Steve has walked past Ootoro on a lunchtime and says it's usually quite busy with office workers. On an evening, in particular this Wednesday evening at 7pm, it was much quieter and I'm sure it's not just the rain keeping people away. Being set back from the strip is probably not great for evening business. We were probably the 5th table there but it felt much emptier as it's a brightly lit, refectory style dining room. There were some other couples and a few suited single diners, probably grabbing a quick dinner afer a late night at the office.
We had $50 worth of credit and we ordered some gyoza and sushi and I had the seafood laksa (not exactly Japanese) and Steve went for katsudon. Green tea was served in the tiniest pots and tiniest cups which wasn't very practical.
Food arrived quickly and it was all pretty average. I suspect the gyoza was pre made stuff ordered in and re heated. Not bad but not great either. Sushi was pretty standard. The bricks of rice for the nigiri were pretty chunky and were more filling than usual sushi rice. The seafood laksa was fine. The good thing was that the seafood tasted fresh and the noodles were cooked well. The broth needed some more seasoning.
Overall, it's a reasonably cheap place to eat especially for the Southbank so perhaps we'd call in again as it's so close to home for a bento box but there are definitely better eateries around and going to Richmond would be cheaper and tastier but for the times that driving seems too far, I'm sure Ootoro would be ok.