Yakimix (Trinoma)

I had never eaten here before so I was honestly kind of sketchy about this choice at first. I thought to myself, “Another Japanese ‘fusion’/shabu-shabu place? No way!” We all know what Saisaki-Dads degenerated into, so I was really dubious about what this experiment would turn out to be. Alas, our first choice Banana Leaf was still closed (at 11 in the morning) so we all ended up here for what was supposed to be a quick meal so we could make it in time for a supposed 1pm class. I read the sign on the door: “Eat all you can buffet… Smokeless Grill” Well, I didn’t expect much. I thought that I would have some “meh” meal. But I was proven wrong.

Upon entering, I was impressed at how classy the interiors looked. Dark wood trimmings on the columns and fresh yellow orchids near the tables. Nice. Ok, so it doesn’t look dirt cheap. But what about the food?

 The buffet spread basically had four sections: appetizers, fresh entrees, cooked entrees, and desserts. For starters, they have the usual bird’s nest soup, kani salad, potato salad, and Korean appetizers such as kimchi. Cooked entrees were an assortment of sushi and sashimi, shrimp tempura, maki, spicy beef and vegetables—the kind of stuff that you would see in other Jap fusion buffets (you know, comfort food). As I was hungry, I darted for the cooked section first. But as my friend said, “You don’t go to Yakimix for that, Chatto.” So what do we go to Yakimix for?

  

Enter the uncooked entrees. One has a wide selection to choose from: seafoods, poultry, beef, and pork. You’d have to cook each piece on a “smokeless” grill heated by lava stones. The grill really is smokeless by the way, so don’t worry about smelling like the foodcourt after you’re done eating.

I was pleasantly surprised that the uncooked seafood was actually very fresh. That’s pretty much a rare treat for many restaurants in Manila. The meats were also seasoned well enough to give them just the right zing. An even more pleasant surprise was that the food wasn’t oily at all—an even rarer treat for this type of establishment.

The good:

Beef with golden mushrooms (this was a sure fire hit for the rest of us in the table), chicken, beef, and pork.

*note the salmon at the bottom :))

Also, I do recommend that you try their salmon. They were thinly sliced, extremely tender even when grilled, and very fresh. It’s my personal favorite.  The cuttlefish and squid tentacles were also very tasty—spicy but not hot.

After the meats are grilled, one can dip them in Yakimix’s sauce to give it more flavor (although the meats do taste fine even without doing so).  I have no idea what they put in this, but there’s definitely soy sauce, some chili and perhaps Thai herbs.

For their desserts, Yakimix has a spread of sweets purchased from other establishments. There’s black forest cake from Goldilocks, ice cream and popsicles from Nestle, and so on.

The bad:

Fruit tart at the desserts section – Don’t even bother eating this. It tastes like flour.

Overall, Yakimix was worth the visit. Because the food was that good, we tried a second (or was it third?) round. Unfortunately, we overestimated our gastric emptying capacities so no matter how much we fantasized about stuffing ourselves to the brim, we really couldn’t take any more food at all. Now that wasn’t exactly good news. The restaurant charges a (very) reasonable price of P499 per person—if you finish your food. Leftovers will set each person back an extra P200. And because some of our plates looked like this:

We had to play a little game and be rather… creative. 

To make it appear that we had less leftovers than we really had, we chopped them up into little pieces and hid them amongst the other food.

Now you see it…

and now you don’t.

Can you spot where the leftovers are?

I think this trick worked because we did not have to pay anything extra...

The verdict: If you think that this restaurant is another Saisaki-Dads knockoff, then you’re wrong. Yakimix (at least the Trinoma branch) is waaay better, with classier interiors, tastier and fresher food. For those of you who haven’t tried it, I recommend you do so.   

Rating: 4/5