Gyoza.
As we all know, it's a Japanese-localized Chinese dumpling dish.
It's one of my favorite "Japanese" foods. Yes, I'll call it a Japanese food although this categorization feels a little awkward.
It's interesting because some people consider this a healthy food.
The combination of the several vegetables used and mixed together with the meat. Add on to that the dumpling skin.
It gives you the minerals, vitamins, proteins and carbs required for your body in magnificent balance.
I get that. Yes I do.
But I'd just hold your horses if you're thinking about substituting Gyoza as your healthy menu just yet. It boils down to the oil it's using. The delicious ones. The ones that taste sinful. Yes, they use sinful oil.
So yes, the "health benefits" won't be my reason for eating this food.
I like it because... well, they're just plain delicious!
I developed some Gyoza cravings after dinner. Looked around and walked in Aburi-en located in JEM for a quick bite with a pint of beer.
It's on the 1st floor, right beside the side entrance which you'll see when you're walking from the Westgate building.
Aburi-en at JEM
50 Jurong Gateway Rd, #01-04 Jem
Website: https://aburi-en.com/
Pork Gyoza (Pan fried pork dumplings) 6 pcs - $6.80 SGD
Today's a quick review - let's get right into it!
The thing about Gyoza is I think overall the standard for this dish is quite high.
In the past I've experienced really awful gyozas. But you don't find those anymore.
It's so common, and decent Gyoza is fairly easy to make.
So what I look for is the extra something.
Let's see how this goes.
Okay.
Looks good. Nothing special from how it looks. (Not that I'm looking for anything special)
Not big. Not that I like big Gyoza either. But just explaining how it looks.
Let's take a peek at the inside.
Yup, you can see a relatively small pork-based filling inside with some vegetables mixed in.
The taste is normal.
Yes, sorry for the uninteresting comment there, but the taste is just normal.
It's a mild tasting Gyoza, not too strong in taste. Which is a good thing.
You can taste the pork. Not special in terms of flavor.
Doesn't exactly carry the punch of the meat.
Not dry. Has a decent amount of juiciness in the dumpling. Here again, nothing really special. Just decent.
The sauce is strong in vinegar. Which is something I like but personally that is for like a home-made dumpling. No surprise or fun in the sauce either.
So it's really just a normal Gyoza. It's okay to eat. But again, I tend to look for something special when I look for Gyoza.
Guru Rating
for the gyoza: 4.9 / 10
I'm pretty confident I probably won't go here for the gyoza. Not that it's bad, but just too normal go there specifically for the gyoza. That said, this type of gyoza is a good otsumami or appetizer for beer.
So if beer is your main thing, then I think this gyoza will work pretty well. The problem about that approach is that the draft beer at aburi-en isn't nice at all.
as an Izakaya: 4.7 / 10
Although I really didn't try too many dishes here, Not too keen on going again. I wouldn't mind if there weren't other choices, but it definitely wouldn't be up there on my preference list. The draft beer didn't taste like draft. Really flat, so it was either a low quality draft, or actually poured from a bottle. The food I tried (including the gyoza) was decent, nothing special.
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