Toko (Surry Hills)

By Boo_e

To celebrate the end of my annual vegetarian month, my partner and I decided to go to Toko Surry Hills for dinner. This place has got to be one of my favourite Japanese restaurant, they seem to do everything Japanese with extra gusto, including the price tag. Despite the slightly higher price range however, a night of dining at Toko is almost always sure to please even the most discerning of patrons.

Being deprived of all things meat for a good 30 days, I was more than ready to test just how many different types of meat I can eat in one sitting, so to start we had Tuna sashimi and a very small bowl of soba miso with slivers of duck breast and a poached quail egg. These were great starters for the feast we had coming. The sashimi was as always of the best quality, I guess when you’re paying $10 for 3 incy wincy little slivers of fish, you'd want it to be of good quality. The soba miso was really quite delicate and subtle; the soft poached quail egg was the best part of the dish for me. Our next treat came in the form of sushi maki, we ordered California and white fish tempura. The former is made using spanner crab mixed with Japanese mayonnaise, this gives the sushi a distinctly different flavour to your run of the mill California roll which is usually done with seafood extender or "crabstick". A refreshing sweetness that accompanies most fresh seafood dishes comes through with every bite. I was very much impressed with this simple but effective dish, the white fish sushi maki however was really lacking in oomph, the flavour of the fish did not come through so it was just like eating seaweed flavoured rice. 

Tuna sashimi

Soba miso

California rolls

Kingfish carpaccio is a dish that we like to order whenever it appears on any menu. So I feel that I was extra discriminating when it came to this dish, I found that the while the dressing was spot on the kingfish itself did not taste as fresh as I would expect for a place of this caliber. Very unfortunate indeed as this is usually one of my favourites. 

Kingfish carpaccio

Agadashi Tofu is another dish that features a lot in our Japanese dining experience so again I feel that Toko had a lot to live up to in this dish, and I have to say they did not disappoint. These very appropriately sized cubes of deep fried tofu was coated in a well seasoned batter and topped with tiny pieces of marinated eggplant, they were delectable and I could've made a meal out of these little things all on its own, but alas I was committed to the rest of our order for the night. This then leads us to the last 2 types of meat for the evening. The pork and the good old chicken.

Agadashi tofo

Our pork dish for the night was the marinated ribs, done of course, right before our eyes on the Robata grill. It was tender and tasty. The meat melted off the bones and the bonus part was that the ribs were cut into individual pieces, each with enough bone space so as to not get our fingers too messy. Not that I would've had too much trouble licking the mess from my fingers. It was, simply put, delicious.
 

Marinated pork ribs

Our final savoury dish for the night was the Nam Ban chicken, this dish packed a punch when it came to flavour, for me I felt that I needed some rice to have with this chicken, without the rice, the flavour was almost too overpowering. But by that stage of our dinner, we weren't going to fit in any carbs so we just ate the chicken on its own. The ginger dipping sauce that came with it was very nice, but the chicken did not need anymore flavour added to it so we didn’t end up using much of the sauce at all. 

Nam Ban chicken

For dessert I had the Ginger pudding. This pudding was served hot with a fig caramel topping and a scoop of white miso ice cream. The ginger flavour was definitely present but was not overpowering as is the usual case with ginger desserts. The fig caramel was really just caramel flavoured and not at all "figgy" and the miso in the ice cream was just as non-existent, although thats not neccassarily a bad thing. I’ve also had the trio of crème brulee here previously and was left with an unsatisfied dessert belly. So long story short dessert is not Toko's forte.

Ginger pudding

The service on this particular night was unusually slow and we found that we had to work to get the attention of staff. This can be quite annoying when you want to have another glass of wine or even just to get the bill. We have sat at different spots every time that we have been to Toko and on this particular night we were placed just in front of the Robata grill, and even though there was a glass panel separating us as well as a massive range hood we still left smelling a little like smoky ribs, so the prized seats for me are the ones right in front of the sashimi bay. Here you can watch the mesmerizing hands of the sashimi chefs slice, dice and knead food into artwork. After having dined at both Sake and Sushi Choo I found that for similar prices and menus, Toko leads the pack in Japanese fine dining.

Robato grill

Suggestions: Arrive early between 6-7pm if you don’t want to wait up to 90 minutes for a table. Toko does not take bookings so you’ll just have to chance it. They do have a very nice bar that does great cocktails right next door called Tokonoma. Great place to go and wait for your table.

Wokking rating/5:

Toko Restaurant & Bar

490 Crown St
Surry Hills 

02 9357 6100

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