Sakutto Tempura & Oyster (サクット), Orchard Plaza

Meanwhile, behind the facade of the stoic grey and calm...

...lies Sakutto Tempura & Oyster (#03-33 Orchard Plaza, 150 Orchard Road, tel : +65 9888 1510). When you hear words like "authentic hidden gems" and "hands down the best tempura in town" you know you should probably read them with a pinch of salt since the people who would know better will probably not be writing their opinions in English. Even if they did, they'd probably be kind enough not to make us endure such verbiage. Anyways...

We waited pretty long for the food. I nursed a beer to death at that and it was 45 minutes before the first item was served. Through that, there were miscommunications and wrong orders taken. Not gonna go into those details.

This was supposed to be hamaguri chawanmushi with uni. We were told they had run out of hamaguri and asked if we would mind if they replaced it with crab and scallop. We didn't. But when it arrived, there was also no uni. In the bill, they charged us for the hamaguri chawanmushi with uni which was $29. Things to look out for when you pay.

It was another half of a grapefruit sour before the tempura started rolling in.

The first tempura we got was their sakutto ebi tempura. The not overly thick batter was firmly clad on the faintly sweet meaty prawn. The fried head was.......well, sakutto! 😬

Next came gyutan - thick, chewy and tender. Chewing gets more flavour out. Nice this one.

Expensive piece of crispy skinned and moist amadai (tilefish). Also sakutto. Lots of crunch from this one.

Maitake.

Because we've never had ankimo tempura-ed before, we wanted to try.

While ankimo sometimes referred to as the foie gras of the sea, the texture of the liver isn't as rich or melty as foie gras. It's much more tender compared to those chilled ones served with ponzu.

Shirako tempura was wet-tish. Not so much texture contrast coming from the batter. Pretty creamy/milky though.

Tried their A5 Miyazaki wagyu. Not bad but I didn't think it was impressive.

Scallops were nice. Not fully cooked on the inside and still has the natural sweetness that paired harmoniously with the caviar.