Shiranui
247 Springvale Road Glen Waverley VIC 3150
03 9886 7755

Last May, we went to Tokyo and experienced Sushi Dai at the Tsukiji fish market.  We ordered the Omakase sushi set and leave it up to the chef to give us the best seafood of the day, complete with instructions: “Soy.” “no soy” “wasabi and soy” “wasabi”.  Oh how I missed that experience!  When one of my friend heard me whinging, he asked me “Have you tried Shiranui?  I reckon they have the best sushi in town! ”

So here I am, at Shiranui.  At the counter that seats about 13 people, we ordered the Omakase menu.  For approximately $90 you get 9 types of different sushi.  You get two per serve and you can order more if you like.

First comes the King Dory with subtle citrus flavour and served with a mound of fish roe.  Fantastic texture, really REALLY fresh fish.

Next, the chefs went blowtorch happy and presented us with seared salmon, sprinkled with Shichimi tagarashi (7 flavoured chilli pepper).  Don’t worry it’s not that chilli but it certainly added another dimension of flavour to that salmon.

Mackerel was next, and I am honestly wanting that blow torch right now cos it seemed to make everything taste charcoaly and awesome

We were then presented with this fatty piece of beef that is so succulent, so full of flavour of soy and sake, that I instantly decided that this would be my favourite dish.

However more dishes are coming, like this ark shell that has amazing crunchy texture, my mind went blank with pleasure.

Tuna steak sushi was lightly seared also, and Chef Hiro happily told us that as the tuna today is quite fatty, it was taste good.  Good, no.  Spectacular- that’s more like it.

As I previously said, the chefs are pretty much trigger happy tonight and the ocean trout is also blow torched and seasoned with a bit of pepper and lemon to cut the fat.  However I find this fish wayyyy too fatty and my stomach is starting to protest.

King fish belly was next, and although I expected this to be really fatty, it was surprisingly mild and sweet.  The king fish belly was served raw and it is extremely fresh also.

The oyster sushi is the grand finale under the 9 course omakase, deep fried with mayo, the meat was then pulled out to make into a “ship”.  Whilst everyone raved about this dish on blogs, I find one of the oysters not very fresh, however the other was fine and it was oozing with Japanese mayo goodness.

The boys are still hungry so we told them to bring on another dish- seared scallops with river fish sauce made into a “ship”.  I like the flavour of this sushi but unfortunately the scallops were overcooked.

They gave us a bit of sobet and fruit for dessert, which was also a fantastic palate cleanser.  We felt like a more substantial dessert, so hubby ordered cream cheese crepes and I ordered Japanese fruit salad with icecream and rice cakes.

The cream cheese crepes were fantastic.  Soft pillowy parcels of crepes, not very sweet though quite rich of creamy cheesy flavours.  It came with a bowl of small fruit salad and cubes of sesame icecream which cuts the richness.  The seasame icecream was a highlight, it has a strong toasted nutty flavour just burst out, demanding my full attention.  YUM.

My Japanese fruit salad is really just strawberries and melons cut into small chunks, sweetened with red bean paste and cubes of vanilla and green tea icecream.  It’s nothing special but I do like rice cakes which is why I ordered it in the first place.

Overall, the food was great.  Whether it’s value for money on the other hand, well… I don’t know…the bill came to $107 per person and that’s a LOT of money for 20 pieces of sushi and dessert.  The service is a bit iffy also… it started off well, we got greeted enthusiastically, but then when the food got served, one bit of the seared salmon broke off from one of the sushi, they took it away and I thought they are going to make a new one for hubby, but they just kinda pick up the broken piece and shove it back on to the sushi and tie it with a piece of seaweed.  Sadness.

Also as there’s 2 seating they started reminding us from 7:45pm onwards that we have 15 mins, then we have 10 mins, then we have 5 mins left.  It just felt a bit stressful considering we paid so much for a meal.  I would give 8/10 for food, 5/10 for value and 4/10 for service.  Overall, a 6/10.

Thanks you Esky for providing the food porn photos.  He came to our house and went “I’ve got porn for you” and I got a bit shocked LOL then I quickly realised what he was talking about.