dinner date
To celebrate the end of term for me (last day of work, although there's still grading and various other things to do) and the start of J's birthday weekend, I headed to town after class to meet J for a long awaited dinner date. Just the two of us, since my mother was babysitting The Bun. I was early, so I had a nice time browsing the shops by myself and marveling at how good it felt to be walking about on my own, following my own agenda, and just being by myself again. When one's a parent, one can't help but notice other parents and their offspring, and each time I saw them I felt so good to be (temporarily) free. I really need to do this more; when I do have free time I can't help but cram it full of errands and meetings and I don't spend enough time just being alone and aimless.
As we usually do when we want to indulge ourselves, J and I decided to have Japanese food. Dinner was at Fukuichi, a Japanese restaurant that we had heard about, located at Triple One Somerset. We ordered the omakase and it turned out to be a great way to taste the different types of dishes served in the restaurant. There were seven courses in total: two cold appetisers, a sashimi selection, a king prawn tempura, an amazing beef skewer slathered in foie gras sauce, a round of sushi, and dessert.
Crab tofu with century egg sauce; sashimi platter
Fukuichi is the dining arm of a century-old Japanese fishery corporation, so they have based their reputation on high quality fish. The sashimi platter was small, but the fish was thickly sliced and the tuna belly melted perfectly in my mouth. The other good appetiser was their crab tofu with century egg sauce - smooth with large chunks of crab and the egg sauce nicely balanced with enough of a wasabi kick. I was scraping my bowl clean with that one.
The ebi tempura was also good - each of us had one large king prawn each, covered in a batter instead of the usual panko coating. I guess the batter offered a bit more heft to balance the size of the prawn, and I actually enjoyed the extra crunch it offered. After one gets through the entire prawn, it's time to munch the head, deep-fried to a delicious crisp.
Funnily enough, the real standout dish for me wasn't the fish (although the sashimi was very good), but the meat. J and I each had a skewer with three cubes of beef that had been grilled with a generous sprinkling of salt and black pepper, then slathered with a foie gras sauce that complemented the meat perfectly. The beef was succulent and tender, and when eaten together with the sauce, melted into a wonderful puddle of umami.
We drank more than half a litre of sake between the two of us and talked non-stop. It has been so long since I was able to have a long conversation without The Bun's constant interruptions that I had almost forgotten what it felt like. We even managed not to discuss The Bun all night, save for a couple of silly anecdotes about him. It helped that I had come from work, not housework, and so I managed to shrug off the mental fog that creeps up on you when you spend the entire day caring for a toddler.
After dinner we took a short walk around town and then headed back for curfew to get The Bun home for his bedtime. He apparently had great fun at his grandparents' house - eating plenty, terrorising the dog, and playing with his grandfather's iPad. He didn't even want to go home, and finally slept past his bedtime at 11pm. Too bad we can't quite wrangle an overnight stay for him yet - now that would really be something!
As we usually do when we want to indulge ourselves, J and I decided to have Japanese food. Dinner was at Fukuichi, a Japanese restaurant that we had heard about, located at Triple One Somerset. We ordered the omakase and it turned out to be a great way to taste the different types of dishes served in the restaurant. There were seven courses in total: two cold appetisers, a sashimi selection, a king prawn tempura, an amazing beef skewer slathered in foie gras sauce, a round of sushi, and dessert.
Crab tofu with century egg sauce; sashimi platter
Fukuichi is the dining arm of a century-old Japanese fishery corporation, so they have based their reputation on high quality fish. The sashimi platter was small, but the fish was thickly sliced and the tuna belly melted perfectly in my mouth. The other good appetiser was their crab tofu with century egg sauce - smooth with large chunks of crab and the egg sauce nicely balanced with enough of a wasabi kick. I was scraping my bowl clean with that one.
The ebi tempura was also good - each of us had one large king prawn each, covered in a batter instead of the usual panko coating. I guess the batter offered a bit more heft to balance the size of the prawn, and I actually enjoyed the extra crunch it offered. After one gets through the entire prawn, it's time to munch the head, deep-fried to a delicious crisp.
Funnily enough, the real standout dish for me wasn't the fish (although the sashimi was very good), but the meat. J and I each had a skewer with three cubes of beef that had been grilled with a generous sprinkling of salt and black pepper, then slathered with a foie gras sauce that complemented the meat perfectly. The beef was succulent and tender, and when eaten together with the sauce, melted into a wonderful puddle of umami.
We drank more than half a litre of sake between the two of us and talked non-stop. It has been so long since I was able to have a long conversation without The Bun's constant interruptions that I had almost forgotten what it felt like. We even managed not to discuss The Bun all night, save for a couple of silly anecdotes about him. It helped that I had come from work, not housework, and so I managed to shrug off the mental fog that creeps up on you when you spend the entire day caring for a toddler.
After dinner we took a short walk around town and then headed back for curfew to get The Bun home for his bedtime. He apparently had great fun at his grandparents' house - eating plenty, terrorising the dog, and playing with his grandfather's iPad. He didn't even want to go home, and finally slept past his bedtime at 11pm. Too bad we can't quite wrangle an overnight stay for him yet - now that would really be something!