After the awesome Spring menu, I'm all for more specially crafted gastronomical surprises from Chef Brandon at Ikkoten Omakase. It is such a joy to enjoy the premium ingredients being prepared, cooked and paired in rare ways that please and surprise the palates. There's also the awesome pairing of different textures to make things varied and exciting. And I discover the best croquette and sukiyaki here!
Specially curated and crafted appetisers 💖
First appetiser of Hotaru with Spinach, Oba, Miso and Tomato is so surprisingly refreshing yet earthy and mildly briny sweet at the same time. This tastes like the breath of fresh air of spring.
Potato croquettes with slightly spicy sauce potato is like the best potato croquette I ever have. The potato tastes so earthy sweet, and this sweetness is balanced by the spiciness and tanginess of specially homemade sauce, making it so exciting. The texture of the potato is so fine, contrasting perfectly with the crispy deep fried exterior.
Specially curated giant Hamaguri features a lovely milky briny sweetness, elevated by the creamy warmness and crispy texture from the burnt top, making for a unique taste experience.
Chef Brandon takes things up a notch even more by serving an entire Baby Sea Bream for sashimi course. And yet every mouthful of the carefully sliced fish tastes so different from each other because of the different pairing of sauces and condiments. Yes, one fish with ten different ways of enjoying it. Five are dotted with wasabi gel while another five with yuzu gel. These gels make the fish slices taste incredibly sweet in different ways. I love it with the spring onion that brightens up the briny sweetness of thh fish. Pairing them with cherry tomatoes or the herbs also works. Absolutely no soy sauce needed. And the fish is wrapped in kelp beforehand to impart the umami sweetness to the meat, making this course a gastronomic delight.
Intense sweetness of Ayu is lifted up by the refreshing cucumber sauce that makes the result tastes almost magical. The balance of flavours is so on the point. The deep fried enoki mushroom tastes so sweet due to the contrast from the sakura salt and edible sakura soaked in brine. The tempura bits add awesome crunchy bite to the texture.
I get to try Japanese version of popian where the plump scallop is being wrapped with seaweed and then coated with tempura batter before being deep fried to yield a thin crispy skin, which accentuates the juiciness of the super juicy and bouncy scallop. The briny sweetness of the scallop is elevated by the tangy, earthy specialty sauce, making for an exciting and complex taste.
The best sukiyaki comes in the form of Wagyu Dumpling and vegetables soaked in a savoury umami sweet broth. The broth is lighter than the usual sukiyaki sauce, but packed with more meaty sweetness, thus is perfect for sipping on. It feels so good and warm to sip on the broth served boiling hot in a claypot. The thin slices of Kagoshima Wagyu is packed with buttery meaty goodness, going perfectly with the texture of cubed vegetables packed within the wagyu slices.
I always look forward to savouring the Donabe here because Chef Brandon always adds new special ingredient to the donabe each time I come here. And every time, the donabe makes me go, "Ahh, so delicious, so flavourful, so satisfying!" Every starchy smooth grain is pumped with soft briny umami of the collagen broth and hamaguri, and the taste is lifted up by the abundance of chopped vegetables added. This is oh so good.
Special homemade Sakura Ice-cream is creamy, smooth, slightly earthy and completed with a hint of savoury goodness from the sakura salt. I enjoy this so much, especially with the buttery, earthy pine nuts that adds the extra oomph and crunch.
Super rare Sparkling Sake curated by Chef Brandon. It is so smooth, with soft bubbles to excite the palates. Best Sparkling Sake!
Another Sake specially curated for the course, and it goes so well with the meat.
Thoughts: Simply Fantastic and Exciting!