Get interactive at Inamo

This mainly Japanese venture (with judicious borrowings from other parts of Asia) has one massive, unmistakable gimmick; an interactive menu displayed onto your table top from above. Wiggling your right finger inside an indented circular shaped part of the table will operate the cursor, enabling you to view and choose drinks, food (two small and one big plate each, we were advised) interactive games and even the colour and pattern to be beamed onto the table itself. It’s pretty easy to get the hang of despite my tendency to put my drink inside said circle, staff are boundlessly friendly, and we quite liked being able to pace the arrival of our dishes by ordering 15 minutes before we wanted to eat.

 

Sitting on a pretty anonymous part of Wardour Street, Inamo is doing pretty well for itself, packed out on a Tuesday night at the arse-end of January. The sashimi salad we chose to start was fresh enough – safe options of salmon, tuna and, I think, yellowtail, came with some leaves and a perky yuzu-scented dressing. Four scallops – or more likely two cut in two – were well seasoned and perfectly cooked, with a yuzu (again) dressing which lacked the punch of the advertised wasabi. Tuna tataki, one of my favourites, was nicely seared on the outside, raw and glistening within, although its wafu dressing alone was enough, and didn’t need the sludgey mayonnaise (sorry miso aioli) accompaniment we got. Seafood gyoza were really well cooked - soft on one side, crisp on the other - but the filling was a little bit anonymous. Marbled beef came as carpaccio-thin slices in a heady truffle dressing with deep-fried garlic; rich and savoury and very, very moreish.

 

Mains stray a bit further into Asia, with dishes like thai red curry, pomegranate duck and pork neck in chocolate sauce. A black cod dish in spicy miso was a poor rendition of the Nobu classic, the beautifully cooked cod completely drowned by a way-too-sweet miso dressing. But a wagyu bavette – that’s a bit of Japanese steak to you and me – was well-cooked, well-seasoned, and generally not mucked about with much. A white chocolate mouse accompaniment to a macaroon dessert was an addition of yuzu too far for us, but crème brule was much more pleasant.

 

Having lived in Japan for three years I have that infuriating trait of twattish ex-ex-pats – ridiculously high standards of any Japanese or Japanese-influenced food I come across. But to be honest, Inamo is pretty good. That the kitchen can get food out to this standard within around 15 minutes is testament to a well-drilled brigade.

The only problem was the table of eight suits behind us who whooped, guffawed and screamed their way through dinner, delighted by the interactive table in the same way a group of special needs kids on a school outing might be … but louder and more irritating. Not quite as irritiating though as the two thirty-something Soho secretary types who spent 20 minutes hollering down the phone at a prospective beau they were both arranging to meet in the bar below. Yeah Inamo is fun, maybe a first date kind of fun – but don’t go expecting a sophisticated night out. This is Shinjuku Station on a Friday night Japan, not elegant Kyoto kaiseki meal Japan.