The tie that binds…

It was the day before Melissa left home to go back to Sungai Petani…and seeing how she would grumble about the sushis at the place there where she and her friends would go whenever they felt like having some Japanese food, I decided to take her here…

…that day for lunch.

I had the teriyaki chicken bento set (RM13.90)…

…which came with this very nice plate of chicken…

…a piece of tofu, done Japanese style and miso soup, other than the rice and the fruit – two miserably-thin slices of not-very-nice honeydew melon. I enjoyed the chicken very much and the sauce went well with the rice but it is quite obvious that the bento sets that we had at this other place in town were much nicer and cheaper too.

Melissa had their teriyaki salmon bento set (RM13.90)…

…and she said that the salmon she had at that other place was nicer but of course, that one was a lot more expensive and was a dish by itself, not a bento set…so it would not be very fair to make a comparison between the two.

My missus had the yakitori bento set (RM13.90)…

…and if you ask me, I would say that they’re chicken kebabs. LOL!!! They were nice though so due credit must be given for that.

Other than those sets that we had, I also ordered these that were served on red dishes (RM4.30 each), their unagi baby fish sushi…

…and their soft shell crab…

…and this one on an orange dish (RM4.90)…

I liked the one with the soft shell crab…but the baby fish one was extremely salty and what they called baby fish turned out to be fried ikan bilis (dried anchovies)…or at least, that was what we thought they were.

Green tea was RM1.30 a glass, hot or cold – it came free with the bento sets that we had the other day…and I was quite put off by the fact that they have been in business for years and their business has always been very good but they still do not accept credit cards – cash terms only. If eating there is cheap and the total is not that substantial, I can jolly well understand but that unfortunately is not the case.

It did not help one bit either that they actually collect 5% service charge on the total in your bill. Service? Given a choice, I certainly would not want to give a sen to that short and fat rolly-polly sour puss of a cashier – Miss Congeniality, she definitely isn’t! Tsk! Tsk! Where friendly and polite service and everything else is concerned, I would definitely say that the other place wins hands down…and I certainly would not consider it good service when they opened for business at around 11.40-11.45 a.m. when it is stated very clearly outside that business hours begin at 11.30 a.m. every day.

Besides, I do feel that they should think about having more spacious cubicles for plus-sized people like me (who usually would eat more)…

…and if they want people to order what is on their menu, they would have to think twice about calling it “kanasai” (like shit)…

I, for one, would get quite put off by that somewhat peculiar sense of humour.

Well, never mind the more expensive tab and the grouchy faces and all, at least the food was good enough and Melissa enjoyed the lunch – that was all that mattered…but we certainly would think twice about going there again.