26 March 2012

Takeru Poporo ~ Japanese - Market City, Chinatown

Alison's face lights up like she's a six year old with a McHappy Meal when Japanese spaghetti is suggested for dinner. Japanese spaghetti is like kids' party food for grownups: it's cheesy and fun, but with fish eggs and seaweed.



Takeru Poporo does great Japanese skeddi, it's not high-falutin' cuisine but it tastes good and it's cheap. We particularly like Takeru for their half size menu, you can try more dishes for less dosh, or just have a small cheap meal if you're not a piggy like us. While Takeru's cheesy wacky western dishes are a hoot, we really get a kick out of the more traditional Japanese dishes, much like we did at Takeru's sister store in Sussex street.



Hotate kinoko spaghetti (scallop & mushroom) - $6.10 and Mentaiko spaghetti (spicy cod roe) - $6.50 - both half size. The scallop and mushroom tastes very western, but with the lovely Japanese touches of seseame sprinkles and seaweed on top. Cod roe skeddi is the winner, a little fishy, a little salty, so Japanese, so delicious.



Curry croquette don (dinner box special) - $8.90. Light crunchy mashed potato croquettes on rice with curry sauce on rice. The curry sauce has an unusual tomato bent to it, quite nice. Served with salad, pickles and miso soup. It's not art, but it's good and cheap, and it tastes of Japan.



Half size tonkotsu shoyu ramen - $5.90. The ramen was surprisingly good for a joint that doesn't specialise in it, a great broth and just the right amount of chew on the noodles. Very happy. We wish more ramen joints would do these half sizes, a full serve in some places can be a bit much.



Unagi Tofu Tamagotoji - $13.30. This was described in the menu as 'eel, tofu & scrambled egg' so we had to try it, and we're glad we did. It was delicious with hunks of soft tofu and eel in a classic Japanese sweet dashi\soy\mirin kinda broth with scrambled egg floaties. While eating this Shawn briefly flashed back to Tokyo, unfortunately to the less-than-exciting suburb of Minowa, which is not to discredit the food, more a comment on Shawn's astral-navigation skills.



Unagi doria - $7.90 (half size). We knew that unagi is eel but we had no idea what doria is, so we ordered it. Doria turned out to be rice with a cheesy sauce, see here for more on Doria. A plate of eel, rice and melted cheese may sound like some crazy pregrancy craving, but is was nicer than it should be.



We love Japanese pizza, and we love takoyaki (octopus balls), so we get the takoyaki pizza - $10.90.  A layer of cheese, a few takoyaki and a party of dancing bonito flakes on top. Yum.

Takeru Poporo Japanese restaurant is at Level 3, Market City shopping centre (above Paddy's Markets), next to the food court. Phone 9211 2777. Takeru is also in the city at 339 Sussex Street.



Minowa, Tokyo. Not exciting.

6 comments:

  1. Totally agree about half-sizes too, more places should do it! And Japanese spaghetti is oh so tasty, definitely going to try this out sometime!

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  2. Asian skeddi is the bomb! I so miss the taste of Japan...

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  3. Mushroom is not kiniko but kinoko.
    Anyway, it is good trend that this kind of Japanese daily food gets popular outside Japan too.
    These are magical improvement by the Japanese.
    They not only imitate each country's food but also add some value and do not call themselves as original unlike a race.
    We can distinguish those food such as hotate kinoko spaghetti, curry croquette don, shoyu/tonkotsu ramen, etc as not authentic original food by the name easily.

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    1. Thanks for the corrections!

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    2. ps - we intend to seriously get into Japanese pasta on our next trip to Japan, we think we will find some artful dishes.

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    3. That is great but there are so many kinds of pasta in Japan.
      Which do you do, traditional one, so-called B-class gourmet or magical improved oversea-originated pasta?
      1. Traditional one includes udon, soumen and soba.
      There are 3 famous udon in Japan, Inaniwa of Akita, Kishimen of Nagoya and Sanuki of Kagawa.
      If you distinguish the taste of soba, you can be called gourmet in Japan.
      2. So-called B-class gourmet
      Ramen is profound and Champon of Nagasaki and Sohki soba of Okinawa are tonkotsu based and famous.
      Some areas boast of yaki-soba, grilled ramen noodle.
      3. Magical improved oversea-originated pasta
      Napolitan Spaghetti was inspired from Spagehtti al Pomodoro e Basilico.
      TaiPinEn of Kumamoto was inspired from Chinese noodle.

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Thanks for your comment joy - please keep your musings happy - if you want to complain about a restaurant please do it on a restaurant review site (or your own blog) - we're all about celebrating cultural diversity and the great eats that come along with it :-)

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