Tarafuku Japanese Buffet (313 Somerset)

Tarafuku Japanese Buffet is located at 313 Somerset and is part of the Tampopo Group. If you are thinking Liang Court, Shabu Shabu Black Pig, Tonkatsu Ramen and Matcha Chiffon Cake, you are on the right track!

Price List

Visited the restaurant on a Saturday for dinner. So per person it will be $27.80++. They have increased the price as of 18th Feb 2011. Previously, dinner on a Saturday night would have cost $25.80++.

The place was brightly lit decorated with japanese umbrellas hanging on the ceiling.

There is free flow shabu shabu for dinner only.

Hot pot for shabu shabu.

Thinly sliced, this was good! We ordered several helpings of this.

Selection of raw items to accompany the shabu shabu

Selection of vegetables, mushrooms, meat, fishballs and also prawns for the hot pot. Prawns were fresh! Also, there is miso soup at the extreme left of the picture.

Salad Selections

Very few selections for their salad section. The other half of the counter was for desserts. A must try item here is the potato salad.

Sashimi

They have Sashimi, Tuna and in the middle I think it is yellow tail.

Oddly and disappointedly, there was no alasakan crab! What happened to it? I have no idea, but earlier reviews clearly showed that there was alasakan crab. Ironically, with a price increase this item is missing..

Sushi

Chawanmushi

Chawanmushi was soft and smooth. I would have gone for more helpings of this if not for the fact that it was too salty.

Fried spaghetti and fried rice

Shishamo (middle) was not fresh.

The chicken wings (left) was delicious.

Tasty egg with runny yolk only downside was that it was cold.

Soft Shell Crab

You can order Soft Shell Crab which tastes great when it is hot. Ordered several servings of this.

Tofu

You can also order tofu too. Taste great, ordered extra helpings of this too.

Ramen

Ordered a small bowl of ramen. Can’t remember what ramen this was. It was average.

Dessert Selections

The desserts were average. No Matcha Chiffon Cake, maybe the top right was meant to be a small piece of the matcha chiffon cake. But it pale in comparison to the one I ate at Tampopo.

Ice cream

The green tea ice cream was good. The sesame ice cream (not in picture) was way too strong.

Lots of misses and few hits. The delicious items were the potato salad, chicken wings, shabu shabu and its selection such as prawns. Service wise, the staff were mostly foreigners, it was hard to communicate with them. One of them even took our bill to the next table and despite the person saying that he had a ready paid, the waiter could not understand. Overall, I find it a tad too expensive. Not sure if I will be back. If you do try it, let me know whats nice and also if the alasakan crab are being served.

Tarafuku Japanese Buffet
313 Orchard Road
#B3-31/34, 313 @ Somerset
Tel: 6634 0889
Opening Hours: Daily 11.30am – 10pm
Website: http://www.cfc.com.sg/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/TARAFUKU/268831277561?sk=info 

Tampopo (Takashimaya) 2nd Post

It was about 7pm on a Sunday night. Surprisingly, there was no queue. Maybe everyone went back early to rest as there was work the next day.

Kyushu Ramen $13.50

As usual, the egg yolk was still runny when u break it into half. Can’t really remember much about it as we ate this quite long ago. But i remember that i contains 2 pieces of pork and each piece was lined with fats.

Tonkatsu Ramen $15.90

Felt that the Tonkatsu Ramen which i ate in the previous post was better than this time. Maybe the reason was because, I only ate a few mouthfuls. This time, its the whole bowl to myself. Felt that it was quite spicy halfway through.

Felt that the layer of flour this time was much thicker than in the first post. Another reason why I felt that the earlier post’s Tonkatsu Ramen was nicer. But still a decent Tonkatsu!

Scoop Cake $6.00

Tried Scoop Cake this time round. Prefer the Matcha Chiffon Cake. Main reason is that the scoop cake had too much cream. Beside having a thick layer of cream on top, there was another layer in the middle. The cream was surprisingly nice. Normally, we would not eat the cream, but this time we did!(still I do not think eating cream is healthy and is fattening) And also, am not a fan of strawberry. I think both she and I had our ate our entire lifetime of strawberries in Cameron Highlands earlier this year. Ok, should be she, as she ate most of the strawberries as I refuse to eat them and only ate one or two while she ate almost the whole basket.. Take the cream and strawberry out of the equation, the cake is fantastic. Its very soft and with pieces of orange in between.

As for refill of water, its always the same guy who goes around refilling water for all the patrons inside. The rest of the staff does not refill water for customers, unless its requested for. I just wanna say kudos to this guy as it is this type of little things that seems trivial that makes the difference.

Tampopo Restaurant (Takashimaya)
B2-33 Takashimaya Shopping Centre
Tel: 6235 2318

Tampopo (Takashimaya)

There was a queue outside Tampopo which we expected as it was a Saturday afternoon. Waited about 15minutes. Thought will have to wait longer, lucky us.

Tonkatsu Ramen $15.90

I am not sure what makes a ramen good. Personally, the soup and ramen were not bad. The star was the Tonkatsu! Crispy n the outside, it is not oily. And the it was not too thick. Nice!

Tasty egg $1.80

Look at the egg yolk, still runny. Wish they at least heat up the egg as the egg was cold and abit expensive at $1.80.

Black Pig Deluxe Shabu Ramen $15.30

took some black pig up to the top

The black pig was shiok, thin slices with melt in the mouth sensation. Ramen and soup was not too bad either.

Matcha Chiffon Cake $5.80

I came here for the black pig, but I think the highlight is this Matcha Chiffon Cake! Its very nice, try it. The azuki bean in it was heavenly, if only more was added.

Service was good. Water was refilled promptly without any need to request for a refill. Moreover, you do not need to wait too long for the food to arrive, although it was full house.

Tampopo Restaurant (Takashimaya)
B2-33 Takashimaya Shopping Centre
Tel: 6235 2318
Opening Hours: Daily 11am – 10pm
Website: http://www.cfc.com.sg/