Kenzo Japanese Noodle House

Kenzo Japanese Noodle House is one of the well known ramen place in Toronto.  I've heard a lot about it through food blogs and through friends, and I finally had my first ramen there a few weekends ago.  I went to the Kenzo on Yonge and Steeles.

There were quite a few choices on the menu but I opted for the Hot Ramen.  The Karashi Ramen was served with a 'Special Ramen in Karashi Sauce and Japanese hot sauce'.  There was a hot level from 1 to 3 to choose from, and I chose level 2.  My tolerance for hot food is pretty high but the ramen was considerably hot for me.  My mouth was flaming and I had to drink ice water throughout my lunch.  I am not a huge fan of ramen but I believe the most important things about a delicious ramen are the noodles and soup-base.

The ramen at Kenzo was decent.  I did not had a jump, nor disappointment from it.  The portion was more than enough for me too.  I will return to Kenzo if I suddenly crave for ramens in the future, since it is probably the closest by my house.

Cafe Green Tea

Cafe Green Tea located in the supermarket at JTown is definitely another one of those non-Traditional Japanese dining places in Toronto.  The environment was extremely casual due to its 'food court' style.  The way it works is you order your food by the cashier, she gives you a number and she'll bring you your dish when it's ready. 

I ordered the Curry with Breaded Chicken since I read some positive reviews about it earlier.  When the dish arrived, I thought the curry was too watery, however it seemed to be just right when you mix it with the rice.  The dish is a very 'homemade' style dish, so it felt as if there isn't much you can complain or complainant about it.  I will definitely try something different if I ever go back to Cafe Green Tea in the future.

Shiso Tree Cafe

This is my second time visiting Shiso Tree Cafe.  The first time was last year before I started blogging and I thought the concept of having Japanese-Italian style food was pretty unique.  However, I never went back until today.

My sister and I arrived at Shiso Tree Cafe located in J-Town at around 6:30 pm.  The restaurant was pretty quite but it started to filled up very quickly.  I love the environment there because it was bright, quiet and modern.  All these combined makes you want to stay there comfortably and enjoy yourself for the rest of the night.

Both of us ordered one of the Shiso pasta served with Shiso Tree Salad and Garlic Bread.  We didn't go for the set meal for an additional $8 that comes with soup and a slice of Japanese-style cake as well.  However, we regretted it when we saw the soup served to the table next to us.  I am not sure what kind of soup it was but it just simply looked delicious.  The Shiso Tree Salad was served with mixed greens, cucumbers, carrots and miso-based vinaigrette.  The salad was awesome because it was cold enough so it seemed fresh; however, some of the veges at the bottom didn't physically look fresh to me.

The pasta that I opted for was the Shrimp Okonomiyaki pasta served with shrimps and bacon bites.  The sauce cooked with it is different than the tomato or the cream sauce that we always get from Italian restaurants.  It was simply amazing!

My sister ordered the Shoyu and Mushrooms pasta that was cooked with Japanese soy based sauce and served with enoki, king oyster and shimeji mushrooms.  The sauce used for this pasta was a lot more mild compared to the sauce for my pasta.  Taste buds certainly calmed themselves when I took a little bit of this to try but it tasted absolutely great.

The dinner was excellent at Shiso Tree Cafe.   I will certainly come back again since the food is unique and it is close to my home.  The pasta was cooked just right and the thickness of the pasta matches the dish amazingly well.  To.live.my.life grants a rating of 8/10 to Shiso Tree Cafe.  Next time I will try their fries for sure because I came home and read some very good reviews about them!

Niwatei Japanese Restaurant

Normally I won't buy Groupons for a noodle or a burger place but since Niwatei Japanese Restaurant is so close to where I live, I bought a $10 for $20 coupon.  However, after dining there, I figured I should of bought a few more for nights that I am lazy to cook :p  I made a reservation for Miss J.Lui and myself that night because usually it is a requirement for the usage of a Groupon.  I am glad I did that because the family owned restaurant located at J-Town was packed when we got there at 6:30 until around 8-ish when we left.

Both of us looked through the menu and opted for the $12.80 Ramen Set that comes with appetizer, ramen and dessert.  For appetizer, I ordered the Gyoza and Miss Lui ordered the Steam Rice with Mixed Vegetables.  Nothing too special or bad about them.

For our ramens, both of us went for the Tonkotsu Ramen in pork-bone based noodle soup.  The soup was tasty, it does not taste like it was made with any or too much MSG.

As for dessert, we ordered the 'Dessert of the Day'.  Miss Lui got the Cheese Cake, which was baked with sponge cake instead of cream cheese.  I got the Earl Grey Cake.  The cake was quite special because the earl grey flavor was very strong in the cake and I never had that before.

Overall, dinner was casual and filling.  To.live.my.life gives a rating of 7.5/10 to Niwatei Japanese Restaurant .  We were both very satisfied with our dinner and mentioned that we will return again.   We thought it will be better if they have more variety of ramens because after a few times one might get bored of the same ones.  The pricing is pretty good too (especially with our Groupon :D)

Osechi Japanese Cuisine

Osechi is another AYCE Japanese Cuisine in the Richmond Hill area.  It opened recently and the decor did not change from the previous restaurant, Dozo.

Positive:
-Large Variety
-Fresh Sashimi
-Quick with orders
-Serve Fresh Oysters

Negative:
-Lots of Mosquitoes
-'Fresh Oysters' were not too fresh all

Ginza Sushi

I'm finally back and life is back!  (at least for a little while...).  After writing the mentally and physically tiring 6.5 hours exam, I celebrated by going out out for dinner at Ginza Sushi.  I've passed by Ginza Sushi at all four of their locations before and knew of its existence for a while, but have never dine in it before.  The environment was somewhat different from those Asian AYCE restaurant, it had more of a Western-style sushi restaurant scene. 

Mr. Y and I ordered a sashimi combo and two sushi rolls.  It was quite a surprised when our 30 pieces sashimi combo arrived.  It ONLY had 26 pieces, so we told the waitress and without a word she brought the sashimi boat back to the sashimi bar.

 Here comes the real surprise.  The waitress brought our 30 pieces sashimi combo back to us with hamachi, tuna, salmon, octopus, snapper, white tuna, surf clam, sweet shrimp, as listed in the menu. However, the whole dish literally changed from the one she brought back in and she just put it down on our table without a word or an explanation. I believe our originally dish was then given to the table across from us.

 See the differences from the two dishes?

Next, our Philadelphia Roll with grilled salmon, cream cheese & green onion in BBQ sauce, and Black Pearl Roll with snapper tempura, BBQ eel, black caviar served in a special tangy sauce arrived.  There wasn't a 'wow' to them from my taste buds or from the appearance of them.

'To.live.my.life' rates Ginza Sushi with a 3/10 due to the sashimi incident.  Taste and environment were very average, so your experience might not end up to be as bad as mine.

Sushi on 7

It's been years since I have AYCE Japanese food due to my limited interest in Japanese food.  For years when I think of AYCE sushi, it will have to be Sushi on 7 due to the wide varieties and selections of food available.  Today, Miss H Wong aka my sister and I went out for a sister bonding and some sushi at Sushi on 7.  We were there around 6:30 but the restaurant filled up 7pm during dinner time.

We ordered Seaweed Salad, Salmon and White Tuna Sashimi, Tempura, Sashimi Pizza, Soft Shell Crab Roll, Fried Uragi Roll, Green Dragon Roll and Green Tea/Red Bean/Mango ice-cream.  The portions and the freshness of the sashimi were great.  I like the Soft Shell Crab roll because it is rare and I never ordered it in any Jap restaurants before.  This time, I actually thought Sushi on 7 is a pretty standard Chinese-opened all you can eat Jap food restaurant, and nothing more.  In 'to.live.my.life''s opinion, the restaurant did meet the general standards and a rating of 5/10 is given.  In a bias position, sushi is not my favourite and it is believed that the quality of an AYCE restaurant is worst than a normal restaurant.   

Tekka Japanese Restaurant

Thanks to Mr. C.Li for lunch!  Nice catch up time once again, and your 'Sky 9' meal will be on us next time (...or maybe not)!

Tekka Japanese Restaurant, a Japanese restaurant that I will never pass by or have never heard of.  The restaurant is very open and somewhat small once entered.  Even though the waitresses looked Japanese, but the restaurant doesn't give me much of an authentic Japanese restaurant feel, however that's just my opinion.

We ordered a lot for lunch that day!  First, for appetizer, we got Sunomono, it is assorted seafood and cucumber mixed with sweet vinegar sauce.  However, as I remembered I only tasted cucumbers in it.  I didn't taste any seafood, maybe it's because I only had around two bites of it and did not eat the shrimps.

Next, came our rolls. Smoke and Fire Roll - Smoke salmon on shrimp dynamite roll, and Black Dragon Roll - BBQ eel on shrimp tempura and avocado roll.  I am not a big fan of sushi, only the ones that eat with me a lot knows, but I like Tekka's sushi rolls.  Their assortments in their rolls are different and they have a lot of varieties.

18 Pieces Sashimi - There were 9 types of sashimi, each with 2 pieces.  The sashimi varieties were common and are the typical ones from most Japanese restaurants.

After all those, the 4 of us were not full at all.  To end off, we had to order more. The Beef on Skewers, which I can make at home myself, and the Tekka Special Fried Rice, which was pretty expensive and it could also be made at home.

'To.live.my.life' believes that a 7.5/10 is well-deserved for Tekka Japanese Restaurant.   The sushi rolls and sashimi are quite delicious, but what losses points in my mind are the cooked food.