Secret Tavern @River Valley

In the recent years, Japanese food has transcended many boundaries all around the world and at times localized for marketing and integration purposes. I love the fact that I can get Japanese food almost everywhere, but being in Japan for a year has changed my tongue. I still like the localized Japanese food, but there are simple everyday dish that you just can't find in a restaurant. That is until one day I stumble upon this little Japanese tavern called Ichigo, which means strawberry.

Handcrafted Menu out of Kimono Fabric

A Strawberry, for "Ichigo"

Hidden in the corner of Zion and River Valley Road, I finally braved myself to try enter the big wooden doors and turned into its fan. Everything is so cozy and homey here. The menu's cover is handmade with kimono fabric and the list of the dish handwritten. The restaurant itself is not that big with two different sections of seating areas: the semi tatami (the one where the middle part, directly under the table is hollowed so that you can put your legs down) and the normal table and chairs area. On the back corner, directly across the entrance is the grill and the bar.

Wooden table, green tea and my clean plate (before tsukune)

Ichigo's specialty is tsukune, which is minced chicken meatball. Here they grill it with different sauces and toppings. My favorites are avo mayo, which is avocado and mayo, and oroshi ponzu which is grated radish with ponzu sauce. Two other toppings that I also like is the ume shisho, which is plum and herbs but be careful if you can't take sour stuff as this can be quite strong. The other flavor is okonomiyaki. The meat is always savory and the toppings make it even more so. I could easily order 10 sticks here... It's rather addictive.

Page one of Tsukune variety, there's another page right beside it!

Ume Shisho Tsukune

The simple dish that I talked about that got me hooked to Ichigo is kimpira! What is kimpira? Unless you're Japanese or lived in Japan or lived with Japanese before you probably never heard of it as its not commonly served in restaurants. Although I do notice some supermarket that supplies ready food do offer kimpira. Oh, MOS Burger does kimpira burger!!! I never tried though. Anyway, kimpira tastes very simple, cooked with only sesame oil, soy sauce and mirin, it has the faint taste of sweet and salty and savory from the sesame oil. It tastes like a home cooked meal. Give me rice with kimpira and I'll be a happy camper.

Kimpira and Oroshi Ponzu Tsukune

Another thing that made me fell in love with Ichigo is my discovery of Yuzu-shu. Ume-shu, plum wine, is probably much more popular and well known. Yuzu-shu is citrus wine! Yes, Citrus! You read correctly. It's sweet and refreshing, its like the Japanese Limoncello. Try Yuzu-shu on the rocks, it will brighten your day after a long day at work as it certainly did for me.

Ichigo
399 River Valley Road
Singapore
+65 6736-1340