Where blood and species matters - 勝博殿日式炸豬排(Saboten JapaneseCutlet)

Early June(Stuffy)

My interest for this new Tonkatsu restaurant was enhanced after reading and hearing so many about it - you could hardly ignore new reviews that kept coming everyday! Therefore we paid Saboten a visit in an early evening to see if it could live up to our expectation.

I am not a super fan of Japanese tonkatsu as I do not like heavy meaty meals, not to mention deep-fried ones. I had not had many experiences eating Japanese deep-fried cutlets too - only twice in Japan and twice in Hong Kong, therefore I was not knowledgeable enough to tell if something is authentic or not. But one thing for sure was that it was stupid comparing what I had in Japan with what i was going to get in HK. All I can trust and judge with is my tongue and how i genuinely feel about the restaurant.

It was only six something but a number of people were already there, eating halfway through their meals - what a starking contrast with Ichigo where the place was empty even at seven!

We were instantly greeted by the energetic and polite staff, and i felt it was a bit 'over' and unnatural...but still having some service is better than no service at all. The menu was long, but they do not have oysters (and i was shocked),but a number of combinations were available, so it took a few minutes to fully digest everything. At last we decided to had the combo for 2 persons ($299), which came with the Original pork loin, tenderloin, rolled pork loin, prawn and the creamy crab croquette - basically a bit of everything, perfect for us greedy foodies.

The set came with shredded cabbages(椰菜絲) - bottomless! - and we were free to add whichever dressing to our likings.

Two dressings were available, either the thicker sesame dressing or the yuzi dressing. I am usually a fan of goma but i found the dressing too watery and bland in flavour - i was looking for something more grainy and aromatic, but could find none.
Disappointed, I turned to the yuzi dressing. It wasnt very sour but tasted like soya sauce. Still a better choice than the goma dressing tho, and i really like how you could refill the shredded cabbages again and again - they had helped a lot in balancing the fattiness (and guiltiness) from eating the deep-fried cutlets and seafood.

We were also given a small bowl of black and white sesame to grind by ourselves, and upon reaching the desired texture we were to mix it with the special Tonkatsu sauce. The sauce itself was thick and sweet, and was further enhanced by the grounded, aromatic sesame. The little grains in the smooth sauce had made it more complex in texture, which was excellent!

we LOVE the bottomless preserved veggies and cucumbers - while i think the first plate tasted best as it was best chilled. The refills were equally sour and refreshing but had lost the coldness since they had been carried around by the servers.

As we were busy eating the salads and preserved vegetables the deep-fried foods came on a long plate, together with the miso soup and rice. They looked delicious!

Just a quick word on the rice. Previous reviews had pointed out the issue with the moisture but mine turned out to be perfect. I asked for the bran rice(麥飯) each and every grain were round, sticky, and very, very sweet. It was a good companion of the deep-fried foods - too bad that I could not even finish a bowl of it!

The waiters told us to eat the rolled pork tenderloin with cheese(芝士豬柳卷) first for freshness' sake. The cheese fillings was still molten as we bit in, and the roll was quite succulent with the many layers of thin pork in it, wrapping the cheese in a roll, the texture was a little coarser than what i had expected. Still the coating was perfectly thin and crispy, and it was a delicious epilogue to our tonkatsu feast of the night.

Moving from my left to the right of the plate - the first i tried was the deep-fried pork loin(豬排). This time the coating was a little loose and even fell off at some part of the loin. The meat itself was almost 20% fat, not very tough, but not of the utmost juiciness and tenderness. Searching in my memory, I felt like the pork loin I had at Ichigo last time was far better than this, being more refined in everything. This was just so-so.

Then was the creamy crab croquette(忌廉蟹餅) beneath the rolled pork loin. The croquette was filled with molten cream and crab mix. It tasted pretty sweet but not heavy, which was surprising as i thought something 'creamy' in Japanese would instantly equal something cooked with heavy cream and stuff. I found too much 'cream' and too little 'crab' in the croquette however, but in general it was wholesomely delicious - too bad there was only one piece and we had to share!

Next was the deep-fried pork tenderloin/fillet(豬柳). I was not expecting a lot of meaty flavours from it as this part of the pig would be naturally blander in flavour than loins, but i was looking for something smoother and juicier in texture. And what i tasted was an awful piece of pork meat, so soft as if it had been heavily chopped with the back of a chopper to achieve a softer texture. Now the fibre were destoryed and the meat had a texture similar to a piece of broken tofu, and it literally collapsed in my mouth. it was AWFUL - the worst i had ever had. Now that i could compare between the 2, the pork loin was way better than this as it at least tasted like meat instead of tofu.

If you think the pork tenderloin is the worst, it wasnt. The prawn was. It looked pretty beautiful, being big, long and fleshy. I was wrong and you could never judge a book by its cover. Similarly, never judge a prawn by its look. The prawn had a weird texture similar to the pig tenderloin and it tasted as if it was 'melting' in your mouth, literally crumbling into sands. There was no taste of freshness or whatsoever but the taste of egg in the coating. What a joke. I was expecting quite a lot from the prawn, to be honest.

One minor issue with the coating was that it became really wet and soaked with juice halfway through the meal. It appeared that the net the foods sat on did not help to keep it crisp.

I later read and discovered that Saboten is using a Taiwanese/Xiamen species of pig for regular rolled pork, loins and tenderloins, while the Nippon hogs were used only when you order the premium set. I previous thought the species of the animals would not really matter a lot but it appeared that when it comes to Tonkatsu, the species of the pig DO matter. While the Taiwanese pork had a strange and unpleasantly coarse meat fibre, i am sure that the Nippon pig would taste more juicy and tender.

M seemed interested in trying out the 'premium' pork while i was more interested in the crab croquette. It was actually my favourite in the set!

Comparison between this and Ichigo@Central was unavoidable as we just ate there less than a month ago. While we agreed that the pork was of a much better quality at Ichigo, everything else was better here at Saboten. The refillable cabbages was addictive and we had 3 rounds of it!

Not sure if we would come again, but if we were to, I am 99% sure that i would be ordering the CCC ie. creamy crab croquette.

勝博殿日式炸豬排
Saboten Japanese Cutlet
Lower Ground Floor Henry House 42 Yun Ping Road
Causeway Bay Hong Kong
Mon-Fri: 12:00nn - 3:00pm; 6:00pm - 11pm
Sat, Sun & PH:  12:00nn - 3:30pm; 6:00pm - 11:30pm