Food Court Fiesta: Okuya Express

My boys and I usually eat out for lunch after hearing mass on Sundays. We oftentimes dine at a food court because it's cheaper and we get to choose what we want to eat. Last Sunday we decided to head to Glorietta and chose to eat at Food Choices. After checking out the different stalls I decided on Okuya Express since I rarely cook Japanese dishes.

For a small stall they surely had a lot of dishes and maki/sushi to choose from. I got curious with the tamago california maki and ordered one plate -- I was surprised to see that it contained 8 rolls and not just 4 (only for PhP90!). It's standard california maki wrapped with tamago (egg). It was bigger than usual, so I had a hard time dipping it in kikoman.

My diet is pretty limited (no chicken), so I got my usual katsudon. It just cost about PhP80. The top was pretty tasty, but some parts were a bit matabang. The serving was huge, so I tried to donate two strips of pork to Sweetie, but he was already full haha.

Sweetie originally planned to get some food from the Spanish-Filipino cuisine stall, but he got envious with my order. He got yakinuku beef (I forgot to take a photo) and mixed sushi/maki.

Our total order cost less than PhP400. We got our drinks from another stall because I wanted buko juice and he wanted fruit shake.

Must try: maki/sushi, definite good buy

Cost: less than PhP200 for rice topping and maki

Okuya Express

Food Choices, Glorietta Mall

(map)

Little Tokyo: Umareshi-ya

I never knew there was a gem beside Makati Cinema Square. The area called Little Tokyo. I have long ignored this place since I didn't think it was a good place to dine in, but I have long wondered why a lot of cars were always parked in the area. May ginto naman pala kasi dun.

It was Nina's idea to have a "meat-all-you-can" evening since she said she was in the area that day. So we found ourselves (Jay and me) with blogger-friends Juned, Jayvee, Maro, Winston, Nina, Fritz, Coy, Sha and Karla. Rochelle and Panda San joined us too.

I didn't really know what to expect. Nina just said, we'll eat as much meat as we can and just bring PhP500 each. We entered Little Tokyo through the grocery fronting Pasong Tamo. I ended up buying 3 bottles of milk tea to sample for my tea blog. We wanted to try out the Japanese ice cream, but Fritz said that they weren't that frozen anymore.

The experience was quite different from shabu-shabu. We were served different kinds of meat for 45 minutes. Mix of beef, pork and sea food which we had to grill. We took turns cooking and eating and were quite full half-way through the alloted time, but since Rochelle and Fritz kept cooking, I ended up eating a lot and surprised myself by finishing almost 2 bowls of rice.

We all smelled like grilled beef after eating, but hey it was a fun experience! I'd like to visit Little Tokyo again soon and try out the other Japanese restos in the area.

Little Tokyo (map)
2277 Pasong Tamo
Makati City
*it's in front of Herald Suites

Davao FAT2: Tadakuma Japanese Restaurant

This is the first of a series of posts I will be making about the recent Davao Food Appreciation Tour, fondly called the Davao FAT which was organized and sponsored by DavaoDeli.com and DavaoFoodie.com. I had so much fun during the pioneer run of the Davao FAT last year and I made sure I'd be there again this year (booked flights last December just to be sure!).

The first stop we went to was Tadakuma Japanese Restaurant. It was raining hard when we arrived and I was quite excited to start sampling the food. 

We were served a lot of dishes and I was really envious that my friends managed to sample the california maki. I am unfortunately allergic to crab and I could just watch my friends with envy as they popped in one maki after another.

And since most of them ate a lot of maki I said that I would get a bigger share of the sashimi. As expected the raw tuna was fresh and not malansa.  

There were many other dishes, but for me the superstars for the day were the Sukiyaki and the Atuyaki Tofu. The sukiyaki was heaven. It just had the right amount of herbs and spices and wasn't salty, the noodles too were al dente. 

The atuyaki tofi was a surprise. I've tried other tofu dishes and most of them were "disjointed", meaning the tofu and the dish weren't "one". The atuyaki tofu was cooked perfectly and I couldn't stop adding the sauce to my rice. 

Tadakuma Japanese Restaurant

Damosa Business Center, 

Mamay Road, Lanang, Davao City

Must haves: Sukiyaki and Atuyaki Tofi

Can do without: the iced green tea, it was too bitter

Price range: my friend said they get really stuffed with just PhP250

The Lakwatsera's Rating: must have the Sukiyaki again!