13 January 2007

Wagamama restaurant review

| lenny
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Recently dined at a new Restaurant called wagamama. Its located in the new part of civic- north quarter, bunda street.
We went for dinner and overall it was a pleasant experience. We ordered two mains and two sides. Its a little bit different in that they dont do entree, rather ” sides” which come at anytime. We got our sides half way through our mains which I didnt really like, and think it would probaly be better if they did entree- followed by mains. Apparenly they have adaopted the ways of tradional japanese “ramen bars” and that is how they serve meals.

Onto the food, I had the Teriyaki salmon and you can choose to pay extra for rice. I forgo the rice and I am glad I did, they are massive serves. I thought the it was well cooked and quite nice, not one of the best salmon teriyakis I ve had, but still very good.

My partner had the chicken ramen, which is a noodle/soup style dish, not really my thing but she enjoyed it.

For the sides we had chilli fred squid and gyoza (like little fried dumplings). Both were nice but I wasnt too keen on the squid it was a little too hot for my liking and more quantity than quality.

The staff were very friendly and the service was quick, I just wasnt so keen on the sides coming half way through the meal.

I felt the prices were expensive. For example my salmon was $18 and this came with no rice/sides. If you were to go to say Iori or Wasabi you would pay around the same amount for the same dish, plus miso soup, rice and salad.

But with this said, the salmon was quite a large portion.

I have walked past a few times since and it seems busy so I have no doubts it will be popular, its quite big all around the world, especially in the UK.

For a restaurant just starting up I would say they are definitely on the right track

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Take a hard line stance guys – the profits from Wagamama are going to end up overseas. Just don’t go. There are plenty of good restaurants in Civic that serve good Asian food at reasonable prices (by Canberra standards). I can’t go past the smoked eel rice at the Korean Restaurant, Godori, even though if freaks out my wife’s pseudo-Vegetarian sensibilities.

7.30pm. HOT as hell, noisy as a school canteen. No juices, machine’s broken. No wine. No they don’t do free water. We leave. Next day we find out it’s illegal not to serve even tap water in a ACT restaurant. Let’s see if they’ve changed their tune by the time we decide to give them another go.

And when I say miles, I of course mean “Three blocks” – considering some of the whinging on this site about parking, three blocks is obviously an extremely long way to walk.

Well, Barbars is still there – it’s just miles from anything interesting now (well, almost – Toast is still nearby, and the bookshop isn’t moving till the end of the month).

I miss Barbars (sob).

fast food ‘feel’ but heaps better than fast food ‘quality’.

wagamamas rocks. used to eat there often in the UK. love the food. perfect for a quick meal, especially if you want to eat before the movies at dendy, where you won’t get good meal service!!

i’ll try again:

Sounds aweful!

We were in there last Friday evening. It was extremely hot inside – almost painful. I’m not sure if they had air conditioning or not, but if they do, it wasn’t working. Our cold ice tea arrived luke warm, with the remnants of an ice cube floating in it. Sure, it was an unusually hot day, but another restaurant we ate in that night was nice and cool.

Our wait-person was also depressingly happy and up-beat. Personally I’m not a fan of that American style of service, where the waiter is instantly your best friend. On such a hot night, we didn’t need this chirpy girl deliberately violating our personal space with such gay abandon. It really put us off, and we couldn’t wait to be out of there.

Food wise, we ordered four ‘sides’. All arrived promptly and were fine, but nothing special.

This place is definitely ‘fast food’, rather than a ‘restaurant’. I’d eat there again if I was in a hurry and it wasn’t too crowded – but the over-zealous waiter really pissed off my partner, and I think she’d rather not go back.

Woody Mann-Caruso3:32 pm 13 Jan 07

So it’s more of a bistro? Short order stuff you could make yourself in ten minutes if you could be arsed and had a deep fryer?

hmm I wouldnt quite call it fast food, but then again I wouldnt really classify it as a restaurant either

Woody Mann-Caruso3:19 pm 13 Jan 07

its a ’side order’

Results 1 – 10 of about 10,500 for “side order of fries”. (0.12 seconds)
Results 1 – 10 of about 70,300 for “side of fries”. (0.15 seconds)

Results 1 – 10 of about 136 for “side order of salad”. (0.05 seconds)
Results 1 – 10 of about 879 for “side of salad”. (0.05 seconds)

Results 1 – 10 of about 233 for “side order of rice”. (0.43 seconds)
Results 1 – 10 of about 35,300 for “side of rice”. (0.14 seconds)

Results 1 – 10 of about 173 for “side order of vegetables”. (0.38 seconds)
Results 1 – 10 of about 12,800 for “side of vegetables”. (0.13 seconds)

Results 1 – 10 of about 110 for “side order of potatoes”. (0.30 seconds)
Results 1 – 10 of about 10,900 for “side of potatoes”. (0.12 seconds)

Wagamama IS just fast food

sides !

lazy fuckers

its a ‘side order’

i get irritated when im asked if i want sides. i arrogantly ak ‘ a side of what’ and the waitron patiently explains ‘a side order’.

fast food culture is responsible for this and it permeates into our food service industry from there.

Vic Bitterman11:35 pm 12 Jan 07

Sounds interesting Lenny, thanks for the review! We’ll have to pop in there soon and give em a try!

I’ve been looking forward to eating there. The ones in England are great. I’m not fussed by the lack of entree-main serving order, it’s more of a drop in and have nnodles place than a proper restaurant, isn’t it?

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