Nadaman     灘萬日本料理  

Although most restaurants used the kanji "懷石料理" to indicate the now well known banquet style of Japanese food, the correct form is actually 会席料理. The former is basically part of the Japanese tea ceremony "茶道". I don't think you'll get the tea ceremony type in a restaurant anyway, so for practical purposes, you could ignore the differences and just treat it as another piece of general knowledge in the information age.

The set menu of a kaiseki ryori is pretty much standardized and depends on what is in season. The idea is similar to set menus in European cuisines, especially French. Being a "philistine", I'm quite skeptical about these sort of "fancy" cuisines which I found to be very stuffy. To my surprise, other than the sashimi which was so-so, the other dishes were pretty good. Like what you'd expect in a normal kaiseki ryori:

1. Appetizers 前菜 (zensai): tofu, two pieces of ginko (which were surprisingly good) and some gooey thing inside a nice glass.
2. Soup 吸い物 (sui mono): This was quite good. A very light seafood broth with a distinct citrus flavour. Very refreshing.
3. Sashimi set 刺身: The sashimi set was so-so. My wife and I did not like it.
4. Simmered/Stewed food 煮物 (ni mono): I remembered it was a type of vegetables stew.
5. Grilled seafood - usually fish 焼き物 (yakimono): The fish here was mackerel. (青花魚- 鯖- sabaさば ) The timing was very good.
6. Fried food - usually tempura 揚げ物 (agemono): The shrimp tempura was quite small, as usual for kaiseki, but was OK.
7. Steamed food 蒸し物 (mushimono): We had steamed egg. The quality was really good.
8. Pickled vegetables 酢の物 (sunomono): Can't remember. Usually standard stuff.
9. RIce, Miso Soup with more pickled vegetables ご飯 (gohan) ‧汁 物 (sirumono) ‧香の物 (koumono): My wife liked the rice. I can't remember it.
10. Fruits 果物 (kudamono): I remembered they gave us some ice cream.

I ordered the hot sake to go with the food. That was OK.

We went in last minute, believe it or not - at Christmas eve, and still managed to secure a table for two. Other than the strong light which was a bit hard on the eyes, it was comfortable and spacious with a very high ceiling .

The service was quite nice. To my utter surprise, it wasn't stuffy at all. In fact, it was on the casual side. Everyone was pleasant and made customers feel pretty comfortable.

It was about HK$950 per head on Christmas eve for a pretty decent kaiseki ryori. The price was actually very reasonable for a kaiseki ryori in such a setting (and I'm not being sarcastic)!

All in all, I'd suggest trying sets without a heavy leaning towards sashimi. Other than that, this place is surely worth a try.

P.S. It's true that you'll have to pre-order KFC chicken for Christmas day in Japan. Apparently, the chicken breasts are the largest piece of poultry you could find there (to replace turkey).

Went here on a late Sunday evening, so there was no wait time at all. We were seated immediately upon arrival. The manager noticed that I was cold due to the strong air conditioning and kindly provided a shawl for me. After seeing how appealing the teppanyaki menu was, we wanted to change seats, and the staff did so for us with no problems.

We decided on the set teppanyaki courses that were 680 HKD and 780 HKD (the 780 one had one more course of sole meuniere and lobster, but no beef). Here were some of the highlights of the meal:

- Very nice and calming Japanese tea
- Appetisers of deep fried lotus root crisps and some greens - quite lovely
- Sole meuniere that was served in a copper tin. The fish was perfectly cooked without being overdone; it was soft and silky. However, I didn't quite appreciate the sauce which was buttery and slightly too bitter from the alcohol.
- Green salad - a refreshing palate cleanser for the "mains." I liked the soy based dressing.
- There was a choice between sirloin or tenderloin, and I went for the latter. It was a really big portion, enough to feed 2 people! It was melt-in-your-mouth, soft, meaty goodness. Not stringy or chewy or fatty at all. Thumbs up for superb high quality beef cooked in a superb just-perfect way. I really enjoyed the garlic soy-based dipping sauce, and the mustard sauce was heavenly with the beef!
- Fried rice - texture was perfect. The grains were not separable, but joined together nicely with the scrambled egg. Hot and satisfying, but I found it slightly too oily.
- Miso soup - very flavourful, not overly salty
- I loved the greens. They were young and not stringy. Ate them without the dipping sauce, and they were delicious.
- Ice cream dessert - I chose the sesame flavour. Wow, it was different from other sesame ice creams I've tried. The sesame flavour was very pronounced, and there were actually whole white sesame seeds in the ice cream. Very yummy, and a perfect ending to this grand meal!

Definitely more than enough food to feed one person. It was pricy, but you pay for top-quality food and service. I will gladly bring my friends and family to this place again.

Nadaman has been one of my favorite Japanese restaurants in Hong Kong for several years now. it consistently provides delicious and fresh food and great service.

The atomosphere of the restaurant is peaceful, and if you are seated at a window seat in the corner, it feels like you are dining in the treetops. The manager has been most helpful and so friendly, always ready and willing to give suggestions and recommendations. The service staff is also so friendly and always smiling, they will remember repeat customers and make you feel very welcome there. I also enjoy their traditional Japanese dresses, it's a small touch to add to the overall authentic atmosphere of the restaurant.

I usually order a different set each time I go, to get myself to try more and more dishes. I would love to dine there daily to be able to sample each and every dish as it rotates seasonally.

On this particular dining experience, my husband and I sat at the teppanyaki bar and ordered the chef's special set lunch. The starters are always so fresh and inviting, so delicately presented in such beautiful dishes and with such a fine and delicate touch. We then had a delcious soft shell crab hand roll which melted in your mouth. We nearly fought over the last piece, it was so tasty.

The chef then came out to prepare a delicious stewed fish dish that was served directly in the copper pot from cooking. It was served with deliciously browned onions and prepared with a special Japanese liquor to bring out a sweet and tangy flavor. It was so delcious, I used my spoon to get to every drop of sauce. We also had some prawns which were so sweet and fresh, they needed nothing on top of them.

Then the chef prepared very thinly sliced beef wrapped around minced garlic and spices. You can dip the beef rolls into mustard or other dipping sauces provided. Alternating between sauces and using no sauce gives you a different flavor each time. I cannot remember how many of these little rolls we were served, but we had some left over, because it seemed like the food was endless.

Fresh fried rice with egg followed, with some gently sauteed vegetables. We accompanied our amazing lunch with a great bottle of sake, so by this point, I was in a Japanese dream.

Fresh mango pudding with a perfect little dallop of fresh cream to finish. I would seriously go back if only for this dessert. So fresh, so light and so simple.

Nadaman is always a great choice for dining. We always leave happy and already thinking of when we'll go back again.

P.S. This foodie never takes a camera to a restaurant. I'd rather enjoy the moment and not stop before each course to take a perfect picture. Enjoy the food --- live in the moment!

Nadaman has always been my favourite japanese fine dining place in HK. The first time I had dinner here was a year ago on my birthday as a treat by my boyfriend. I was so impresed by the food and have been missing the 'clay pot boiled rice' that I had last time since then. This time I and my boyfriend decided to go back for dinner to celebrate my promotion.

The highlights of Nadaman should be:

- their menu changes from time to time to make sure only food that is of the season is featured in the menu

- it goes without saying that the food is perfectly done. I can tell the chef has invested effort in choosing the way to cook each dish

- their kaseki is very delicate, uses only the best food of the season and always manages to give me a warm and touching feeling.

We tried their newly designed February kaseki set dinner. I think Kaseki is so attractive because they only have one or two pieces of each food such that you always feel like you have not had enough of it.The first course was this tofu with sea urchin on top. The sea urchin was of course very fresh, very sweet with very meaty texture. Great! The tofu was not a simple tofu. It tasted much more chewy than plain tofu so we suspected that the chef mixed japanese rice cake with tofu to make this chewy yummy thing.These three dishes were very refreshing. The one on the right top corner is some wasabi-made sauce mixed vegetables. I do not eat wasabi at all (I do not even add wasabi to soy sauce dip for sashimi) but i loved this dish because it had a very fresh hint of wasabi that was just enough to start our appetitide w/o giving out the strong choking taste of wasabi that I hate Sashimi! None of the fish was the usual sashimi that we normally found in other Jap restaurants in hk... I believe the chef especially chose these three types because they were of the right season now! Very fresh and sweet taste~ yummy! Hot pot seafood soup! The miso soup base was very clear and sweet! they have fish, shrimp, crab meat and fish sperm in this dish (one piece each). The best was the fish sperm thing - how should I describe it? imagine eating fish tummy (kua jia), just that this fish sperm thing was much more smooth and much more tasty. I just loved it so much! After I had a first bite, I couldnt help asking a waitress what that was. She nicely told us that it's the sperm of a type of fish and was only available in early spring . According to her, Japanese family loves to cook this as part of the new year feast.Grilled japenses beef. ho yummy r~ each slice was very thin and had the right amount of fat such that when we put the meat inside our mouth, it just slided down our throat without much chewing effort. It gave a great beefy after taste and still not oily at all. I believe I had this same dish one year ago as well. I think this is going to be another dish that I will always miss~Clay pot boiled rice! My all-time-favourite! I still remember last time I had this dish, right after I put the first bit of rice into my mouth, I was so impressed and felt so warm! The only difference was that the rice last time was cooked with small clam meat and this time it's cooked with bamboo shoots. Well both were great! The rice was very warm and had the right amount of moisture that each piece of rice was kind of stick to each other but nevertheless they were not clummed together - you could still taste each piece of rice but the texture was so soft! Red bean soup with rice cake ball. The red bean soup was the sweetest red bean soup I had ever tasted. After having this spledid Japanese red bean sweet soup, I felt like all those Chinese red bean sweet soup that we had are not red bean soup at all! but anyway it's also a bit too sweet and too thick that I could not finish the whole thing.

Anyway the whole night was very delightful, as perfect as I expected. I believe, in terms of food quality and service, Nadaman is definitely a fine dining place. However, one thing that is not at all satisfactory is the table arrangement. I must say the tables are too close to each other such that I could easily hear what the persons behind me are talking. This is probably something that is not acceptable for a 'fine dining place'. I think it could be a good idea if Nadaman can consider having a more spacious arrangement of tables to offer a more comfortable dining place for the customers.

But we will definitely come back for another special occassion! and in the meantime, I will be missing the clay pot boiled rice and the grilled jap beef~

For a business lunch Nadaman is definitely a popular location, being one of not many options in Admiralty. We managed to secure a table for 1.30pm booking the day before,and we arrived promptly to be greeted by two ladies in very pretty kimonos.

After some time of looking through the menu, I was stuck between a couple of lunch sets, but in the end went for the Hana set ($390), whilst my dining partner went for the Beef Teriyaki set ($390).

In the Hana set:
Appetizer - Cold Spinach in a light stock - simple, tasty, I wanted more!

Sashimi - There were two types of fish and sweet shrimp. All were fresh and especially the shrimps which were quite large and juicy.

Miso Soup - The miso soup here was not salty despite the dark brown colour, but very boring. I think if they added something - negi or mushrooms or even diced tofu it would've brightened up the soup a little....

Chawanmushi - One of the best! The cream-yellow coloured custard was silky smooth and there was a fresh bouncy prawn inside along with some sliced mushroom. Lightly flavoured and delicious. The china spoon they gave you to spoon it with was also really nice.

Cod - Arrived looking quite dark and unfortunately slightly over-cooked, so the cod didn't flake as easily. Nonetheless the sweet and salty marinade was quite balanced and the fish went really well with the rice =)

Tempura - I was most disappointed by the tempura I was served. It looked nice - thin batter and all, but none of the pieces out of okra, eggplant, shiitake, 2 shrimps and eel had that light crispiness I was looking for... Rather, they were quite oily and the pieces I let sit for a while had an unappealing chewy texture.

Rice - The rice was no less than chewy, sticky and plump Japanese rice - perfectly cooked.

Dessert - assorted fruits in a jelly. A light sweet ending, but definitely can improve on the appearance - it was a glob of jelly spread on k top of diced fruit in a wine glass....

As for the beef teriyaki, it came medium as requested, and the set came with the same spinach appetizer and also an all-greens salad and miso soup. Although I didn't get to try any of it, I was told it was good and very substantial.

The hit-and-misses in my hana set definitely disappointed me a little, but the hits were excellent. Nadaman has a good reputation with manyi, so I'll be back to see if it was just an unlucky day!

This was possibly the most delicate meal in HK of jap cusine.

We have ordered 2 sets of seasonal kaiseki ryori . Our meal opened with appertizer. It was served within a set of delicate covered porcelain dish. I was stuck by the beauty and also the taste. Especially the agemono (agedashi tofu), that was a deep fried bean curd with crab meat. It was impressive how they managed to get light crispy tofu coating with crab meat paste filled inside.

Raw sashimi served not bad either, with nama wasabi by side.

Overall speaking, dishes can harmonize seasons, colour and taste very well. Worthwhile to taste

There is no doubt in my mind that this is one of the best Japanese restaurant in HK. Both the Tenshin (dim sum) and Lady's sushi set were exquisitely presented and represent Japanese cuisine at its very best. All the ingredients were super fresh and cooked just right. A true Japanese feast for the eye as well as for the palate !

(Note that the Tenshin set lunch also included a bowl of rice with 白飯魚, a miso soup and a small dish of appetizer, apart from what was shown in the photo)

Considering the high quality of the food, the nice environment and the 5-star hotel restaurant service, we think that the meal is a real bargain. We will definitely be back to try the 懷石料理 later.

This place is no doubt the best Japanese restaurant in HK, especially, their teppanyaki section. all the chefs are skilled in what to are cooking.

Best show is if u don't like oil, the whole meal could be done without a hint of oil, but only oil from the meat itself and other food items. Really healthy and oishi!!

Their sushi/sashimi not bad either, sitting at tables or sushi counter (of course, sushi counter is the best place for sushi as u can get crispier nori - temaki and maki). I think it's much better than Kenjo in TST. Ambience is better, it's less greasier..

The only comment I would say is that they are a bit understaffed in particular to the number of teppanyaki chefs versus number of tables.

Great service extended by the floor staff.