#queueforfood

Tendon Kohaku had a 45 min wait when I arrived there at 545pm on a Saturday. We got seated at 630pm and was given a simple and straight forward menu to order from. Having been in line, I knew what I wanted to order already though. Basically if you come to Kohaku, you’re here for the tempura don. In terms of spice level, there’s spicy and regular. I had a bite of the spicy and it was a bit numbing for me – so no guesses needed on which option I had opted for. The non-spicy option was quite a sweet sauce. I would advise to not complain about what seemed like a lack of sauce at first glance cause the sauce may have trickled down onto your rice. The tsumemono was white radish with yuzu in a gingery sauce which complemented the tendon well

In terms of what is in your don, on the menu it said prawns, chicken and vegetables. What you actually get is 2 prawns, 2 generous pieces of chicken, 2 long beans, 1 crab stick, 1 baby corn, 1 pumpkin, 0.5 mushroom, 1 thick piece of ika. That’s a lot of value in terms of condiments for S$15.00++. The set comes with a hot bowl of udon with spring onions at S$19.50++. I’m not sure whether the set is worth it but if it’s your first time there, it’s nice to try. Their udon was thinner than the typical udon we normally see but was chewy. I would not have complained if I was given this bowl of udon to eat (and I don’t even like udon in the first place)

The tempura was served freshly fried and lightly battered. The chicken was tender, prawns felt fresh and just cooked. In fact, the vegetables did not lose their “juicy-ness”. I guess the most surprising condiment was the squid/ika as I’ve never had squid in tempura before. Although the hotel was fried, I didn’t feel gross like I was afraid that I might have felt.

They didn’t charge for the water and I observed that they were quite prompt at refilling the green tea (S$2). The music that was playing was Japanese instrumentals which made you feel like you were in Japan or a ninja. While waiting, I was able to see the chefs scurrying and hard at work. It was also somewhat reassuring for me to see the chef add new oil in the pot for frying. For this price, I would see myself as a returning customer. As we left the restaurant, the line was roughly ended where we had started queuing.