Warakuya Japanese Restaurant - Johor Bahru

Was introduced by my friend to this Japanese restaurant while we were planning for a day trip to Johor Bahru, Malaysia. It was highly recommended by my friend after their visit to this restaurant a few weeks back so we decided to try it out ourselves. We went into JB in the afternoon and went to shop around first before heading to the restaurant at 6.30pm for dinner.

This is how the shop front looks like and the place was crowded when we reached there. Quite a number of people was already waiting outside and lucky we made a reservation beforehand as advised by my friend as they previously waited for quite some time before having a table. As there was quite a few of us, we made a reservation for a private room so that we can enjoy our meal and laugh as loud as we wanted!

The restaurant is located by the main road and has a very big signboard outside, so it's quite easy to spot. Sorry for the bad lighting in this picture as this was taken with my phone cause my camera died on me :(

 All their pictures looks so nice making it so hard to resist!! Everything looks so nice and delicious we can't decide on what to order. And what's worse, they have lots of variety to choose from. There's individual items, ramen sets, bento sets and of course sashimi sets.

Salmon Belly Shio Yaki - RM 14.90

One of our favorite dish that we will always order in a Japanese restaurant is this Grilled Salmon Belly. We are a major lover of salmon and the salmon belly and head meat are the most delicious parts as it is tender and juicy, which is why we always order both! The salmon was fresh but it was a bit too greasy.

Shark Fin Chawanmushi - RM 8.90

My must order item whenever I am having Japanese cuisine is this little baby - Chawanmushi! I love eggs, especially steamed eggs! It didn't tasted much different from the normal ones in my opinion.

Our Sashimi Set topped with one serving of sea urchin. We ordered a few different type of fish and they put them together into this one big plate. This dish is so refreshing as they are all soo fresh. We had this finished as soon as it was served!

Top: Kani Karrage Maki (Soft Shell Crab) - RM 19.90, Bottom: Cheese King Prawn Maki - RM 23.90

Next up for some more filling dishes! This 2 dish was one of the few recommended items on menu and the pictures just made it even harder to say no, so we ordered both. Both tasted really nice but if I could only choose one, I would pick the Cheese King Prawn Maki.

Top left to down: Grilled Wagyu Beef - RM 129, Fried Chicken with Tartar Sauce - RM 13.90, Barbeque Squid - RM 19.90.

The Wagyu Beef was superb!! It was really juicy and totally melts within your mouth. It was kinda small but it was the most expensive dish of all that we ordered. (We did not noticed the price when ordering as we were so attracted by all the pictures and was totally shocked when we saw the bill!!!)

 We ordered some other side dishes along the way to go with our sakes before leaving the restaurant close to 3.5 hours later. Overall, the food here is pretty good and the service was excellent even though they had a full house. The dishes are a bit pricey but I would still come back again as the variety here is really amazing and the overall experience was great! If you are looking for good quality and nice ambiance Japanese restaurant, do try this one out. But do remember to make a reservation to avoid long waiting time.

Warakuya Japanese Restaurant (和乐屋日本料理)

43 Jalan Kuning 2, 

Taman Pelangi, 80400 Johor Bahru

Johor, Malaysia
Tel: +60 07-332 0789 / +60 016-777 8234

Business hours: Monday to Sundays, 11.30am - 11pm