Tenya Tempura ION Orchard : Affordable Japanese Food

Tenya Tempura ION Orchard is one of the newer restaurants at the Orchard Road shopping mall. What is “affordable” is a topic for debate these days. Here, bowls of rice stuffed with tempura seafood start from around $13, which is less than the price of one tempura prawn in some restaurants.

Tempura Tendon Tenya

Tempura Tendon Tenya, popularly known as TENYA, is described as Japan’s No.1 Tendon Chain Restaurant. It has its roots in the historical and cultural district of Asakusa in Tokyo. Singapore’s first Tenya outlet first opened in Orchard Central a few years ago to long queues. Tenya Tempura ION Orchard is their second outlet. It is a small restaurant in B4. From our experience, the busiest times at this restaurant is lunch time, even on week days.

Tenya Tempura ION Orchard review Affordable Japanese Food

Tenya Tempura ION Orchard Menu

The Tenya restaurant contains mainly different variants of tendon (i.e. rice bowls with tempura toppings) and several side dishes. Those with a big appetite can opt for a set meal which is an add-on of an extra serving of soba or udon. Here are pictures of some portions of the Tenya Tempura ION Orchard Menu. At Tenya, they offer an option to increase or reduce the quantity of rice in the tendon. The prices shown on the menu are for a regular serving. A 50 cent discount or surcharge is applied if the rice is reduced or increased respectively. We think that this is a very good idea that reduces food wastage.

We decided to have the Seafood Tendon ($14.90), Aomori Tendon ($15.90) and a Kirin beer ($5.50).

Our Tendon Lunch

The Aomori Tendon ($15.90) was one of the premium items on the menu. As you can see the bowl was overflowing with fried seafood items – prawn, salmon, oyster with a few vegetable items. The batter used for this is also different from the other tendon items. It is said to contain seaweed flakes. We thought that it was more tasty than the regular ones. Definitely worth the extra bucks.

Our other dish that was a seafood tendon ($14.90). This is a classic Tenya dish and contains tempura prawns, anago, scallop, sish, pumpkin and French beans. It is a dish we can eat everyday. Tenya’s secret weapon – the sauce (tendon tare) was developed together with a traditional soy sauce maker. It has a complex savoury yet sweetish flavour. Apparently the secret of the Tare sauce is grilled eel essence.

Note the tendons are served bare i.e. without the tare which is available at the table. The above picture is the Aomori tendon before any sauce was added. The picture below of the seafood tendon was after sauce was added.