hint of foie gras. However, at $2.16 per thin slice, we were careful to savour each morsel.
This was the star dish of the night, and dare I say it, the dish that saved the entire dinner from being blah and bland. The sauce was punchy enough to keep the taste buds interested while the quail egg yolk tied the whole thing together with its creamy consistency and richness.
This was my bowl of warm noodle and when they say warm, they do mean warm so be prepared to be disappointed if you, like me, were expecting a bowl of pipping hot soup. But I'm guessing this is the optimal way to enjoy soba? Anyway, overall it failed to impress but it wasn't inedible, just not satisfying. Perhaps I was expecting the soup to be more flavourful, almost like a ramen stock, but this was overwhelmingly lacking in depth. I'm usually ok with clean flavours but this felt, well, too clean. The ume did give it an occasional burst of tang, but it came more as an undesirable shock to the tongue because the sourness stood out too much.
You probably can easily imagine how this dish tastes like since you've probably eaten tempura, a poached egg and soba, albeit separately. Again, it was underwhelming. And my husband, who usually has a ferocious appetite, said he was stuffed because of all the flour. It felt like eating starch with starch. Overall, it wasn't a bad meal, just not satisfying. I guess I'll be exploring the other restaurants the next time I'm at Nex!
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