Tai Boon a.k.a Ta Wen, a blog reader of mine, invited me for a meal before I came to KL.

After some planning, I found myself making my way to 1U using public transport. Honestly, it was really tiring compared to driving there, but the recent petrol hike made me never want to drive to KL anymore.

The taxi touts at Kelana Jaya LRT station offered me a ride for RM15 to 1U. I SMS-ed Tien Soon and he tipped me. I walked over to the other side of the road and managed to get to 1U for only RM6.

Pasta Zanmai, located in between 1U’s old and new wing and right next to Carl’s Junior, is quite easy to miss for its misleading shop out front. From the outside, it looks like a Japanese grocery / food shop from the outside, and the entrance to the restaurant is just a narrow lane next to it.

The interior isn’t that huge and has about 15+ tables. Considering the size and amount of tables, it is pretty cramped and can be noisy when it is full house. The “cubicles” are really tight and cramp, which I later decided to switch to another table for more comfort. The kitchen is just at the back of the restaurant, with glass panels separating the two sections. You can take a closer look at how the chefs prepare your dish, if you want to.

The menus are pretty straight forward, the dishes (yellow), beverages and desserts (red).

Of course, I ordered the officially cheapest drink in all Japanese restaurant, refillable iced green tea!

Screw the names of the dishes. I barely remember them and the fact that I don’t know Japanese isn’t helping either. I ordered a half boiled egg, that somewhat caught my interest when I looked at the menu. I wonder what I was thinking, half boil eggs?!

It was soaked in Japanese soy sauce, thank God, it wasn’t the super salty kind of soy sauce. I got to say, they really do know the perfect timing for cooking half boil eggs. The egg whites were intact and, like a piece of paper, it wrapped around the still liquid egg yolk.

Ta Wen ordered the deep fried soft shell crabs, which was really crunchy with the right taste. There were two soft shell crabs, chopped into half each. Although there weren’t much meat in it, the dish was still good. It’s soft shell crabs, what were you expecting?

The waiter recommended us the deep fried tofu, which was half soaked in Japanese soy sauce again. I got to say, the tofus were really awesome. Lightly pan fried on the outside to give tofu a golden coloured skin and its crisp texture, on the inside was pure white, soft, smooth and delicate tofu(?). On the top were dressings like fish roes, seaweeds, spring onions and I-don’t-know-what.

Our main course came with a bowl of heavily seasoned with sesame oil salad and miso soup.

Ta Wen had the chicken in teriyaki sauce with pasta. I got to say, it looked really delicious, especially with the half boiled egg on top and one has to mix it up before eating.

I ordered the prawns and squids pasta, which tasted a little weird in the beginning. After a few mouthfuls, it got better and I was happily eating my noodles away. A few prawns and squids, tossed with some cabbages, carrots and seasonings, it was good to go. It has this weird taste which I hope they could really make do without it, but I can’t identify what taste it is.

For desserts, I ordered their ice cream combo set, which has a scoop of chocolate ice cream topped with two pieces of crunchy biscuits, green tea ice cream with red beans and black sesame ice cream with whipped cream on top.

The chocolate ice cream was awesome, seriously. I am not a chocolate lover and always choose vanilla over chocolate at any given time. I never like the fake chocolate after taste lingering in my mouth whenever I eat those cheap chocolate ice cream. However, this particular chocolate ice cream totally blew me away. Its even nicer to eat with the crunchy biscuits.

Not knowing what to expect from green tea ice cream, together with the red bean paste, it was pretty decent.

Last on the tray was the black sesame ice cream. It was really smooth and creamy, the after taste lingered inside my mouth for a few more seconds before vanishing itself. Definitely one of the best black sesame ice cream I have ever tasted so far.

Ta Wen footed the RM115 bill (Thank you!), which is definitely on the expensive side. However, the portion isn’t anywhere small to begin with, hence, it does somewhat justify the hefty price tag. Each main course will cost you around RM22 to RM28 while the side dishes range from RM3 to RM15, depending on what you order. The desserts are priced between RM6 to RM18, if I remember correctly.

Will I return? Yes.

The black squid ink noodles look really really interesting.

Related posts:

1. Sushi Zanmai, Revisit
2. Sushi Zanmai, The Gardens
3. Wa Zen Japanese Restaurant, Melaka Raya
4. Singapore Chicken Rice, Kepong
5. Half Boiled Eggs

Tags: 1U, Bandar Utama, Eating..., Fusion, Italian, Japanese, Noodles, One Utama, Pasta, Pasta Zanmai, Petaling Jaya, PJ, Shopping Mall, Spaghetti