ShinnSato Okinawa Cuisine

Checked out the new-to-me ShinnSato Okinawa Cuisine at Orchard Plaza. Okinawan food is wayyy too familiar to me. I literally ate these styles of food growing up — soba, tofu, bittergourd and pork slices — these are still my comfort food today. Whyyy... I dunno. My Japanese heritage on the paternal side of the family doesn't hail from Okinawa. 

Bittergourd chips appeared. I was so pleased with the stir-fried bittergourd and pork. I could have that and a bowl of rice, and called it a night! It's got those homecooked flavors which I love, and it's a dish I can do well, and mine isn't inferior when compared to this version. Yay. 

If you're not a fan of bittergourd, there're plenty of other things on the menu to munch on. The yakisoba was surprisingly tasty; this version was more savory than sweet. Nice! The Okinawa soba uses wheat flour instead of buckwheat. The tamago went well with the yakisoba. There was banana fish! Okay, ordered that — it's a prefectural fish called gurukun グルクン (double-lined fusilier) that's always deep fried, served whole with lemon. 

There was the stewed braised pork belly (角煮, kakuni) , which of course leaned sweet. This iteration in either Chinese (紅燒肉/東坡肉, hong shao rou/dong po rou) or as this Japanese version always taste sweet. Dohhh. Had to order the peanut tofu (jimami tofu, もちもちピーナッツ豆腐). I love Okinawa tofu because it has got less soybeans in them. Heh.

We also had tempura of prawn and corn. The man ordered some beef tacos thingy that we were all iffy about. Hahaha. I skipped it, and skipped the negitoro maki too. I needed space for my pork onigiri, which is effectively spam and egg onigiri!

I love meals like this with friends. Sure, we can do fancy. But with friends we see often, we can do any type of meal. These are the best — they're comfortable to chill out at, and comforting to the soul.