Kuru Kuru Japanese Restaurant @ Valley Point

Located at Level 1 of Valley Point, this shop is rather small. Lunch option include ala-carte, set meals (teishoku and bento sets) and buffet (@$26++ for adult). Was there to celebrate a friend's birthday, so opted for buffet.

interior

paintings adorning the wall

buffet menu (can be found online as well)

soy sauce

 Ordered hot green tea for drinks, while we pondered over the menu.

green tea

 After eliminating heavy duty carb stuffs like rice, noodles, handrolls, soups etc, our choices became somewhat limited...so we started off with sashimi; small assorted platter (12 pieces) and salmon.

sashimi moriawase (salmon, tuna, swordfish, seabass, octopus)

salmon sashimi

yellow tail sashimi

The sashimi was alright, but the salmon seemed to be sliced rather haphazardly. The wasabi was a little too mild for us, hence, no kick!

Then the deep fried stuffs came.

prawn tempura (1 piece per portion)

tori karaage (about 5-6 small pieces per plate)

The prawn tempura was nicely fried, but rather oily. Was disappointed that all items with unagi were unavailable on our day of visit, otherwise, would've ordered the unagi tempura... Tori karaage was nice but too bad the batter was lacking in flavour. Ordered another portion of prawn and vegetable tempura. The vegetables were just sweet potato and brinjal. Watch out for the brinjal though. It was soaked with oil! Sweet potato was nice though. Mildly sweet.

seasoned squid tentacles

The squid tentacles were quite yummy. The batter flavouring was just nice and the squid tentacles were firm without being too chewy.

From the Yoshoku section of the menu (japanese styled western dishes), ordered the scallops with cod roe and cheese. One order is just one tiny piece. It was prudent of us to order one portion to try. The scallop that I had, didn't taste that fresh.

tiny scallop with cod roe and cheese, it actually looked better than it tasted

Next, we had grilled items.

grilled mackerel with salt

tebasaki (just mid-wing) 1 piece per portion

grilled capelin aka shishamo

chicken meatballs (super duper salty sauce alert!)

grilled mushroom (abit too charred on its outerside)

insides still ok

I kind of liked the tebasaki, though it looked so skinny but then, I liked all kinds of chicken wings. Hmm. Probably I'm biased. The shishamo was nicely tender. But the chicken meatballs was a shocker to our tastebud. The sauce on it was way tooooo salty!

Then somewhere in the middle of our meal, we decided to order some appetisers.

potato salad (single portion)

baby octopus

Baby octopus? Such a misnomer...just look at the size of that thing!

Tried some of the items from its Ippin Mono or popular dishes menu.

beef with special sauce (best dish, hands down)

braised pork belly with soy sauce Tokyo style (too sweet!)

fried beansprouts (because we felt guilt for having so much meat)

My friend commented that the potato salad was too bland. That was until she tasted the extreme saltiness of the chicken meatballs and the extreme sweetness of the braised pork Tokyo style. The 'blandness' of the potato salad was heaven-sent to balance out those two extremes!

The only soft-shell crab in the buffet menu, was categorized under the Makimono  or mat roll items. Means, it had rice. Oh well, just try lor.

soft shell crab with wasabi mayo makimono

The still crunchy bits of the soft shell crab makes a good foil for the soft rice. The wasabi mayo was a tad too salty as well. But overall, it was tasty.

Service was alright and the restaurant seemed to have just two service staff on our day of visit to take care of getting customers' orders, serving, cleaning of plates, and cashiering duties. If you do not appreciate any surprises on the portion being served to you (especially nearing the end of your meal), then remember to tell the waitress because she assumed that we wanted a portion for each of us even when I've indicated that we wanted just one single portion.

Click here to view second visit.