​Issho Izakaya @Kallang Wave Mall

Despite its rather obscure location, this place is certainly very popular!

We decided to come here thinking that it was quite near to the Singapore Indoor Stadium, where we would be catching Kit Chan’s concert later!

Being autumn, we wanted to try the Sanma Sashimi and Sanma Sushi ($20++), and this was definitely the highlight of the dinner. The fish was fresh and quite sweet. Would have been better if it was abit fatter, but it was still delicious!

We also had the Salmon Kama ($2++) Salmon Collar, which was quite value for money, despite the small portion. Eh, it’s $2, and yummy!

The Kawahagi Yaki ($8.50++), was grilled dried leather jacket, that tasted like bak gwa. Not bad.

The Aburi Anago Sushi ($12++) was abit of a let-down, for the fish itself was quite flavorless and barely torched.

We also ordered the Yamamoto Kushi Set ($18.50++), where the mekajiki (sword fish) skewer was the clear winner with its sweet and juicy meat. The tomato buta was also not bad, for the juices of the tomato burst out when we bit into it. The torimono, tori negima, and U.S beef skewers were all too dry.

The Tempura Moriawase ($15.50++) was a platter of carrot, sweet potato, tapioca, egg plant, shitake mushroom, 2 lady’s finger, and 2 prawns. The batter was quite thick, and the egg plant was sliced so thinly that we could barely make it out. The prawns were fresh though.

Please do not expect service that you would normally expect at a Japanese casual restaurant though. 😦

We arrived just after 6pm, and the indoor seatings were either taken up or reserved, and there was already a waiting list. We enquired about the waiting time, but the staff would not commit to any estimates, and instead pointed to a group of 4 in a very nonchalant tone, and said that there were already people waiting here. He mentioned that there was still outside seating, but it was going to be VERY HOT. Wow, we already felt quite unwelcomed here.

But since we were already kinda late, and we had cravings for Japanese food, so ok lor. Endure abit for potentially good food (just look at the crowd!). Anyway, since we were the first customers sitting outdoors, we picked the table under than fan. It was not that hot in the evening, plus the scenery was quite nice.

Of course, sitting outside meant that you can forget about having any staff coming outside to take your orders on their own accord. It’s ok, we went in to call them (as did the later tables).

Water was chargeable at $1++ per person. We declined, since we do not think that we would want to have to keep going indoors to ask for more water. In fact, when they served other items, they would not clear the empty plates on the table unless we asked them to.

They also apparently served our tempura to another table, and the end result was an additional 20-minute wait for this very last item after the previous item was served. In between, we had ask a male staff to check on this order (he never returned), and then a female staff came by with a vegetables tempura (not our order), and she walked off abruptly. Then she came back again to ask if we really did order tempura moriawase (Yes we did, but it never did arrive), and she just walked off without a word (OMG…). Finally we asked the same male staff to check if it was being prepared, otherwise we would like to cancel it.

Magically, good service appeared. He returned to confirm that it was in the making, and finally cleared away the empty plates without us asking. Within minutes, the same female staff served us the tempura, with eye contact and words, instead of just plonking it on our table, which was what she did for the first couple of items. Gosh!!

We did see some other customers served by another female staff get consistently good service, for she would bother to explain about the food, and also serve with a smile. So we could have been just really unlucky.

Anyway, we spent way too much time for dinner and had to rush for our concert. We will look for alternatives should we come back to this area for other concerts in future.