Have you Saboten-ed?

Ever tried the food at Saboten?  Its recently become one of my favourite eating places.  The shredded cabbage salad is so refreshing and the fried katsu is just about the right portion.  Coupled with the amazing sauces, hot steaming rice and a bowl of miso soup, the combination is just heavenly.  As airport staff, I've had a few meals there during lunchtime and we will take the set meals which comprises a portion of fried meat/seafood (depending on what you order), 1 portion of salad, soup, pickle, rice and a bowl of soup.  Its just about right.  Oh, did I mention that the price of $11,90 doesn't really give you much opportunity to consider taking the full set since its quite a good deal for staff.

The salad is just amazing.  Did I just say its amazing?  Oh yes I did.  Its amazing.  The cabbage is cold and thinly shredded, so its just like eating alfalfa, except that it doesn't really taste like rabbit food.  Then there's the sauces that you can add to the salad - one is the sesame sauce while the other is some orange flavour.  I kinda like to alternate both.  The sesame sauce is fragrant and has a thick rich aroma whereas the orange flavour sauce is sweet and gives a kick.  It somewhat reminds me of eating cold soba.  Yeah, the sauce kinda tastes like that.  Sweet and a little sour.  Add that to cold, shredded cabbage and its a winner.



Salad with sesame sauce added

Eating the loin katsu or tenderloin katsu allows you to have some fun too.  The server will give you a bowl of sesame seeds and you'll have to grind them using the wooden stick that comes with it.  Once you start grinding, you'll start to smell the aroma of the sesame seeds.  

I am pretty sure they've been roasted before, hence the fragrance.  After you're satisfied with the grinding, you can add the tonkatsu sauce.  Add more for a more watery dip, but watch out as that also means you dilute the sesame flavour.  I suggest 4 scoops for the right intensity.  

The fried tenderloin isn't too oily and is best eaten hot.  The wire mesh prevents the katsu from soaking up any excess oil (not that there is any).  See how lean the meat is?

But when you have a chance to dine there during dinner, that's when you get to experience the never-ending portions of salad, soup and rice.  Not that you need another bowl of rice, but the thought of that already makes dinner worth it right?

Yummy!

Saboten at Terminal 1 currently has a 20% offer for diners.  They will hand out dining vouchers at the Departure hall, just when you're about to step onto the escalator.  Otherwise, any airport staff pass will give you the same discount.   That should work out to be $20 after discount.  Pretty good huh?