jin loves to eat: Sakura by Edo-San ♥ ♥ ♥

I think you all know I am a delinquent blogger. I have a backlog of about 400 (and counting!) which includes meals I had from 3 years ago. Gasp!!!

Please don't unfollow me. Hee hee hee.

You see, I don't normally post about a dinner I had just a few hours ago, but if I don't do it now, I might change my mind and decide to keep this place a secret forever.

Sakura by Edo-San

I saw my friend Leslie's photo of the aburi uni she had at Sakura's City Club outlet and acted on my desire immediately. Meaning I called the restaurant to make reservations and then "suggested" the place to my girlfriends for our dinner that evening. I'm smartass like that. ;)

Good news is, you do not have to fly all the way to Balesin or fight your way into the members-only City Club because Sakura has a third branch at Alphaland Southgate Tower and it is open to the public.

The restaurant design is something, too! I fell in love with it immediately.

And the best part is, we were the only customers on a Monday evening.
I like quiet places like this where I can enjoy long and leisurely meals with friends and family.
So please DO NOT go and crowd up the place even though the food at Sakura is very good. Lol! :P

They have a private room for a group of 10

And another smaller room which the 4 of us occupied comfortably

Tray setting. They changed our plates and chopsticks occasionally.

The welcome salad was crisp and crunchy

"Japanese Popcorn"
Don't be shy, grab a stem and pick on the buds! This was such a delight
to eat and I probably would have finished the whole bunch except Jen
loved the stuff, too, and was eating faster than I. Hahaha!

Aburi Uni - the lightly grilled uni was extremely creamy, buttery, sweet and briny.
It is what all the uni in the world dream to be. If you are a big sea urchin fan,
I suggest you impose a strict no-sharing policy.

Amaebi (with a pot of pink paper flowers)

Look how milky the flesh!!! Very sweet, too!

You're supposed to eat everything - the eyes, the whiskers, and the legs.
Deep-fried shrimp head tastes like chicharon, only 1,000,000 times better. Promise!

Kaki To Papaya Yaki - grilled oysters in papaya shell covered in special sauce and topped
with tobiko. I've had sea cucumber in papaya before (see here) but it was nothing compared
to this experience.

The papaya meat was sweetness, and look how plump this baby!

The only disappointing dish was the Suzuki Foil Yaki, which was served in this huge aluminum
pouch that got us all excited

That is, until we peeked inside to find 3 teeny weeny pieces of sea bass and a miserly
amount of mushrooms. It felt like somebody played a horrible joke on us. The fish was
terribly overcooked, too.

But what came next was the best ever Beef Usuyaki I've had in all my Japanese meals in
Manila. The beef was so tender, the mushrooms so earthy, it was like eating a newborn
baby cow. Sorry. Lol.

Four ladies also meant four orders of crazy rolls. We had:

Edo-San Maki - cream cheese, kani, avocado, anago and prawn.
This was the tastiest and also my favorite of all.

Caterpillar - unagi, avocado, salmon, mango

Spider Maki - soft shell crab, avocado, tobiko

Dynamite Maki - shrimp tempura, avocado, cucumber, tobiko
(Actually, looking at the photo now, it seems the description above doesn't quite fit. Lol. Probably
some miscommunication with our waiter. He got a bit confused with our dessert orders, too.)

But nothing the Sakura staff didn't make up for in thoughtfulness. We were celebrating our
friend Sheryl's birthday and the whole team came in to surprise her with a birthday song and
a birthday cake! Thank you, Val! :)

The "birthday cake" was a Sushi Pizza which had deep-fried white rice as the crust, and topped
with spicy salmon, kani, cucumber, mango, cream cheese, tobiko and flying fish caviar.