Singapore - Kaiho Sushi

In our quest to conquer Little Japan down at Cuppage Plaza, we decided to venture without reservations into Kaiho Sushi on Level 3, which we hadn't tried previously. With no reviews or recommendations to go on, we bravely took a counter seat (ok, there were no other seats available).

Bernard Tang, the sushi chef helming the place, welcomed us and got us drinks. My companion got a sake which was light and sweet but looked like water which rice was washed in and left for a few days - voila! Sake is born! But seriously, it was very pleasant though not for the serious sake drinker.

It being a Thursday night, many things we ordered were unavailable eg. the geoduck, fugu (puffer fish), Asari clams, etc. We therefore ended up with the following:

For starters, slivers of Aji with natto - not my favourite, it was a little too salty for me. The Aji was fresh enough but I avoided too much of the natto. Thankfully, it was only an appetiser portion.

The Kisu tempura was crispy enough although it was just a tad too much flour for my liking. But the fish maintained its fluffiness which I like in my Kisu and was not overcooked.

Although named Kaiho Sushi, I didn't think the Sushi Mori we had was that great. The rice was not evenly vinegared and we had our meter busily running from "decent" to "so-so" to "uh-huh" across the 7 pieces and the additional maki. Some of the pieces were too chewey and made it difficult to take bite sizes off.

What was tasty was the substituted scallop (they were out of geoduck) baked with spicy mentaiko sauce. The fresh soft scallop was just cooked just right and the spicy mentaiko which I have a weakness for as I believe it makes anything yummy, was good enough on its own.

What was very average was the grilled minced fish paste with miso. This turned out to be what I thought were bits of left over fish topped with miso paste then quickly baked. Very ordinary even if presentation in a shell over a bed of sea salt made it prettier than it tasted.

All in all, a mediocre experience for us and as a result, made the price we paid seemed less justified.