Lunch on my own for Friday afternoon and I had cravings for Japanese food. My usual take-out outlet is now closed for good, I can't find any cheap and sort of cheerful alternatives, so it's time I looked around to see if there are any cheap-ish and cheerful Japanese restaurants. I was choosing between two restaurants (one being non-Japanese) and in retrospect I'm actually thankful to have checked this place instead of the other one. I didn't need to wait for a table for one, and I guess as long as you were asking for a table for 4 or less, seats were plentiful. That sounds slightly dodgy, but once I started to look around at the clientele and realised that the staff spoke fluent Japanese to the expat patrons, I was thinking, surely Japanese customers know what they are eating and wouldn't accept knock-offs... I was seated at the bar table, next to a pair of ladies who were talking about their interest in religions, particularly Christianity.

I wasn't quite spoilt for options, but it still took me a while to decide what I wanted to have. Eventually I settled for a Hokahoka Set, which had a bit of everything. Yes, I was in the mood for that. The Set came out about 15 minutes after I had ordered. There was sashimi, tempura, tamago (eggs), deep fried oysters/cheesy cake, pickles, seaweed/dried tofu appetiser, miso soup and a decent bowl of rice to go with everything. The sashimi was nice and fresh, with five chunky pieces in the mix; the deep fried oysters/cheesy cake were nicely fried with a crunchy batter. I squirted lemon juice on them and that was the only piece of flavouring it needed, making the sauce redundant.

The tempura was a bit odd though. While there were vegetables (a strange bitter green bean and eggplant) and shrimp, they poured the tempura sauce over the tempura before it was served, which in turn made the tempura soggy. I'm not a fan of soggy tempura and I think many people share my view, so perhaps they should serve the tempura sauce on the side, possibly in lieu of the sauce for deep fried oyster/cheesy cake.

Nothing special about the tamago, pickles, miso soup and seaweed/dried tofu appetiser - I'm not a big fan of the appetiser so while I ate it nevertheless, I don't have much comment on it.

The meal itself was good to fill me up but I felt I needed something sweet to complete the meal, so I ordered a scoop of green ice cream for an extra $10. Thumbs up for the green tea ice cream. With so many different types of green tea ice cream on the market, this one is wonderful: I had a strong fragrant green tea flavour linger around my throat for a good hour after the meal. Such a delightful ice cream to have.

Lesson of the day: There are very decent sub $100 Japanese set lunches around. This is one of them. I will be back.

Found this Fuel through accident, really. I was waiting for a job interview nearby and was quite early for it, so I decided to have a walk around Landmark and see how I could spend my lai see money. What I didn't realise was that I would spend the first $40 of my lai see on a flat white.

As I wrote early last year about the sublime flat whites they dish out at the IFC joint, Landmark's store did not disappoint either. Like IFC, the brew here was slightly bitter and an entire stick of sugar did not hide the fact that the brew had a subtle yet distinctively bitter taste to it. The foam was stiff and was still standing even after I had poured the sugar in and stirred the drink a good few times. I didn't want to put it to waste so I ate the foam with the teaspoon (oh pinotgris, manners please...)

Flat whites are always a pleasure to drink at Fuel, even though they cost $40 and are served in almost miniature saucers. Oh well, we deserve a treat every now and then.

There is something different between the IFC and Landmark stores, and that is seating. Seating at Landmark deserves a less than favourable mention. Being the less than 5-foot-6 east Asian that I am, I find it difficult to perch comfortably in bar stools, with or without back rests, yet the joint was full of them. I mean, at least I had the choice to sit down in decent chairs at th IFC store, but it seems that place is at such a premium, they can only afford bar stools and unfortunately make things uncomfortable for patrons to stay any longer than 15 minutes.

But I say it's a good thing, because just in case I do get that job, I don't want to make this place my hideout destination...

Lesson of the day: If you want to sit properly, burn more calories and walk to the IFC store; if you are comfortable with bar stools, however, Landmark will do you just fine. I think the staff are also more attentive at the IFC store, but that could just be because of my one pleasant experience.

My official first lunch outing at Metropolis Mall since changing jobs, and I went with my colleague for a pre-CNY lunch celebration of sorts.

The two of us ordered set lunches consisting of vegetable soup, a sole fillet with red curry sauce main dish for her, a chicken fillet with onion sauce for me, and lemon tea for her and coffee for me. It took us a while to capture the attention of the staff at this place, I was finally noticed when I waved my arms frantically, almost looking as though I was drowning in the invisible pool of water.

The food came out at a steady pace. The soup had lots of vegetables in it, which distracted from the fact that the soup was a little bit watery. The garlic bread that went with the soup was dreadful: the slices were thin (less than 1cm thick) and looked more like food scraps than proper feed.

Fortunately the main was a little bit more fulfilling. The chicken fillet was the size of my hand and quite thick too, while the sole fillet was even bigger. Taste wise, the chicken fillet was marinated with thyme and so the chicken had a light taste to it before the onion sauce was drizzled over it. I liked the vegetables - a generous portion of beans, carrots, half a tomato and some eggplants. My colleague decided that she didn't want vegetables as a side dish and asked for spaghetti instead when the dish arrived. The staff then said, "Sure. Let me give you a dish of spaghetti instead" and served us an entree plate of spaghetti. The serving wasn't huge but we were pleased with the extra carbs.

I had a coffee as an after-meal drink. I was expecting a black coffee where I could add my own milk and sugar, but lo and behold out came this cup of foamy, latte-like white coffee instead. The lady said it was one of their signature drinks or something like that, and I tried it with half a packet of raw sugar, with the other half going into my colleague's cup of lemon tea, which she liked. The coffee was quite well done, with a really nice mix of foam, milk, sugar and coffee. I happily spooned the foam into my mouth and enjoyed the small cup of coffee.

To be honest the food isn't top notch quality, and at just over $40 per person there are plenty of options around this neck of the woods, but I'd give a happy face for the sake of the cup of coffee. Strange.

Just stopped by here for lunch, and ordered a Greek salad set meal with a vegetarian samosa.

I could get really picky about the way they heaped in umpteen amounts of sauce in the salad and basically ruined the essence of a Greek salad, but I won't - I'll just say it's a Greek salad with a twist because it actually tastes quite good. The greens are fresh, the feta cheese isn't awfully salty and neither are the olives, although I might complain just a little bit on the lack of tomatoes and olives in relation to the other greens like the leafy vegetables and cucumber. It was a hearty portion and just what I needed after several back-to-back carnivorous meals the day before.

The vegetarian samosa was just what I had in mind. It's the Indian style samosa we're talking about: the large, thick pastry pocket with a potato (starchy) and green peas stuffing - not the paltry triangular, grease-laden pockets with a curry taste in them. Brilliant. It was nice and hot, but not to the point where it burns my lips. It goes really well with the salad and gives me enough starch to last through the rest of the working day.

It would've been nice to throw in some chicken tikka pieces like I did last time at the Lockhart Road Ebeneezer's. Oh well, there's always next time - I'll make sure I come back for some kebabs in the near future.

As with the clientele, I couldn't help but to note that the patrons around me weren't Chinese: Indians, Jewish, Pakistanis etc. Don't ask me how I can distinguish between them though. Hello my Chinese friends, where art thou? The United Nations ambience in Ebeneezer's is indeed a microcosm of the cultural melting pot that is Tsim Sha Tsui and even Hong Kong, and it contributed positively to my eating experience at this joint.

Lesson of the day: Don't write off restaurants just because they look like chain outlets. They could still house the real deal and give you an authentic experience of sorts.

Another comment on Cafe Crema, but this time strictly on its meals.

I wanted to go because of the coffee so we went to Crema for lunch. It turned out to be a decision worse than Lebron James' "The Decision".

We looked around the tables to see what others were ordering: egg salad with greens, pasta with veal and mushroom sauce, spaghetti cabonara and smoked ham and cheese panini. We saw all but the veal pasta and none were convincingly pleasant on the eye - the cabonara looked simply like spaghetti with ham and some white sauce. Since we didn't see the veal pasta, we ordered it along with roasted coffee and a latte.

During our wait we were told they had just run out of veal and asked if we wanted chicken in our pasta instead. We saw no harm (another bad decision) and said we didn't mind.

Out came the pastas. The pasta was disappointing. I tried the mushroom sauce and it was probably some canned mushroom soup thickened up to be a sauce of sorts - it was awfully salty. The pasta had some chew in it, which was alright, but the sauce and chicken were bad combinations. This pasta needed to go with red meat. We made the effort to tell the staff what we felt upon paying the bill, let's hope they'll take our comments seriously because it was really quite foul (and we're not that discerning either).

While I got a cute kitty cat on my latte art, the roast wasn't as aromatic as the one I had at the old store. They almost tasted like two different brews. Not impressed.

This sad face

Lesson of the day: Just stick with coffee and cakes. Crema has earned the respect of many through its coffee but I agree with fellow commenters, saying that the joint's service and quality has taken a dive since moving to its newer, bigger premises. I am happy to stay away from here for a while, even though it means compromising my caffeine intake.