Spoiler Alert: ROKA, the newest Japanese opening on Riyadh’s restaurant row, is outstanding – and you need to book a table right now.
Done? Good, because as one of the city’s hottest openings this year, and with a bulging reservation book filled for literally months to come, time is of the essence if you want to get through the door.
There’s a reason ROKA is so popular. After successfully serving up plates of clean-cut sushi, sizzling grills and creative desserts to diners across the globe, ROKA has pincered together its best chefs, mixologists and waiters and brought them all the way to Riyadh.
With the reservation route exhausted, we try our luck for a weeknight walk-in, and to our surprise we’re quickly whisked to two prime-view seats at the elegant bar on the edge of a busy dining room (the restaurant holds back a few spots every night including a wait list for the robata grill).
Given its popularity, ROKA has opted to stick with a tried-and-tested menu from its Dubai branch, except for a new crispy squid starter which is a firm favourite of the Saudi crowd. But by no means are the dishes at the Riyadh branch merely faithful recreations – this is
the real deal.
It’s clear that the concept hasn’t lost a single sizzle as waiters return to the table again and again with sharing-style snacks, salads and signatures. Service could be a little less rushed, but with so many dishes to get out, we can let it slide.
Start with the light and refreshing avocado, asparagus and cucumber roll, which packs delicate layers of vegetables into a compact centre. Elsewhere, baby spinach with umami-filled sesame dressing impresses, as does the baked potato with cream cheese and chive – mashed tableside.
Robata skewers are brilliantly charred, but the intensely flavourful beef dumplings, blending the light nuttiness of sesame seed with a pungent kick of ginger, proves a winning combination that has us yearning for another plate.
Desserts take a far more inventive turn, with the ‘sumi fuumi no kokonattsu tamago to passion fruit’ served as a giant frozen ball of coconut lying on a bed of chopped passion fruit, raspberry and lychee.
The cheesecake with robata-grilled pear is deconstructed and Hokkaido-style, with a light and fluffy sponge taking the place of traditional cream cheese. It’s an excellent end to an excellent meal, and all as artfully prepared as a plate of new-style sashimi.
Simply put, ROKA is exceptional – from the dark and moody dining room to the expert execution of even the simplest of dishes. Get yourself a reservation now and start counting down those weeks.
