Token South Yarra restaurant review 2024: Kara Monssen visits mod-Japanese eatery
South Yarra’s new modern Japanese eating house may be a little cliched, but that doesn’t mean it won’t get people through the door.
Food
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When I first heard about Token, I was admittedly a little judgmental.
Here we go again. A big name restaurant group inserting another manufactured and clichéd “modern Asian” restaurant into upper-middle Melbourne.
Maybe I’m a little dreamy, but some of the best meals I’ve eaten come from restaurants where you can taste, and feel, the chef’s passion for cooking in every bite.
Go on, roll your eyes, and call me the ‘w’ word that rhymes with banker.
But isn’t that why most chefs cook for a living, to tell stories through food?
And aren’t we as diners chasing those ‘OMG’, utterly delicious moments to burn into our brains forever?
Maybe I’m being unrealistic. Everyone needs to earn a buck right now, and fairytale endings aren’t financially realistic, so from a business perspective it makes sense to engineer Token – and all those that have come before – to work.
The Darling Group has this down to a tee. They’re behind some of Melbourne’s most successful cafes, using the same template for their first major restaurant project.
Trendy Toorak Rd, South Yarra location? Beer starting at $14? Sinkable cocktails that are hard to stop at one? A menu so vast even the fussiest of eaters are pleased?
You get the point.
I tip my hat to chefs who can not only perform at scale but deliver on quality, and flavour.
Chefs Ashly Hicks (Garden State, Prince Dining Room) and Jun Sun (Nobu, Ichi Ni Nana Izakaya) do a fine job.
As the place is jammed by 7pm on a weeknight, I guess the punters agree.
It seats 150; the ground level awash with tan-timber tables overlooking Toorak Rd’s peak-hour chokehold, the elevated back section offers private nooks and booths, the centre is anchored by a buzzy open bar and smoke-filled kitchen.
And if that isn’t enough, a rooftop bar is slated for later this year.
Token’s menu is equally exhaustive: dumplings, rice and noodles, sashimi, sushi, fried things and that’s before we get to the main event.
Tempura-crisp oyster mushrooms ($16), all golden and Troll Doll hair squiggly, go swimmingly with a cold beer, or a fizzy lychee highball cocktail ($20).
In a win for non-drinkers, they also have a neat zero-booze take on the Roku which tastes almost identical ($14). If wine’s more your style, the list is also far reaching, largely Aussie and spice friendly.
Raw Ora King salmon ($31), sliced into neat tiles with nectarine, would have thrived at room temp, though dressed in a zappy red kosho (chilli pepper) and mandarin, it’s not a huge loss. Two splayed grilled prawns ($18) are a bittersweet romance of chilli butter and flaky-singed burnt shell edges. It’s a highlight, along with pan-fried pork dumplings ($26 for four); sweet with wombok, less fatty and thicker-skinned than other cheap takeaway finds. Shame they’re not made in house.
Some dishes need work. The ‘cacio e pepe’ udon noodles ($24) subs parmesan for savoury miso butter, while black pepper is replaced by a persistent sansho pepper that becomes more overwhelming with every bite. Thank God for furikake (seaweed and sesame salt), as it’s kind of boring without it.
The chasu pork belly ($22) was great, but just for the meat, as the face-melting karaachi mustard is far too potent.
Remember the vending machine regret you’d get when you accidentally ordered matchstick fries? I get the same feeling with Token’s version, which is a carbon copy of the packet snack just ruffled with spices. These come with the steak, too.
I’m usually ho-hum about ordering dessert at mod Asian restaurants, but the misomisu ($16)– that layers mascarpone, hazelnuts and white miso over whisky-soaked brown butter biscuits – is game changing.
Token may lack depth, but certainly has delicious moments. While it wasn’t my restaurant holy grail, I’m sure it will be for others.
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