Tatakii Asian @ Oslo

Tatakii Asian in Oslo is the sister restaurant to the more centrally located Dinner, both serve high quality Asian fusion food. I arrived there by way of a Norwegian flight from Gatwick – both new experiences for me. Gatwick seems like a bit of a rabbit warren, reminding me of Manchester airport, replete with restaurants and shops. We ate chicken and prawn Pad Thai at Wagamama which was pretty standard fare but elevated by the addition of plenty of chilli sauce from the table.

Norwegian had comfortable seats and our flight wasn’t too busy meaning we got a spare seat on our row – so none of that annoying elbow jostling and fighting for bag storage space that often occurs –  and it set off and arrived on time at Gardermoen Airport which is still being refitted.

At the restaurant we opted for the five course set menu. This kicked off with spicy tuna tartar and mojiti sashimi.

Unbeknownst to us a few of our party ate something at this point that made them violently ill in the small hours of the morning. The rest of us felt like we dodged a bullet. It’s not a great advert for the kitchen or their suppliers, but the resulting letter of complaint will hopefully resolve the issues that led to this upset.

The next dish was a mixture of spicy laks tempura maki and foie gras maki. Lightly crunchy and fresh in the mouth, these were washed down with some Tsingtao beer.

The wasabi paste was quite mild in comparison to that encountered elsewhere and the ginger was thinly sliced and succulent with a powerful flavour. These tasty morsels were packed away with vigour in single mouthfuls while the conversation flowed.

Then we were treated to a plate of yakitori chicken, which I found a bit slimy, oksekjake which very phonetically translates in ox cheek which was delicious sandwiched inside the accompanying airy dumplings, and crispy scampi sticks which were thankfully free of any shell and juicy.

Then it was on to the star of the show – despite it being the most familiar dish to the Englanders present – the crispy duck. The only unusual twist being the addition of some mango.

Pudding was ‘Asiatisk riskrem servert med mandarin sorbet’ the rice cream in this case was a very thick rice pudding frozen into ice cream. Served with nut brittle shrapnel it was an excitement of tastes and textures in the mouth.

If it hadn’t been for the after-effects of this meal, I would be rating up there with Ling Ling and above the aforementioned Dinner.

The location of the restaurant also allowed us a late night stroll through Frogner Park. The park contains 212 bronze and granite sculptures, created by Gustav Vigeland 1924-1943. Some are hard to see at night but the bridge, opened to the public in 1940, is lined with 58 sculptures, including ‘Angry Boy’ (Sinnataggen).

Here’s a selection of some other terrible photos of the statues around the bridge:

We saw the historic, and rather Dutch looking, Manor House but didn’t visit the Monolith Plateau – a platform in the north of the park – made of steps that house a totem and 36 figure groups representing the ‘circle of life’. Hakuna matata!

Some day, I’ll go back during the day and have a proper look around and get some better piccies. It seemed like a very nice public space much like one of the London parks, and I wonder if the statues influenced the design of the ‘engineers’ in the film Prometheus.