Koi Restaurant (SoHo, New York City)

Koi SoHo is located on the ground floor of the Trump SoHo hotel. I first saw it when I was staying at the Trump SoHo last summer but did not get a chance to check it out then.

It was not a planned dinner and we ended up here as a result of my tummy not feeling too well earlier in the day and I did not feel like venturing out too much. So JN and I met up and had a 'walk in' table at Koi.

After having a drink at the bar, we sat down and at the recommendation of the very friendly Gina, we chose the following as shared plates. Apologies in advance for the quality of the photos, some were rather grainy due to the low lights at the restaurant!

Lobster Tacos with mango salsa and yuzu guacamole. This was a delightful dish with the crunchy tacos offsetting the small bites of lobster with hints of the mango and guacamole in the taste buds.

Sunfire Roll - this is one of Koi's signature rolls. It was filled with lobster, snow crab, cucumber and cilantro roll topped with mango, avocado and ichimi. Beautifully plated and smack bang full of flavour. Delish!

Koi Crispy Rice topped with spicy tuna and yellowtail tartare. Very interesting texture of the crunchy and slightly chewy crispy rice as the base. The tuna and yellowtail tasted very fresh.

Sake Restaurant (The Rocks, Sydney)

Believe it or not, this is my first time to Sake. I found the right excuse to check it out when K and S were recently in town from Melbourne. It's been a while since my last catch up with my nephew K when I was last in Melbourne and I cannot recall the last time we actually had a meal together in Sydney.

I didn't realise how cool an ambience Sake would have. When I stepped in to the restaurant, I immediately looked around and tried to absorb the decor and vibe around me. As I walked past the open kitchen, I was immediately greeted with a bunch of welcome greetings in Japanese!

We were seated in a long table and shared it with another couple. But The Sake team arranged the seating in such a way that there was an empty seat between us and the other couple. That gave us some privacy and we didn't feel cramped in.

As you would have expected from me, I had browsed the menu prior to my visit! :) So I had an idea of what I would like to order and with my visitors' agreement I went for gold (sort of!).

Sashimi platter - a small plate of extremely fresh sashimi of salmon, tuna, kingfish and snapper. We devoured it!

Kingfish jalapeño - this was recommended by the waitress and I can see why it is one of their signature dishes. There was just a slight kick in the jalapeño to lift up the flavours of the kingfish. The combination of the coriander and yuzu soy was subtle and not too overwhelming. Again, it was a hit with us!

Steamed prawn dumplings - Chinese inspired dumplings but with a twist. It had strips of noodle instead of a wonton piece covering the prawn and had such an interesting texture. Loved that it was different and delicious too!

Sashimi tacos - these were salmon and tuna sashimi diced and filled in baby tacos with chilled tomato salsa. They were matched with kozaemon junmai 'sake shots'. I normally don't have sake but I had to try this. Wow! I definitely liked it, both the tacos and the shot. I found the tacos just a tad small in size but other than that, the combination of flavours and textures were good.

Oki Oki

Sometimes when a friend wants to meet up in a suburb that I am not too familiar with, I start scrambling for ideas on where to meet for a meal. I also take it as an opportunity to check out local treasures and blog about them. Such fun, oh such fun!!!!

Well, this time it was to meet for lunch in Hornsby. The only thing I know about in Hornsby is the Westfield Shopping Centre. So I 'googled' and found a Japanese restaurant which caught my interest. It is called Oki Oki.

What a lovely find. It is located right across from the Hornsby Railway Station, a block away from the railway entrance. I met my friend LG at Westfield and we took a walk to Oki Oki.

We were both pleasantly surprised at the food. There was a very good range of Japanese food on the menu and I found it difficult to choose as there were so many dishes I wanted to try out!

So we settled with:

A small set of sashimi which had 12 pieces of a variety of fish. There was salmon, tuna, kingfish and another fish I failed to identify. It was fresh, light and just delicious!

Lunch box with spicy BBQ fish. The lunch box included a main, rice, miso soup, salad, deep fried spring rolls and dumpling, and sushi rolls.

Lunch box with chicken karaage.