itsu Notting Hill Gate
From the Hot Food menu we ordered Soft Shell Crab Tempura (£11.45) -a crispy soft shell crab in a light tempura batter on a bed of rocket with a sweet chilli dipping sauce- and Tiger Prawn Tempura (£7.75)- 5 tiger prawns wrapped in oba leaf, brushed with Japanese flour with a sweet chilli dipping sauce. These were both well executed dishes. The batter was light and non-greasy and the seafood flavours came through.
Next we moved on to the conveyor belt plates.
Tuna and Salmon Tartar (£4.25) tasted freshly prepared and was accompanied by a tasty herby sauce.
Prawn Crystal (£4.95) was prawn and salad wrapped in crystal noodles and was fresh and clean tasting.
After all this healthy eating it seemed appropriate to slip back into decadence and so I went for the Creme Brulee (£4.25). It had a dense rich egginess with the right level of burnt sugar on top.
itsu is very reasonably priced, is a more sophisticated offer than Yo Sushi! and avoids Wagamama’s carb heavy approach. The takeaway elements undercut and are of better quality than the equivalent from M&S and the restaurant offers an attractive environment for meeting friends or taking your family. The combination of nutritious light bites with cocktails and the occasional ‘bad’ dessert certainly hits the mark in this part of town and if the Body Blitz menu we were meant to review wasn’t particularly obviously presented-well it didn’t really matter.
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