- Authentic cuisine from Japanese prefecture Okinawa
- Specialties include Okinawan soba and beancurd, purple sweet potato and simmered pork belly
I love Japan but I hardly know anything about Okinawa, a Japanese prefecture that is made up of more than 150 islands located miles south of Tokyo in the East China Sea and is closer to Taiwan than it is to the Japanese mainland.
Thus it was with much anticipation when a cell group mate chose Okinawan Diner Nirai-Kanai at Great World City for our April fellowship dinner (and this was just days before Okinawa was in the news as it was affected by the massive earthquake that hit Taiwan on April 3).
Besides popular Japanese dishes the likes of sushi and sashimi, Okinawa has a few local foods that are uniquely its own and Nirai-Kanai’s menu is filled with them.
These include Okinawan soba and tofu, goya chanpuru (stir fry dishes with bitter gourd) and purple sweet potato, just to name a few.
Okinawan Grub & Grog
The extensive Nirai-Kanai menu is chockful of big and small dishes of all kinds. There are starters ($6.50-$14), salads and carpaccio ($6.50-$18), chanpura and stir-fry dishes ($7-$14.80), various meat dishes including pork and fish ($8-$18), deep fried dishes ($5.80-$17), soup and cold noodles ($7.60-$14.80), rice and flour dishes ($6.50-$16), soups ($6-$10) and desserts ($3.50-$9.80). There are also sashimi (from $12.80) and set meal items (from$16.50).
Drinks-wise, besides fruit juices ($4-$5), hot and cold beverages ($4) and free-flow roasted barley tea ($1.20/$1.90), there’s a wide range of Okinawan and Japanese shochu (traditional hard liquor), as well as hot and cold sake.
Three out of our gang of eight decided to have beer: I went for an Orion draft beer ($9.60, pictured above), while the other two went for Fruit Beers ($9.60), one calamansi and one pink guava.
Born and brewed in Okinawa, Orion with its bright yellow hue and a full foam head is crisp and refreshing and went down very well with all the food we had.
Okinawan Hot & Cold Favorites
The great thing about dining with a large group is that we can order a good variety of dishes to try. And try we did, almost 17 dishes in all!
We started with some Okinawan-style tofu: first was the Peanut Beancurd ($6.50) which we carefully sliced into eight pieces, while the other was the Salted Young Fish and Salted Bento Maw on Okinawan Cold Beancurd ($9), the portion of which was thankfully exactly eight pieces!
From my tiny slice, I didn’t quite taste the peanut but the tofu was super smooth and flavorful with the soy sauce. As for the other, it was akin to having a bite of tofu with salted fish on it. An acquired taste for sure, probably would go better with porridge.
Okinawa, it seems, is big on bitter gourd and you either love or hate them.
I’m not a fan but the Bitter Gourd Chips ($7) were surprisingly good, as was the goya chanpuru or Stir-Fried Bitter Gourd with Pork, Okinawan Bean Curd and Okinawan Egg ($7/$9.50), a very popular local dish.
For the carnivores among us, the Simmered Pork Belly (2 pcs $9.80 / 4 pcs $14.80) was a must-have as Okinawa is famous for their pork too. The pork belly was tender and tasty, and the accompanying veggies were soft and nice too.
We also had the Minced Beef and Pork Cutlet ($13.80). It was crispy and meaty but nowhere as enjoyable as the Okinawan-style stewed pork.
Next up were the seafood items. The Grilled Dried Stingray ($10) was absolutely lovely, as was the yummy chewy Octopus Fritter ($12.5). Both make for great pub grub for sure.
Another Okinawan novelty is the Green Caviar Seaweed with Ponzu Sauce ($14, above left) a.k.a “sea grapes”. Known to be found only in the waters around Okinawa, this seaweed has texture a la caviar hence its name. Quite fun to eat if truth be told, if not exactly a filling dish.
Another seaweed item albeit deep fried is the Aosa-Seaweed Tempura (2 pcs $8.80 / 4 pcs $14.00), which offered crunchy bites with seaweed mixed with onions and other veggies.
Here’s yet another two local favorites. Sweet potato in Okinawa is uniquely purple and above left is the Okinawan Sweet Potato Tempura ($9) which actually tastes more like chewy mochi cakes rather than crispy tempura.
Their pancakes are rather unusual too. The Okinawan Pancake (Leek and Red Ginger) ($9) is more like a flat crepe and you eat it by rolling the ingredients into the sliced crepe wrap. It’s fascinating to say the least.
Whilst Japanese soba is made from buckwheat, Okinawan soba is made from plain wheat flour and is more akin to thick egg noodles.
We tried the Cold Noodle with Soy Sauce ($14.80) and Soup Noodle with Stir-Fried Vegetables ($13.80). For both, the noodles were just simply good to eat. The cold noodles, well dipped in soy sauce, actually came with pork slices as well so I enjoyed that more than the soupy one which had mainly vegetables and a heapful of bitter gourd piled in a clear broth.
Should have gone for an even 18 so this dish don’t have to feel left out but this was one of the best dishes of the night. The Deep Fried Crispy River Shrimps ($9) was well-fried and indeed crispy, great to eat on its own (albeit with salt and a dash of lemon) and even better with beer.
Last but not least, besides Green Tea and Sesame Ice Cream ($3.50 each), desserts comprise mainly Okinawan Round Donuts (2 pcs $5) and Okinawan Brown Sugar Pancake with Whipping Cream ($9.80).
We found the donuts rather dry and wished there was, like, some sweet sauce to go with it. We ended up using the cream from a birthday cake that we had bought to spread onto it to make it more palatable.
As for the brown sugar pancake, it was alright but then again, we were probably too stuffed by then to really enjoy it. (We also have two of our own cakes as desserts as well).
On the whole, it was really fun to try Japanese cuisine that is different from what we are usually used to. In the end, it was about $40++ per person for all the things we ordered which was pretty decent.
Coupled with a nice ambience with seating ideal for both big and small groups, Okinawan Diner Nirai-Kanai definitely gave us reason to return and try their Okinawan delicacies again.
Okinawan Diner Nirai-Kanai is at 1 Kim Seng Promenade, #01-107/108 Great World City, Singapore 237994. Tel : 6339 4811. Opening Hours: Mon-Thu 11:30 am–3 pm, 6–11 pm; Fri 11:30 am–3 pm, 6–10 pm; and Sat & Sun 11:30 am–3:30 pm, 5:30–11 pm.
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