KUURAKU — Restaurant in Gurugram District

A breath of fresh air ! KUURAKU is a "Global Restaurant Chain" operates several brands in Japan, Canada, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India. Now they have opened in India Delhi Gurgaon and we are lucky to have them in Bangalore. The timings are a bit tricky as all good things have a short window. Official timings :12noon – 3pm, 6pm – 10pm. However in my experience its between 12 pm to about 2:00 pm. and 6 pm to 9:00 pm. Its located in Forum Rex Walk and ample parking is available. The restaurant is quaint, tiny and getting a table is quite a challenge on weekends. Make sure you impress the manager and you could use his number for reservation. The best seating are the private cabins and floor seating which is so romantic. Makes me want to go back to dating days. The waitresses are dressed like Japanese and the place transports you to restaurants in Tokyo…

Vodka cocktails and hi balls are excellent and if you win a rock paper scissor game with the waitress you get a tall glass. Try the beer cocktails especially the chilled sweet lime beer cocktail lacks the punch but makes for a good drink. For non-drinkers there are mocktails and the good ol’ green tea. Menu is extensive. I have visited this restaurant on multiple occasions and haven’t tried all the dishes yet. By far the only two dishes I have been disappointed with is the Ebi Tempura( insipid and oily) and Chicken Katsu curry ( usually love it but not in Kuraaku!). All the Ramen’s are good however my go to Ramen is Miso Ramen and Kara men (spicy!). Have tried both the vegetarian options. Tan Tan men and Tomato Ramen. Tomato Ramen was better among the two. There is a live Yakitori counter and you can try the Yakitori set which is interesting. They are mild flavoured and personally I feel Yakitori Don( main course that compromises rice) is a complete meal rather than Yaki tori it is a small portion. Every dish is enhanced by their in house chilli oil which is perfect for our Indian palette. Torimiso tan tan tofu is such an awesome dish. It’s a cold tofu garnished with some meat on top and can be used as a starter in hot sweltering noon. All the rolls are good however my son is a fan of Crunchy Ebi rolls and avocado cheese rolls. Tompeiyaki (egg rolls with pork and veggies) and Teppan gyozo ( grilled chicken dumpling) are so authentic and delicious.

As far as desserts go, I haven’t gone past Annin tofu (almond jelly with mango sauce) and Yukimi Daifuku( ice-cream wrapped in rice cake) as both are super delicious and can’t do without them. Baked cheese...

I know it is hard to find the true japanese feeling and taste outside of Japan. But the standards I found in Kuuraku are far lower than what I found in many cities of Japan.

Kuuraku it is an ok place to eat. Three stars. As a japanese restaurant, I would give two stars. As prices, one star.

The ramen is not even close to the taste of a japanese ramen. The noodles were not even cooked. A sushi roll was worse than in the buffet of a cruise ship. I received green tea only when I asked about it. I received green tea in beer pint cup glass?!?!?!?

To understand me better? After visiting this restaurant, I searched for another one in order to satisfy my desire for japanese food.

I found Kogai on google. Went there, the serving feels japanese. I tasted Yose Nabe and it tastes like in Japan.

I sincerely recommend Kuuraku owners to visit Kogai restaurant, to learn from it. Kogai is not amazing, but it feels japanese, they really put an effort to serve like in Japan.

While in Kuuraku, waiter was kind of smiling/laughing in my face when asking about missing green tea starter.

(By the way, at Kogai japanese restaurant, you get all you can eat sushi, deserts and drinks, with the price of one sushi roll and one drink at Kuuraku).

Money is important. When a restaurant is expensive, it must justify it with quality food and service. Kuuraku was expensive with low quantity of food, low quality of food and no japanese feeling.

One more thing, when and where in this world, in a japanese restaurant you will not receive cold green tea as the first thing when you seat. Also, when and where, in a japanese restaurant you will find spicy food? Japanese do not eat spicy. I am not talking about wasabi, of course.

As a conclusion: This review is more for Kuuraku owners, to help them improve. No regular users will read all this. And the general rate will not be...

We went here for the first time wanting to try a new place and reviews were great for it.

And they weren’t wrong.

Parking at Global Foyer (where this is located) is easy. We called ahead for a reservation and glad we did because the place got busy.

As soon as we entered we had the entire staff welcome us in unison (chefs, servers, all of them). It was nice.

We chose to sit upstairs but they have the option to sit next to the kitchen where you can watch the food being made. You take off your shoes and put them in little lockers before going upstairs.

The menu has plenty of options and the portion sizes are quite generous. And serving efficiency is amazing. We got our food fast.

The food was delicious for the most part. My kids finished their food which is always a good indicator of the food taste.

About the environment though - this place gets busy. And seating is close together (very cozy). So it gets loud. It didn’t bother us much, but it may to some. Another thing was that our seat had direct cold air coming from the cooling vent and we didn’t think of asking for a change of seat. Half way through our meal, we were quite chilly.

Having said all of that, it is a place we will visit again.

(One thing I haven’t seen elsewhere is that for some of their alcoholic drinks, you can play rock paper scissors with the staff, and if you win, they give you an extra large glass for free. The table next to us did this and it was...