Welcome to Haji Lane. Looking for Japanese places?

Enjoyable with the right amount of chew and snap, the Fremantle Octopus ($26) was pretty good too. Happy to nibble on them all night long, the smokey octopus offered tender, supple bouncy bites. The accompanying macadamia tahini was bursting with sweet nuttiness and paired even more nicely with a good squeeze of fresh lime.

Another stand-out dish was the flavourful Babaganoush ($14). Adorned with crispy keropok chicken skin, this chilled mezze featuring creamy smoked eggplant dip, earthy kinnogomadare, and roasted sesame seeds is a savoury delight. Just perfect with warm, soft, pillowy Pita ($3/piece).

Revisited Habibi-san recently and it's safe to say their dishes are as unforgettable as ever.

The Roasted Brussel Sprouts ($20) remain an absolute favourite, offering a delightful medley of flavours and textures. Imagine crisp charred buds, dancing in nutty kinnogomadare (roasted Japanese sesame paste), with the added crunch of pickled red cabbage, jalapeños, and a generous topping of umami-packed bonito flakes. It's a symphony of smokiness and sweetness, with just a hint of heat.

For something more substantial, the De Raza Iberico Pork Collar Chop ($42) resembled a succulent char siew in the best way possible. With a beautiful blush of pink, the shogayaki glazed sliced pork was nicely seasoned. Do expect a pleasant chew with the charred exterior and a wonderful balance of meat-to-fat ratio. However, the cut does get pretty cloying towards the end. Oh and not forgetting the roasted pumpkin (sprinkled with furikake), served on the side, was very complementary as well - amazingly sweet and melty-soft.

Overall: the flavours is reflective of the chef's training at high end restaurants, it's really incredible to be able to put tgt so many flavours of great flavours and so innovatively. This is a place to remember

Not a big portion, but immaculately prepared.

The pork collar was a beautiful medium pink, and the shogayaki marinade was fantastic, because it's not entirely faithful to the combination for shogayaki but it was well adapted for a big meat.

And gosh, the skin was so perfectly crispy. It's a thin shatteringly crisp layer, really excellently grilled.

Even the salad was delicious, clean but interesting enough from the surprisnfly strong smokiness

The only downside is that the crisp disappears after 1min, so enjoy it as soon as it is served. Otherwise a brilliance that's a must try

I have to proclaim, I'm fairly certain this is the best Brussel sprouts I've had.

I've had a lot of what other ppl consider good ones but nah none of them were up to my standards. Brussel sprouts are tasteless so they first of all need to be charred A LOT, which most places don't do enough of because they're scared it's gg to be burnt I guess, or it takes too long. Secondly because they're tasteless it needs very strong umami to support it

This place has both. Enough said

It's not a must try in my eyes cos I don't like Brussel sprouts, but if you do this is definitely a must try.

The naibai was really charred excellently on applewood, the smokiness was intense.

Burrata was good, the mentaiko Harissa wasn't spicy unlike how it seems. It provides a complex saltiness but the small amount is really not enough for the burrata at all

Overall not bad, ask for more mentaiko Harissa

This was similarly layered in flavour and intense, but I didn't like this one as much. It's still good, the acidity balancing the strong body a little bit, but I feel it deviates too much from a proper taramasalata for me to enjoy it. It's nice there's proper heat here though, so take note of that

If you treat it as a random mentaiko dip, then I think it's still very good. However the chives and the fried onions didn't pop as much as the ckn skin in the other one

A good ratio of spread to pita would be 1 to 2, so for 2 dips get 3-4 pitas. I recommend around 1 pita per pax though, because it is quite surprisingly filling, if you still want to try other items like mains

This blew my mind.

It looks tiny but it's actl quite abit, because it's intense and it's very filling. It's hardly like the traditional babaganoush, this was much bolder w the flavours, esp the kinno gomadare (roasted sesame sauce) and there's layers of flavours coming through. On top of that, the ckn skin was very crispy and added more umami

The complexity is really incredible and this is a must try

Not too bad, freshly toasted but not v crispy, there's some bite to it

PSA the place is really hard to find, it's this door at 57A with no signs, you walk up the stairs

Very good quality seafood here. However, this place is a bit pricey. The place is airplane themed and the staff are friendly.

Located at Haji Lane

Complimentary!
The orange one had red bean paste and the yellow one had white bean paste.

Recommendation: 4/5