Okawa Japanese Cuisine

We recently found out about a new Japanese restaurant that opened up in Rockwall. There's not too many interesting places to eat in Rockwall (and we've been to all the good spots) so it was nice to have something new! Looking at the online reviews, the place seems like it has a lot of potential! Great reviews, nice looking food pics, so we decided to go check it out.

Okawa Japanese Cuisine
2927 Ridge Rd Ste 105
Rockwall, TX 75032
(972) 722-2888
www.okawajapanesecuisine.com
Price: $

It's located in the same shopping center in Kroger (just around the corner from it). There was only 1 other table when we got there, it was pretty slow on a Sunday night. It's a small place, not much on the decor side. The front of house was an Asian lady. There didn't seem to be that many people working there. My guess is 1 person in the front and 2 in the kitchen? She was pretty friendly but I could tell immediately that her English was somewhat limited.

We ordered some hot teas since it was freezing that week. And she took our order.

Crunchy Beancurd (deep fried tofu with special sauce) $6.95~ 

I ordered this purely based on the picture from yelp. It looked pretty awesome and different from other fried tofu at Japanese places I've seen. However, it was exactly like all the other places -___- haha. Basically Agedashi tofu, the name usually used on Japanese menus. It was piping hot. The tofu was soft on the inside and lightly fried on the outside. I thought it was a little light on the flavor but I was ok with that. So... it was good, but pretty standard.

Okawa Salad (mixed greens with house dressing) $7.95~ 

I also wanted to try this because of the picture cuz it had sprouts in it! I love sprouts. We were wondering why this salad is more expensive than the others. It is topped with white wood ear mushrooms. I'm guess that's the reason. The ginger dressing is light. The salad is pretty good, but I wish it was bigger in portion.

Unagi Don (grilled eel with eel sauce over rice) $9.95~ 

It's rare to find Unagi Don for under $10 so we each ordered one. However, the waitress only put in order for 1 even after my fiance double checked with her that we ordered 2. I think it was language barrier there. So we waited around for them to bring the 2nd one and it never came. Finally I asked her and she thought we only ordered 1 the entire time. However, while eating, I overheard her talking to the kitchen. She was Chinese, so I started speaking Chinese to her and she seemed like she relaxed a little. She quickly put in another order and I got my own unagi. :) It's a good portion. The dish came with ginger and some pickled vegetables. The unagi had good flavor, but the skin on the bottom was quite tough. And there were some bones so watch out. I'd say it was ok. Not sure if I would order it again. But I took half of it to-go for my lunch the next day! We also reserved some of the sprouts from the salad and mixed in with our rice.

Chicken Yakisoba (stir fried noodle) $6.50~ 

We also ordered this so we'd both have leftovers for lunch the next day. I thought this was tasty. I liked all the veggies in there. I think because we also ordered this, she thought we only got 1 Unagi.

I had some small talk with the lady. She seems really nice. They'd only been open for about 2 months at that point... so maybe almost 3 months now. The food is decent. For the price point we'll probably go back. There's some other stuff on the menu I'd like to try still. I've heard that's not the greatest location, so I hope their business picks up!

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~~ CHOMP CHOMP ~~