Kobe Jones Teppanyaki, The Rocks

Kobe Jones Teppanyaki at The Rocks is really not your everyday show chef Teppanyaki. This is fine dining, Teppanyaki style. So if you are after the games or tossing of kitchen equipment at a show chef Teppankayi, this is not the place you are after. However, if you are looking for top notch food, this is one place not to miss.

Kobe Jones Teppanyaki at The Rocks is located in one of the quieter spots at The Rocks. It is situated in what looks like an old shop house with a complete makeover. The front room has is luxuriously decorated in vintage style. Patrons are then brought into to one of two backrooms where they are served Teppanyaki style. There are 8 seats per table. Seating is allocated and you would likely have to share the table with 2-3 groups. These rooms are a far cry from the two front rooms. It was summer, and the room was very stuffy. Also, the room was very cramped and got quite squeezy when the table was filled.

We were welcomed warmly by the establishment's wait staff. As we had bought a Groupon for the meal, it was going to be an adventure as we didn't know what we were going to have! We first served with the house sake warmed. The sake was super smooth and fragrant. Definitely would have bough a second bottle if it wasn't so costly.

Our chef for the night greeted us (quite lukewarmly). Unlike a show chef teppanyaki, there was very little interaction between guests and the chef. The chef literally was a "heads down, get the job done quickly" kind of personality. It was quite a turn off especially with the price, comes expectation of good service. However, the food did make up for a lot of it.

First course was "Flaming Number 1 Special" - Crab salad with avocado wrap in kingfish with a special sauce. This was a creamy ball of goodness! It totally melts in your mouth and oozes with juicy crab meat. 

Next course was "Hot mushroom salad" - Fresh green salad with  mushrooms in seaweed butter. I never really like most mushroom salads as I'm really not about raw mushrooms. This really fixed that problem. The different mushrooms and the lovely seaweed butter together with greens went very well with each other.

The next course was a "Seafood selection" - Salmon, scallops, king prawns and calamari. Can't fault it! The calamari was cooked to perfection - no rubbery texture! Scallops nicely seared to perfection. 

The next course was a "Citrus sake soba" to cleanse our palette. It was indeed refreshing and got us wanting for more!

Follow that, the next course served was "Waygu Roll". This was interesting to watch cook. The chef put very thin slices of beef on a plate and rolled in asparagus, carrot and spinach. This was seared and finished with butter, soy sauce and brandy (flaming effect!). As you can see, the beef was perfectly medium rare and very juicy. By this stage, we were getting really stuffed!

Despite being full, we trudged on! Next course garlic fried rice. If you've never cooked fried rice before, one of the biggest challenge of is ensuring all grains are evenly browned, coated with your sauce, grains remain unbroken and not clumped together. This fried rice ticks all boxes. The rice was super fragrant from the garlic and with adequate carmelisation on each grain.

The rice is served with crunchy prawn legs and crispy rice. I know prawn legs might put some of you off, but do give it a try. This is a real treat!

The final course, not quite Japanese,  "Crepe Suzette" teppanyaki style. This crepe is made with Sapporo beer, flambeed with Grand Marnier, glazed with orange caramel sauce and served with French vanilla gelato. A sweet ending to a very yummy dinner.

Overall

Overall, the food is fantastic but the standard service is really not matching up with the food. We literally did not know what we would be getting as the Groupon was quite vague and we were not given a menu to show what we will be getting - it is something really to work on. We also not told what we were served when the chef put the food in front of us. There was no recommendation of what sauces to use either.

With the Groupon voucher of $138 for 2 persons, I think it is a fair deal. I will not be paying the full $298 for the same dinner any day. However, I've noticed, you could buy a similar Groupon almost anytime.

Would I go back again? Maybe (the food was great), maybe not (the service was very substandard).