G-26, Atria Shopping Gallery, Jalan SS22/23, Damansara Jaya, 47400 Petaling Jaya, Selangor
Opening Hours:
Daily, 10am-10pm
Time Visited:
7pm. Monday blues evening with heavy rain outside
Attire worn:
Business
Item(s) Ordered (Photos taken as inconspicuous as possible with my phone):
Lychee Sour Fizz for drink, 4 Sashimi Varieties of the Season (Chef's Pick), Gyudon Donburi (Sauteed Sliced Beef & Onion Served on Steamed Rice)
The place was largely a huge improvement from the eyesore of a place that previously sits at the same location. However, the surroundings of the mall still contain some dark areas and looks dangerous with no lighting at all. Hence, for safety reason, I think it's best to park inside the mall or walk along the bigger roads to reach the entrance of the mall if it's night time.
Anyway, after a 1 hour tour of the entire place floor by floor, I finally settled in at Manmaru Robatayaki & Bar for my dinner. At first glance from the entrance, it looks like there's no customers at all. But once a long walk inside to the inner part of the restaurant and shown to my seat, there appears to be 2 other tables occupied. But that's all. Not surprising since I don't see many people walking about in Atria during my arrival there.
The ambiance of Manmaru has a calming effect indoors but bright enough with plenty of lightings overhead shining downwards to the area I was sitting.
Initial browsing of the menu had me stumped on what to order since all portions are either too small to order just that dish or too large for one person. And so I decided to make my drink choices first recalling the time where I dine at Rakuzen, Oasis Square where the staff ask me on that before I even had the chance to look through the menu. So I settled for the Lychee Sour Fizz. Looking at the drinks menu, I notice that they had a very wide choice and variety or alcoholic beverages. Some of which are rare and hard to find too. But of course, opening up a bottle wouldn't be cheap.
After looking from cover to cover up to 3 times, I finally decided to start off with Sashimi since I love those things. I ordered the 4 Sashimi Varieties of the Season and then proceeded to look at items that are individual dishes that either contain with rice or noodles. At first, I wanted to order the garlic fried rice but then because it was too plain and seeing that if I order another dish to go with the rice it may prove too much for me to consume, so I went with the waiter's suggestion if I wanted to eat beef and that is the Gyudon.
My drink actually arrived before I even managed to order my food. And when I had a look at the drink, I instantly like how it was presented. It's just so colorful and vibrant. Coupled with the dark backdrop of the surroundings and furnitures, it seems to highlight it emphatically. The colors just pop out of it.
The Sashimi dish was served along with my Gyudon where the Gyudon comes with a free miso soup. The service at Manmaru were excellent. They served all of the dishes at once and one took off the miso soup bowl cover for me, one placing the Sashimi at the center of the table while one more poured the shoyu sauce into the sauce dish from the unique looking sauce dispenser. I wonder will the service maintain the same level of excellence should there be a crowd of customers.
Anyway, at Manmaru, all of their dishes look very beautiful. All of it arranged with finesse and finished with care. I would give them an A++ for the presentation of the dishes. But unfortunately, that's the best part with regards to their food. The first thing I tried were their Sashimi. Among the four that were picked for me, I believe they are Tuna (Akami), Salmon (easiest to identify, Shake), White Tuna (Shiro Makuro) and I think the last one Yellowtail (either Hamachi or Kanpachi. Also called Japanese Amberjack).
A bite of any of the fresh fishes indicates a real refreshing feeling and the freshness of each and every one of it. But to me, I was expecting it to be something more for that kind of price. For a normal standard, I would say this is good but for RM80, it's not good enough though the presentation is above expectation. I felt that the Sashimi I ate at Senjyu, Bangsar supersedes this in terms of refreshing taste and with the same kind of freshness. I just wish it to be more like the details they put in to it's appearance.
Next, I went for the Gyudon. Again, a great looking dish despite it being just onions and sliced beef and seaweed on top of rice. Again this falls short of my expectation. It's just nice. But I was looking for some wow factor just like how it looks like but instead, it's just like some of the other Japanese restaurants in terms of taste.
The free miso soup that comes with it was the biggest letdown. It's not just your normal miso soup, it's lukewarm too. I understand the need to bring it down to temperature that you're able to consume but lukewarm and not hot is unacceptable to me for a soup. If you think that it's because I took so long to get to the soup ever since they opened the cover, you're wrong. I merely took a piece of each sashimi then proceeded with a bite of the Gyudon before stirring up the miso soup to consume. Max I would say including my picture taking would probably be 5-7 minutes and judging from the surrounding temperature and not sitting directly under the air conditioning unit plus stirring it would at least make the soup hot due to the bottom portion, I can safely conclude that the miso soup was indeed lukewarm to begin with. The best miso soup I've ever had was at Rakuzen, Oasis Square after all. They especially added extra ingredients into their miso soup and made it much tastier. It even comes from it's set so it's technically free.
Total Wallet Damage:
RM123. Generally, the expensive part came from the Sashimi which costs RM80. The majority of the items in the menu were slightly higher than other Japanese establishments but that's what I noticed about other eateries in Atria too. It must be an Atria thing.
Final Verdict:
6.8/10. The deceiving looks of the dishes just set the bar too high for the taste standards to meet. If it tastes as good as it looks, then it would have been perfect. Well, almost. That is if you don't factor in the price.
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