Bon Viveur

Having your birthday fall on a Monday, in a word, sucks. First, the weekend has just passed, almost everyone has gone back to work and probably not up to celebrating. You’re probably still hungover from a huge weekend of excess. Second, and more importantly, all the nice restaurants where you want to celebrate is shut. While I fully understand the business and logistical reasons of why this is, it still puts a damper on things. So, a modicum of patience is called for. Being the lazy sod that I am and not getting my act together in time to have a proper celebration, K and I decided to have a quiet post birthday, birthday dinner later in the week. Just the two of us. How kawaii.

With a plethora of options available mid-week, I finally settled on Satsuki in Subiaco after perusing the menus and write-ups of various other restaurants on my hit list. K & I both love Japanese cuisine and it’s a restaurant that is new to both of us, which is good enough reason to give it a bash.

We arrived at the restaurant on a cold, wet Wednesday night and promptly shown to our table by a lovely waitress. The restaurant was quiet. Apart from K and myself, there was only one other occupied table with a pair of Japanese business men. Not very encouraging. A shadow of doubt crossed my mind. Had we made a bad choice? Why aren’t there more diners? Since we’ve already made the trek, we decided to stay and enjoy the evening anyway. The waitresses, dressed in blue and white kimonos were pleasant, courteous and efficient. They were always available should we require anything but not hovering around or fawning. Furnishing us with a pair of menus, a carafe of chilled water and taking our drink orders, they left us to peruse the menu. After some discussion, it was decided that we’ll order three items from the menu, and order more if we should we require it.

Grilled scallops "Isobe" style

The first dish to arrive is the grilled scallops. The lightly grilled flesh smeared with a bit of cheese and lightly dusted with chilli powder was cocooned within a thin blanket of nori. Perfect mouthful parcels. Biting into one, the flesh was fresh, salty and sweet. Not quite as moist as I expected but that was offset by the creamy tang of cheese and the spike of chilli with just enough bite to whet the appetite. My only compliant is there wasn’t more of them with only 4 pieces per serving.

Vegetable tempura

While we were savouring the flavours of the scallops the vegetable tempura arrive. Nicely portioned for two people, there were two of each item so there was no need to fight over who got what. Our platter consisted of red capcicum, shiitake mushrooms, pumpkin, eggplant and courgettes. There was also a small mound of grated daikon and ginger positioned at the edge of the platter ready to be dunked into the dipping sauce. The batter was hot, light and crispy, swaddling just warmed vegetables.

Chicken with onion vinaigrette "Namban" style

Arriving together with the tempura is the chicken. Pieces of succulent thigh meat pan-fried and covered with a sweet, tangy soy/onion vinaigrette and topped with a generous serving of julienned daikon. The ‘Namban’ style vinaigrette danced a jolly jig on our tastebuds with its combination of sweet, salty and sour. Each taste distinct but well balanced. The cool and bland daikon worked really well to curtail the bold flavours of the vinaigrette.

While eating our way through the first set of dishes, K and I decided to order a few more items from the menu and selected a few more substantial dishes.

Wagyu beef tataki

A massive platter arrived at our table laden with these beautifylly lightly pink and white marbled slices of beef, layered atop the tosazu vinaigrette and garnished generously with finely sliced spring onion. To eat, we rolled a small portion of the spring onion in each slice of beef and swishing in a bit of the vinaigrette. Heaven in a mouthful. The meat sweet, succulent and perfectly chewy accented with the tangy vinaigrette and bite of the spring onions. Such a simple dish, but so rich at the same time. There was almost too much for the two of us. Almost. The only disappointment with this dish, if you could call it that, was that the lotus roots were a little chewy, not crispy and crunchy as I envisioned them to be.

Agedashi tofu

The one dish that I will always, always order when having a Japanese meal. There’s something comforting about slices of tofu swathed in a crispy potato starch skin in a bath of dashi broth. I also love how the crispy skin becomes soft and silky when soaked in the broth. The clean simple flavours clensing and preparing our palates for the last main dish to come.

Pork belly "Kaku-ni"

For me, this was the highlight, the pièce de résistance of our meal. After having read so much about it from other various bloggers, I was very keen to try it for myself. When the dish was plated, it wasn’t quite what I expected. Compared to the other examples where the pork was glistening, luscious and coated in a shiny glaze this version did not have the top layer of fat and looked a little more stewed. Undeterred; we split the meat, eggs and broth into two equal portions and tucked in. The meat was tender, flaky and very flavourful, complemented by the sweet soy broth. The taste was reminicent of five spice pork belly.

Homemade green tea ice cream

After the last dishes had been cleared by our attentive waitress, we sat back rubbing our full bellies both agreeing that it was an excellent meal and worth the wait. K was full and didn’t want any dessert but I wanted something sweet to finish the meal. So we ordered a single portion of Matcha ice cream to share. Presently, we were presented with a small dish, containing a pale green sphere decorated with a dusting of green tea powder and sprinkling of brown sugar. Dessert was rich, creamy and ever so slightly bitter from the matcha. Quite a lovely way to end a meal.

All in all, we had a lovely meal and during the course of our meal, three other tables of diners came in to the restaurant. Would definitely return to try other items on the menu. Satsuki is located in Subicao Square and is open Tuesday to Saturday from 12 noon to 2.30pm for lunch and from 6pm for dinner.

Satsuki
Shop 1/50 Subiaco Square, Subiaco, WA 6008
Phone: (08) 9381 9868
Fax: (08) 9382 4367
Email: info@satsuki.net.au
Website: satsuki.com.au