Danro Japanese Hot Pot Buffet // Media Tasting Invite Part 2

Just to recap from Amasoy Japanese Soy Pudding x Hokkaido Milk Series // Media Tasting Invite Part 1 in case you missed it:

I received a media tasting invitation last week for a tasting at DANRO Japanese Hot Pot and AmaSoy by Ministry of Food on 15 May 2013, Wednesday

>> Ps. because the blog post is too long, I decided to split it into 2 parts. This is PART 2! <<
*Part 1: Amasoy Japanese Soy Pudding x Hokkaido Milk Series*

>> CLICK HERE to Read Part 1 of the Food Tasting <<
>> CLICK HERE to Read Part 1 of the Food Tasting <<

And back to Part 2!

NOTE: EXTREMELY photo intensive blog post

Danro Japanese Hot Pot Buffet
Serangoon NEX #02-04/06,
Singapore 556083
6634 4608

Basically DANRO Japanese Hot Pot is Ministry of Food’s (MOF) very 1st Japanese Hot Pot buffet restaurant in Singapore. It is located at NEX Serangoon Central, and is also the 1st hot pot restaurant in Singapore which serves specialty hot pots from different regions in Japan!

“DANRO” comes from the Japanese word 暖炉 which means “steamboat”, and the restaurant specialise in “nabemono” referring to all varieties of Japanese hot pot dishes. DANRO offers customers two authentic Japanese soup bases from a choice of nine in a single pot as Singaporeans love variety, and there is something for everyone at DANRO!

Best of all, it’s not that expensive – in fact, it’s pretty affordable especially when you look at the variety of food they have available for this price (include drinks like soft drinks, hot ocha and iced tea)!

Seafood	Salmon & hamachi kama, crab surimi, fresh squid, fresh shrimps, white shell clams, Japanese fish cake & fish balls, fresh fish of the day
Meat	Sliced shabu shabu beef, sliced shabu shabu pork, shoyu marinated pork ribs, shoyu marinated diced chicken
Vegetables	Japanese leek, white radish, Japanese lotus root, carrot, spinach, sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, cabbage, local greens, onions, sweet corn cob
Miscellaneous	Japanese ramen noodles, Japanese silken tofu, Japanese soft tofu, Japanese glass noodles, wood ear mushrooms, enoki mushrooms, shiitake mushrooms, fresh eggs
Others	Sushi, deep fried items, fresh fruits, soft serve ice cream and assorted desserts

So first of all, Daniel from Danielfooddiary.com and Tim Oh introduced us to Amasoy Japanese Soy Pudding and the Hokkaido Milk Series which was mentioned in Part 1. After the sampling session, they moved on to explaining about the unique concept of Danro where they have the 9 different soup bases which is a first in Singapore.

After that, we had to choose our 2 soup base! Crystal and I decided on the following 2 out of the 9 that were available based on their recommendations/own opinions:

1. Nara Chicken & Milk Broth

2. Hokkaido Wafu Miso Broth

Other recommended soups include: Shikoku Spicy Chicken Broth and Tokyo Tonkatsu Broth!

And while waiting, I was busy snapping some photos of the surroundings (and ourselves)(:

Crystal with the alcoholic drinks menu

But just a note, we ordered the AmaSoy Hokkaido Milk Drinks instead as seen from Amasoy Japanese Soy Pudding x Hokkaido Milk Series // Media Tasting Invite Part 1.

Me waiting for the broths to arrive

Crystal being random, and other invited bloggers in the background

We were then treated to a ‘walking tour’ of what’s available at the Danro Japanese Hot Pot Buffet, so let’s have a look at the HUGE variety of choices shall we?

Sushi!

Loads of veggies and mushrooms!

My absolute fave!

Steamboat/Hot Pot Necessities

Onsen Egg

Hot food selection

(I know it says Dumpling, but it’s actually Japanese potato croquette)

Very popular Salmon Chips

Marinated Meat, shabu shabu meat and Seafood section

Dessert

And of course, what makes Danro special is the large array of condiments including ponzu sauce, shoyu, goma sauce, and specially created sambal chill sauce available for you to mix and match or follow the instructions to create your own sauce.

Of course I didn’t take photos of ALL that is available, there are still loads more – you can see it for yourself when you dine at Danro Japanese Hot Pot Buffet!

Meanwhile when we got back to our seats after the ‘tour’, our twin broths were already there.

But we also were greeted with the sight of these ‘rice sticks‘ aka Kiritanpo! According to Daniel, DANRO’s Kiritanpo きりたんぽ (S$1 each) is a grilled rice skewer dish and these rice sticks can be dipped into the hot pot soup, or enjoyed with one of DANRO’s specially made dips.

And so we did dip it into the hot broth!

And if you were wondering whether the rice will just drop into the soup…well, no worries, it won’t! I stuck mine there for like 5 minutes to get the full taste of the broth in each of the Kiritanpo! You can choose to put it in the hotpot for as long as you like btw~ Personal preference(:

omnomnomnom

And finally after all these, we started taking our food! So let’s just have a couple of the pictures do all the talking shall we? Feeling lazy XD Plus we were too busy eating to take too many photos X)

MY THANKS TO MY PERSONAL CHEF: CRYSTAL BTW!

And ending off with some dessert.

I can tell you..we were totally STUFFED!

P.s we didn’t really get to interact with the other bloggers as we were seated at another table for 2, but surprisingly one of the bloggers, UncleTehPeng came up to us after the event ended to say hi to us! Well, hope to see you at another event soon Damien – we’ll chat next time(:

Overall, I had a great time at Danro Japanese Hot Pot sampling all the delicious food there as well as the soy puddings and Hokkaido Milk drink from AmaSoy. They were definitely OISHI!(: Would definitely recommend you to dine there – for the variety and price. And it has a great atmosphere to large parties too!(:

Danro Japanese Hot Pot Buffet
Serangoon NEX #02-04/06,
Singapore 556083
6634 4608

To end off, I would like to give my thanks to the following people:

Tim Oh (and Daniel Ang from Danielfooddiary.com) for inviting me to the media tasting invite
MOF for hosting the media invite
Crystal for being my awesome plus one – always!