When you ask my brother what he wants to eat, he will always say Japanese food. So for his late birthday dinner, we decided to try one of the newer Japanese restaurants that opened in Alabang Town Center.
I've always wanted to try yakitori, but since the restaurant I really want to go to is a bit far away, I decided we give Nanbantei a try. Nanbantei of Tokyo is a Japanese restaurant that specializes in yakitori or grilled skewered meat. The ATC branch is a bit quaint. For smaller groups and for a better yakitori experience, try sitting at the bar where you can see the dishes cooked up close. Its menu includes various seafood, chicken, pork, and beef dishes. Skewered vegetables and other vegetarian options are available. Other Japanese restaurant staples are available such as sushi and tempura. They also have various set menu and platters you can choose from.
While we were ordering, they gave us warm wet towels. I found it endearing that they were really towels and not towelettes! They also served us veggies and the yakitori sauce right away. We ordered several yakitori dishes and 2 maki dishes along with 2 gohan (steamed white rice) which cost P65.00 per bowl.
We decided to order maki because we didn't want to order a lot of rice. The Crispy Salmon Maki is quite similar to the California Maki except that it uses crispy salmon skin instead of imitation crab. My brother really loved it, plus it was really cheap! The Tempura Maki was also like the California Maki. Since I like tempura, I preferred this over the crispy salmon maki.
Crispy Salmon Maki, P100.00
Tempura Maki, P200.00
For our yakitori, we initially ordered 5 kinds (with 4 sticks each) but since they ran out of one dish, we had to order another kind. We ordered 1 seafood (2 shake kushi yaki), 3 pork (4 butabara, 4 aspara maki, and 4 poteto maki), 1 chicken (2 kawa), and 1 beef (4 beef yakiniku). There's only 1 sauce for all the dishes. The yakitori sauce is both sweet and salty. Good thing we ordered rice or else we would be in trouble. The dishes were seasoned so dipping them in the sauce might make it more salty for some (I eventually stopped dipping them because I found the sauce a bit salty). The restaurant doesn't use charcoal to grill so you won't get that smoky flavor that is attached to charcoal grilling. Flavor-wise, the dishes were good. We all really liked the poteto maki, aspara maki, and chicken skin. The beef yakiniku was also good. The yakiniku sauce was good that I used it for the other sticks as well. However, the pork belly was a bit overcooked so it wasn't as juicy as the one I tried at a sushi restaurant. Our least favorite were the salmon balls because they were a bit fishy (a squeeze of lemon would have been perfect).
Butabara (grilled pork belly), P100.00/stick
Kawa (chicken skin), P75.00/stick
Shake Kushi Yaki (grilled salmon balls with teriyaki sauce), P110.00/stick
From L to R: Poteto Maki (potato wrapped with bacon), P100.00/stick; Aspara Maki (asparagus wrapped with pork), P110.00/stick; Beef Yakiniku (thinly sliced beef with yakiniku sauce), P180.00/stick
It was a good experience considering it was our first time to try such a restaurant. We were fully stuffed! I was always scared to try yakitori because I thought that it would be expensive. Now, I'm looking forward to trying other yakitori places!
Nanbantei of Tokyo is a decent restaurant. They have affordable dishes and friendly staff. It is a good place to hang out with friends having a drink of 2. I would give Nanbantei a 7 out of 10. Next time, I have to try the vegetable skewers!
What restaurant should I try next?
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