Breaking the hype at Yabu

Since the moment Yabu announced its opening, eaters and reviews have been raving about their authentic pork katsu.

Authentic pork katsu?! I'm there!

That flaky, crusty, crispy coating around melt-in-your-mouth pork has been a family obsession heightened during our trips to Tokyo Needless to say, I'm a tough critic when it comes to real authentic pork katsu.

So does Yabu live up to all the hype?... Unfortunately, it's all just overhyped. The positive is that the panko crusting is really flaky and crispy.

Overall, though, I felt sort of cheated. The price isn't at all extravagant, but if you claim to be authentic, you have to do it right all the way without masking or faking anything.

The kurobuta pork and the other pork loins are hammered to forge tenderness. What a sacrilege to kurobuta pork! If it's real kurobuta and cooked properly, the meat will be so tender and flavorful on its own.

The meat was so hammered and ground up that it was as if our meal was Japanese Chicken Fried Steak (or I guess chicken fried pork). That's such a false impression for first time katsu eaters and, especially, for first time kurobuta pork eaters.

Place your cursor above "Notes" below to read the captions for each photo.

The slide show here runs on Flash. If you can't see it, check out my Flickr album: Yabu