Umaya, Parramatta

Seeing the new Japanese restaurants opening up around Parramatta, I decided to visit Umaya (Shop 5/134-140 Marsden St, Parramatta) and although my bro already told me it wasn't that good and rather expensive, I still thought that I might as well try it. Since we went on a public holiday, it was very empty when we sat down for lunch. The staff were thus rather quick and attentive. The meals come along with side dishes like miso soup and come to around $18 so it's not too expensive but still rather expensive considering other options.

Oyako Don

Simmered chicken, onion  and eggs in Japanese sweet sake and soy sauce

My sister decided to get something different from the katsudon that her fiance and I ordered and so chose this. Although it tasted all right, it wasn't anything special and had a bit more of a stronger mirin taste than the usual ones I've had before. However, it was rather soft and smooth. There was way too much rice though.

Japanese  Katsu Curry Rice

This was probably the best out of our dishes, I stole a bit from my bro and it was quite good! Not too much rice, quite a bit of curry and it was smooth, tasty, a bit spicy with a balanced amount of meat. My brother finished it off rather quickly haha. However, he doesn't think it's worth price of around $18.

Katsu Don Chicken

Deep fried crumbed chicken fillet and eggs simmered in soy sauce and Japanese sweet sake

For me, I saw the photos on Instagram and decided to get the katsudon and honestly, it's one of the most underwhelming katsudon I have. It was very disappointing considering the heavy amount of rice with no sauce on it and the chicken was really tasteless and mushy. The egg was okay but couldn't save the rest of the dish. I'm not a fan of pickle radish and veggies etc so the sides weren't my thing either. The miso soup was quite salty as well.

Overall, I definitely wouldn't recommend this place and agree with my brother that it's rather expensive and the food isn't great either. I was excited for a new Japanese joint to open but this was disappointingly not worth the trip to go to.