Nearest station: Jurong East MRT
Celebrated my birthday today with my mum and my brother. It's a Friday afternoon, around 2 pm so there weren't a lot of people. It took us literally 30 seconds to get the queue number from the machine and to be served. Pretty efficient.
Kushiyaki Miso Onigiri - $4.90
For a starter, we ordered mini skewed onigiri. This tasted like the meatball onigiri I tasted in Japan. I believe the meatball on top is minced pork which tasted sweet. Sort of reminds me of Chinese Ba zhang but this is not oily at all as the rice ball is grilled. The mince and super soft contrasted with the chewy rice ball. Pretty nice.
Kankoku Butechige - $16.80
I'm surprised to find Korean Butechige here. We really love korean food so we decided to give this a go. Butechige soup base is basically a stew with gochujang (red chilli paste) and kimchi.
There is a lot of stuff in it: ramen, pork belly, sausages, tteok (korean rice cake), enokitake mushroom (Jing Zhen Gu), carrots, bean sprouts, tofu, cabbages, spring onions and kimchi. This picture was taken before the extra soup base was added in.
Soup base is quite thick and tasted kimchi-ish with slight taste of fermented soya bean.Ramen noodles are typical korean magi mee which is pretty springy. This is my first time tasting korean chige so I'm not sure if has the "authentic" taste but it tasted pretty good to me.
Watami Tonkotsu Ramen - $12.80
Char Siew is soft and tender but with a thick layer of fat. I really hate pork smell but this ramen doesn't have the pungent pork smell at all. Soup base of sweet pork bone goodness and is mildly oily. The ramen is acceptable but not as springy as those ramen I ate in Japan.
I really love ramen but with all the dishes we ordered kinda of order overshadows this bowl of goodness.
Ika Maru Yaki -$12.80
Grilled squid. This one long squid. Surprisingly, this looks as good as it taste. The squid is easy to chew and well marinated. I love the grill taste and together with the mayonnaise, it tasted like takoyaki only without the batter and bonito flakes.
Zaru Soba - $7.80
Just wished that the soba is a little colder. The dipping broth is really good when you mix in the wasabi and spring onion.
Hot green tea - Free
Passionfruit tea - $4.80
Passionfruit juice with jelly and tapioca pearls at the bottom. This is one tall glass of drink. Not too sweet.
Overall, I'm pretty impressed with Watami. The food is pretty delectable.
As we are seated next to the glass, passerby kept staring at our food. Service wise, the crew are not very attentive and it took a little time to get our order and bill. (They are friendly though.) It gets crowded during dinner hours at Watami, in fact most restaurants in Jcube.
Total damage: $70.50 in total inclusive of gst and service charge for 3 people. I definitely recommend this place.
