Nishimura - Japanese Restaurant at Shangri-La Hotel, Jakarta

Japanese idea of simplicity immediately recognized as we entered Nishimura Restaurant at Shangri-La Hotel, Jakarta. Fresh, clean, tidy, all in natural colour scheme, sufficient lighting and dining space and not forgetting option of privacy that may be required by some customers. Ideal venue to hold a casual business lunch or dinner idea came across to our mind. 


We were greeted by a friendly faced waitress dressed in Japanese traditional costume, shown our table and menu then offered something to drink. Getting into all Japanese vibe, we asked for hot ocha - the green tea, as we going through the menu. We noticed, it was rather quite for a dinner time, could be because of Ramadan, where people would rather to spend their quality time at home with family. 


A couple of minutes later, after we took a sip of ocha, we decided to make our order. A salmon salad, a portion of salmon skin crackers, a chawan mushi and a must have misoshiro. Those dishes we chose may not seem sufficient for dinner, but to be honest, after going through them all, we were full. Not belly popping full, but comfortably full. Full to the point that we will not need to have something else to nibble as we get home also full enough to fall asleep without the worry of restless night as our belly working hard to digest all the food we have devoured earlier. 

Back to our dining experience, before our order delivered to our table, we were served a refreshing and mouth watering pickled green vegetable with dried fish sprinkle. It was delightful. Worked well to tease our taste buds. Salmon salad was beautiful too! Made with the freshest ingredients. When it comes to salmon skin crackers, we must say, we had better somewhere else. But it was a great snack. Chawan mushi was served piping hot, super tasty egg curd with few seafood touch on the top. The misoshiro itself was not disappointing either. All good and all healthy. No guilty feeling had we able to manage another set of food all over again, not that it would be necessary though.

We could not end the evening without a nice sweet treat. We went for a mango pudding. Sounded really refreshing. Well, when it turned up, it was not quite as we have expected. The pudding has a beautiful and silky texture indeed, but lacking of mango flavour to our taste. We were hoping for a chilled and sweet mango-ey pudding and a little bit sour to add a kick. What we had was more like egg curd with a hint of mango served with light caramel sauce, red bean paste, a couple of fruit balls and fresh mint. Not bad but not quite refreshing. 

Although we had a slight disappointment, we would not mind to go back there again. Next time we would like to try their sushi and chicken hot pot, so we can share our experience with our loyal readers.


Nishimura at Shangri-La Hotel Jakarta
Kota BNI, Jalan Jendral Sudirman Kavling 1, Jakarta 
Phone: +62 21 2922 999
Website: http://www.shangri-la.com/jakarta/shangrila/dining/restaurants/nishimura/