On this particular night (still in 2013 ><), me and Bun walked pass this restaurant called "Harajuku Gyoza" at Potts Point. What comes into your mind when you thought of "Harajuku" (a place in Tokyo)? The first thing come up to my mind is fun, a place that's full of creativity and vibrant culture, and somewhere with loads of unique surprises. So when we saw this huge Kawaii ("cute" in Japanese) dumpling character on its exterior wall, we thought it would be cool to check it out!
The restaurant is actually in "Izakaya" style (a casual Japanese place for after-work drinking, usually attended by businessmen), with a bunch of bar chairs surrounding the centre (cooking area) and a few tables scattered around the room. The whole restaurant was mainly decorated in black and red colours, giving that modern and mysterious feeling. The staffs were very friendly and attentive (notice the kitchen staff doing the "peace sign" in the last picture? LOL), and the food actually came pretty quick.
We found those photos printed on the plates :)
Here are the sauces of soy sauce, vinegar and chilli oil. I prefer to use these separately although you should combine all 3 together to get the best flavour.
Pork Belly Kakuni $13.00
This is one of their popular dishes, and it came in 4 chunky pieces on the plate. Our first impression of this dish was...SO JUICY! It was absolutely fulfilling. We loved how the fat took up half or more of the proportion, yet the whole bite didn't feel too oily at all. It was a really good dish to accompany a bottle of beer too!
Pork Gyoza (poached) 5pcs $8.00
Since we were getting the Lobster Tail Gyoza as grilled, we decided to pick a poached set of Gyoza. This little dish of Pork Gyoza certainly allowed us to enjoy and appreciate the ultimate combination of the sauces. Personally, my favourite is still the chilli oil ^^
Lobster Tail Gyoza $12.00
The name attracted our attention, as we were curious of what it would taste like. We found the lobster tail was a little bit light in terms of flavours, although it was nice and chewy. To us, we probably still preferred Gyoza with whole loads of meat + vegetable inside, so we actually liked the pork Gyoza more than this one.
This will be a pretty cool place to hang out after work for drinks, or for those who don't have too much time and just wants to fill the stomach in a rapid speed. I loved how they can incorporate such a cute dumpling character to be the logo of the restaurant and how creative their Gyozas were. For a personal comment: I think the grilled Gyoza always tasted more interesting than the poached version!
PS: For our next post, I will write about my first home-made Gyoza with recipe (Yes, thanks to the inspirations from Harajuku Gyoza!!!) ^^
Address:
9-15 Bayswater Road, Potts Point NSW 2011
Phone number:
02 9356 3834
Opening time:
7 days - midday to late for lunch and dinner
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