Yatagarasu, Circular Road

Yatagarasu (#01-01, 72 Circular Road, tel : +65 6221 7785) refers to the three legged crow. It exists as a bird of legend in some East Asian mythologies - namely for the Japanese, Chinese and Korean. Not to be confused with a certain three eyed raven. It is also the name of this yakitori joint. 

What have we here? Small potatoes it seems.

But we got ourselves some simmered eggplant in some sweet soy/dashi broth. These were tender.

We were reeled in by the ankimo which were tender and creamy. Notice that the ponzu is drizzled sparingly over the rough chopped daikon instead of having them pooled at the bottom of the plate. Those daikon also tasted a little sweeter with no bitterness.

The first sticks that hit the table were my favourite of the lot - the hatsu. These were pretty good. Those hearts had a nice bite to them.

Followed up by some crunchy sunagimo.

There was sanma on the menu so I thought why not. The fish was gutted, cleaned and beheaded before it was put on the grill. While I missed the bitter sweet guts and head, it was still delicious.

The way they grilled the reba here left them very tender, creamy and not dried out at all. Kinda like foie gras minus the fatty flavours.

Then came nankotsu and momo. I've never been big on cartilage but am definitely am not beyond eating them once in a while. Just to check if my opinion on them were still valid. The former was crunchy while the latter was tender and juicy.

We had to try their tebasaki since we're doing yakitori. These wings were dripping juices. However they did not achieve what I thought was a more optimal crisp on the skins. No complains though.

Like Otowa, Yatagarasu specializes in yakitori and they aren't so much a kushiyaki at that. There were still a bunch of pork belly items on the menu though. Like this one that's wrapped around spring onions. Those spring onions were pretty fragrant and barely cooked in those belly rolls.

Shiso in pork belly were also in the cards because we thought they might be good and they were.

Apparently their tsukune is an ice cream scoop-ful of minced chicken on each stick. Because we were at the counter, we saw them make them on order. I liked that the mince was a little coarse.

Following that was sasami with a little bit of yuzu pepper. Again, tender and moist. These guys definitely knew what they were doing.

Their kawa had more chew than crisp. Many yakitori here makes them with either a balance of or would have more crisp. 

The score cup.

The state of the mentaiko rosu katsu at Imakatsu

For some reasons, standards of the katsu at Imakatsu seemed to have slipped. I wonder if it's just this particular outlet. I remember them being much more tasty back at the original outlet at Star Vista. The taste of the pork felt muted and was less moist while that strip of fat was more chewy and less flavoursome.

More Nirai Kanai-ing

Believe it or not, the motivation for this dinner at Nirai Kanai was their chahan with preserved mustard greens. Good stuff. A little pricey but always a treat.

We came across the aosa seaweed tempura on the menu. One of those things that we've overlooked in the past visits and we've been missing out. This was pretty good stuff. It tasted like a fried vegetable cake with anchovies and onions. Light on both the salt and grease.

This trip also was an opportunity to get re-acquainted with their rafute again in the form of their teishoku. Tender, sweet and with fat that readily fell apart in the mouth. I still maintain that it's not as good as the ones from the defunct Mimigar.

We've never left without a serving of their chanpuru ever since we re-discovered this place.

Some peachy drinks and an orange tea from Iroha Mart

Some drinks from Iroha Mart at Chinatown Point, picked up I have.

Let's start with that orange tea. It had the expected orange flavour which made them not very different from lemon tea. Flavour's okay, not something that I'll be excited about getting again. That peach flavoured Coke was....unusual. I'm not sure about how I feel about it. It's just peach flavour (artificial probably) in Coke and it's a little more sour than the regular drink. Now that peach flavoured Calpis. I guess there was just enough peachiness in the drink that it could've been another peach soda since I couldn't tell that it was a Calpis drink.

I guess I enjoyed them all. Just won't be getting them again.

Kinmedai saikyo yaki and a grilled hamachi head from Nakajima Suisan

So it's our favourite grilled fish teishoku spot again. I was intent on trying their kinmedai saikyo yaki since I've had the fish in shioyaki previously. Surprisingly I couldn't really detect much of a difference even though it was a miso based marinade. I still loved that fish and wished that it were a bigger portion.

These time round, there was also a half head of their hamachi on the grill. Only two portions served a day as they claimed so we snagged one of them. This was really good and I daresay that it was one of the better grilled fish heads I've had. The flesh which slid off the bones with ease was deliciously moist and appropriately salted for flavour.

So France, Duo Galleria

I'll be straight to the point on this. I didn't think very much of the place (#01-51/56 Duo Galleria, 7 Fraser Street). The people were nice but that niceness felt like a veneer. 

The shop and bistro brought nothing new to the table that others haven't already done and done better. We had a fish soup which was not bad but the same could also be said of those bottled stuff that used to be available at Carrefour which could also be spruced up to taste similarly. 

I didn't like how they charged for additional bread especially when they didn't give much in the first place for their Camembert and charcuterie. Speaking of which, those charcuterie tasted very...... pedestrian. They were also sliced too thinly and we can find better at the same price point. Maybe these guys oughta take a page from Le Bistrot du Sommelier.