• Barley Background
  • Farewell UK
  • Melbourne Magic
  • Restaurant Reviews
  • Guestbook

Kenzan

22/2/2013

0 Comments

 
Picture
Friday night date with my friend Kimmy. We love our dates - we chit and chat and laugh and guffaw and drink cocktails and wine and order EVERYTHING our baby hearts desire. We like to graze, we enjoy seafood and we like to be looked after.

I chose Kenzan for our most recent date and we had a little cozy corner at the sushi bar where we also enjoyed some people watching.

We started off proceedings with fresh oysters with citrus flavored ponzu vinegar and a mojito each. Beautifully fresh with a gorgeous salty tang at the end; these were delicious and I could have eaten another serve easily!


Spicy scallop and tuna salad
— with Kim Wainwright at Kenzan Japanese Restaurant.Continuing with the raw seafood we enjoyed an entree sized portion of mixed sashimi comprising of the usual salmon, tuna, kingfish and slightly more unusual amberjack. Lipsmackingly pure and fresh.
 
Spicy scallop and tuna salad arrived next fragrant with sesame oil. Loved this - loved the chilli warmth, the Asian flavours of soy and sesame mixed with spankingly fresh scallop and tuna, the scallop providing sweetness, the tuna providing an almost iron like hit.

By this time we'd moved from mojitos to a bootle of Shaw and Smith Sauvignon Blanc which was unlike any other sauv blanc I've had. Creamier, rounder and less sharp it was so yummy.
Our steamed dishes came next - prawn dumplings and chawan mushi. The dumplings were plump and dense, sweet with prawn and wrapped in silken noodle threads. The chawan mushi was silky smooth and delicately flavoured as it should be.
Scallops and king mushrooms in a miso butter sauce with strands of fried chilli and two pieces of asparagus arrived next. Chunky mushrooms absorbing a buttery salty sauce complimented by soft, sweet scallop. This was a dish on the specials menu and we also enjoyed additional specials including a miso glazed butterfish. Definitely reminiscent of Miso Black Cod and flavourwise very good; the texture of the butterfish just wasn't quite as delighful as the slippery flakes of black cod. The butterfish was denser like swordfish and it didn't flake into individual morsels like the black cod so a different experience and just short of the esteemed echelons of Nobu's black cod but still pretty close to.
Our final dish before we decided to add more was braised Wagyu braised beef cheek with wasabi and it came out as a small serve of tender beef that fell into shred at the merest touch with daikon that had soaked up all the good juices and had been cooked so long it was soft and tender. The wasabi was like a salsa on top and provided a horseradish heat. Not a bad dish but not my kinda flavours. Intense and less clean and pure than the previous dishes.

We felt we could still eat and so we ordered some tempura (entree size) and grazed ont hat along with a second bottle of Shaw and Smith...
Picture
Dessert time and we ordered a green tea creme brulee and also some ice cream (green tea and vanilla).

Japanese desserts can be a bit hit and miss and whilst the ice cream was fine but not special the green tea creme brulee was not so great. Texture was a bit too gluey on the tongue and it had that powdery creamy residue that remains in the mouth with the fake dairy desserts that are popular in Asia.

Overall Kenzan was great. The food started off amazing especially the sashimi dishes. There's plenty more to try on the menu too but desserts are probably the no no. We had a lovely waitress who was so sweet and keen to please. The temperature in the restaurant did get quite warm as it got busier so we stepped outside for a breather and our little waitress asked to come along with us! Very cute!

Kenzan Japanese on Urbanspoon
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Fine Print

    For those that know us, this section will probably come with no surprise! Steve and I love eating out so this is our record of our time in Australia.

    This is a blog that is 100% written and edited by Steve and I. All opinions expressed are our own and are not influenced by any third party.

    Any sponsored posts are easily identified as such.

    Thanks for reading barleyblog.

    Follow @mindabarley
    View my food journey on Zomato!

    Archives

    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010

    Categories

    All
    Albert Park
    American
    Argentinian
    Armadale
    Armenian
    Beaconsfield
    Beechworth
    Birragurra
    Box Hill
    Breakfast
    Bright
    Brighton
    British
    Brunswick
    Buffet
    Burgers And Pub Grub
    Burmese
    Busselton
    Camberwell
    Canberra
    Carlton
    Cbd
    Chinese
    Collingwood
    Daylesford
    Dessert
    Docklands
    Doncaster
    Elsternwick
    Eltham
    Elwood
    Ethiopian
    European
    Filipino
    Fitzroy
    Flemington
    Flinders
    Footscray
    Fremantle
    French
    Fusion
    Geelong
    German
    Glen Waverley
    Greek
    Hawthorn
    Hobart
    Indian
    Indonesian
    Italian
    Japanese
    Kew
    Korean
    Kyneton
    Launceston
    Malaysian
    Margaret River
    Mexican
    Middle Eastern
    Mildura
    Modern Australian
    Mornington Peninsula
    Northcote
    North Melbourne
    Port Fairy
    Port Melbourne
    Prahran
    Richmond
    Ripponlea
    Rutherglen
    Southbank
    South Melbourne
    South Yarra
    Spanish
    Steakhouse
    St Kilda
    Sydney
    Thai
    Thornbury
    Toorak
    Torquay
    Vietnamese
    Werribee
    Williamstown
    Windsor
    Yarra Valley
    Yum Cha

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.