Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa opens its second Singapore restaurant today, Thursday 1 October, at #B1-75 Raffles City Shopping Centre, 252 North Bridge Road. The Nagoya unagi specialist, run here in partnership with Les Amis Group, arrived in Singapore at Shaw Centre, #01-12, on 15 April 2025.
The Raffles City outlet can be reached on +65 8998 3687, and Shaw Centre on +65 8031 5200.
From an eel wholesaler since 1932
Kikukawa is one of Japan’s largest live unagi restaurant chains, with 33 locations worldwide. It grew out of Nakasho Shoten, a Nagoya unagi wholesaler dating back to 1932, and is now led by fourth-generation owner Chef Kikukawa Yuhei. The brand is MICHELIN selected.
The eels are larger than the ones most restaurants use. They are kept in a tateba, a storage facility handed down through the family, and washed in well water to remove mud and the eel’s characteristic smell. Each eel is cut and dressed in the restaurant, grilled quickly over binchotan charcoal, then dipped in a tare sauce the brand has not changed since it started.
What’s on the menu
The signature is Ippon Unagi: a whole eel, dressed by the chefs and grilled so the skin crisps while the flesh stays soft. Kikukawa’s menu serves it four ways, as the Ippon Una-ju Set, Ippon Hitsumabushi Set, Unagi Kabayaki Ippon Set and Sirayaki Ippon Set. The Ippon Unagi dishes come in Shigaraki ware, pottery made since the Edo period that keeps the food at temperature on the way to the table.
Courses include hitsumabushi, and a kaiseki eel course adds seasonal appetisers. Beer, sake and shochu sit alongside Seiroku, the brand’s own sake blend made with three long-established Kyoto breweries: Masuda Tokubee Shoten, Matsui Shuzo and Kitagawa Honke.
Open kitchens and private rooms
Every Kikukawa restaurant has an open kitchen, so the cutting and grilling happen in view of diners. Seating runs from counters and tables to private rooms, and each restaurant is designed by a different architectural designer, so no two dining rooms look the same.
