Eat-all-you-can-Grill at Tajimaya Yakiniku Restaurant in SM Mall of Asia

Finally I was able to cross out another restaurant from my growing list of restaurants to try for the year!! We have barely 4 months to go before 2013 rolls in and I am barely half way there! *pant pant* So little time, so many restaurants to try!

After visiting an expo at the SMX Convention Center, Paul and I agreed to have dinner at Tajimaya Yakiniku Restaurant. I've been hearing about this restaurant from my cousin in law L who loves this restaurant and has been raving about their yummy grilled beef since last year! In fact, I still owe her a Tajimaya pig-out date together with ML.

We mentioned our dinner plans to The Food Club and our initial table reservation for two was magically turned into a private room for 8 as they wanted to try it out too! Well, as they say...the more, the merrier!

They have an Eat-All-You-Can promo where for only Php. 420 you get unlimited refills of beef, chicken, sausage, fish balls and pork. Add Php. 60 and make it Php. 520 then you get unlimited rice, iced tea, salad, appetizers and shrimps (note, shrimps NOT prawns).  I just love how the restaurant imposes a no-leftover rule where offenders will be charged an additional Php. 200. I really hate to see good food go to waste so this is a great way to ensure people just order what they can consume.



Our meal began with a saucer of Korean appetizers. I was initially wondering whetherthis is a Japanese or a Korean restaurant. I paused to ponder for a while then continued to dig into the complimentary kimchi and beansprout. Anyone knows the answer?

They made use of charcoal for the grill which was very good as charcoal brings out the flavor of the meat over its electric counterpart. The only thing that made cooking a challenge was that the fire was just too strong that they had to repeatedly throw in some ice cubes to tame it down.

The salad was good but I still prefer the ones from Jang Ga Nae anyday. I just had a few pieces and focused my attention on the meats. Carnivore-mode was totally ON that evening.

We got the six kinds of meat and tried each and every one until we found our respective favorites. For me, I love the beef which were sliced thinly and had a good marbling to it. I didn't have to dip it into the sauce as it was flavorful enough for me.

Paul enjoyed the crunchy pork bacon which we had at least three full plates of that evening. The chicken was just a-ok, quite boring compared to its beefy and crunchy bacon companions. I loved the fish balls! My only complain was it took them forever to refill this for us. I remembered asking the server for more plates of fish balls about 6 times until they finally came back with some.

I love shrimps but grilled shrimps make the shell stick that it's quite impossible to enjoy. I tried a few pieces and eventually gave up as I'd rather munch on the bacon and fish balls which I just have to pop into my mouth any totally avoid the struggle with my utensils.

The place was packed that evening and I think they were pretty undermanned thus the slow service. It could also be because we were in a private room that we had to rely on the doorbell to call the attention of the servers.

Will I still go back to Tajimaya? Definitely! This time though I'm sitting outside and will load up on more fishballs and beef too!

p.s. Tajimaya recently opened a new branch at One Rockwell in Makati. I was also told that their first branch was actually in Cebu! Here's one good example of a provincial outlet that became successful here in Manila. Hooray!!!

Tajimaya Yakiniku Restaurant is located at the 2nd level of the Entertainment Mall of  SM Mall of Asia, Pasay City. For reservations, call them at 556-8929.