Hana Hana

This was such a gem and a pleasant delight. I thoroughly enjoyed myself here and each dish was so flavourful! I really loved the unagi paste which is full of umani and paired perfectly with the fried fish skin. There is a variety of flavours and textures in all the dishes and we were very full towards the end! Need to book early in advance as there are limited space in the restaurant and there will be a deposit placed too.

A very small Japanese restaurant that does very good omakase at a good price. The lunch omakase was only $50, and as many others have commented, there is a certain home-y feel about this place despite the very quick service and tiny place I lost count of the courses there were in total, probably around 8-10 with a few little things like melons in the middle. As for the mains there were several choices, I went for the sashimi rice (which was very good btw ) whereas my friend went for the beef fried rice. Some of the courses that I really like: the Nagasaki tofu (which is very unlike normal tofu), oyster, sashimi rice. Very much recommended! Next time I’ll try teppei as well if I could manage to get a booking…

I must say that this is a very different experience for me, for this is not the typical Japanese restaurant serving Omakase in Singapore (usually the ones here are those serving at very high end fare at obviously, obscene prices too!). Hana-Hana is a restaurant that combines (i) a homely feel (small cosy place) (ii) fast service (completed my lunch meal in about 80 mins or so) (iii) value for money (SGD50 per pax for 10 large meal items plus 3 smaller meals items) It is one of its kind in Singapore - where cheap food and/or non-Japanese servers and kitchen staffs do not mean lousy food. In fact, I’d say that they cook/make the meals better than a lot of Japanese restaurants (that are more expensive, that employ more Japanese) in town. I’d say that this place has given a boost to the local dining scene and kudos to the team!

Food is reliable and good as always, but I’ll like to highlight what I experienced when we dined in the restaurant on a weekday night. There is a sign on every seat at the counter telling the diners to be keep their noise down and to ‘Respect Our Customers’. There was however, this one waitress that was drinking and being very loud with 3 of what seems to be regular guests of the restaurant. 2 ladies who just happened to be sitting beside them got dragged into it and she tried to get those 2 group of diners to befriend each other. She later pulled out a deck of poker cards and made both group of diners play games with her and the whole things was just really loud and disturbing for everyone else dining in to a point where everyone not involved were either staring or just trying to finish their meals and get out. Can see the 2 lady diners were just trying to enjoy their dinner and had to entertain her as they ordered the omakase and had quite a few more courses to go. There’s a difference between servers being friendly to diners as seen in many Japanese restaurants, and this. This incident to me has crossed that line. If you read other reviews here, there’s also others who have experienced this form of service at Hana-Hana.