Akari @ Marina Boulevard

I met up with my elder sister for lunch at Akari at Marina Boulevard as it was near her office and she liked the food there. Interestingly, apart from a couple of invited food blogger tastings, there doesn't seem much written about this restaurant. While waiting for her, a quick glance at the menu and ahem, prices suggested this was somewhere she, and not me, would suggest to meet for lunch.

Picking out from the lunch menu, I went for the Gindara Saikyou Yaki Set while my sister went for the Nabeyaki Udon Akari. A quick note about the Nabeyaki Udon Akari as I didn’t take a picture of it: the udon was served in a cast iron pot and came with a hugeass king prawn which stayed crisp-crunch as she polished off her udon (I knew because I stole the prawn head, hoho).

Both of us were served an appetizer of the day was diced daikon with miso paste. My set also included an egg mayo that was tasty as it wasn’t drenched in mayo; served alongside an equally pleasing pickled shredded daikon.

My gindara was a piece of cod that had been marinated in saikyo miso (a type of sweet miso) before being grilled. It wasn’t overtly oily which made downing this sizable slab easy peasy.

I can’t wrap my head around it but the rice at Akari is pretty unique. Their rice was sticker than usual, and had seaweed and mushroom strips stirred through it.
The only disappointment was I had expected clams in the miso soup (as depicted in the picture) but I didn’t find any in ‘person’

For dessert, both of us were served a very pleasant peach konnyaku.

For an upscale restaurant, the service and timing can be inconsistent - my sister's nabeyaki udon came a good 15 minutes after my gindara. I thought the food was pretty good but it is pricey and I know very few people who can stomach the bill like my sister who make her salary work hard for her and not the other way round.