Cafe Kazari (Malvern) 09

kazari: Japanese ='to decorate' or 'to exhibit' 'to arrange with wit'

Tucked away at the back of a gallery filled with a wonderful collection of old Japanese and Chinese furniture, paintings baskets and artifacts, this little cafe with half a dozen tables, opens for lunch Tuesday to Saturday and for dinner Friday night. It has a small menu that changes every week of Japanese style food including some 'sozai', tapas style dishes. After a small dish of slightly sweet sour marinated greens we began with a serve of very tasty steamed dumplings, chicken and prawn siu mai ($18), Chinese style. This was expensive compared to the average Chinese restaurant, followed by Coffin Bay oysters served with grated daikon, carrots and ponzu sauce ($12) which were pleasant without being exceptional. Steamed sea perch in foil with shallots, mushroom and saki with crisp bread was extremely good, delicate well balanced moist and very moorish ($23). We then had a wonderful pasta with seaweed and a light chilli flavouring which did not destroy the palate for the next course. A miso soup ($3) was worth having anytime. The sauteed spring lambwith slightly spicy nato miso on top ($23) was a small serve and very ordinary after the previous dishes. There is a small range of desserts ($6-$9) served with green tea or black sesame ice cream and a pot of Green tea. BYO with a $5 corkage is very reasonable. An interesting place well worth browsing around before or after a meal. So where is it? 490 Malvern Rd. Half a dozen doors west of McDonalds, opposite the Peugot showrooms.
Score: 13.25/20