Keyaki Tempura Restaurant in a Marina Square Japanese Garden

Koi, clipped shrubs and stone lanterns surround Keyaki, the Japanese restaurant on Level 4 of Pan Pacific Singapore at 7 Raffles Boulevard, and that garden is the first reason to come here for tempura. The hotel describes the room as surrounded by a Japanese garden and koi pond, and its printed menu talks about soft shadows from the keyaki-wood structure and reflections from the pond. Few dining rooms in Marina Centre let you eat fried prawn while looking at stepping stones instead of a mall corridor.

Pan Pacific Singapore has been part of the Marina Bay skyline since 1986, according to the hotel, which is marking its 40th anniversary in 2026 with offers across its restaurants. Keyaki is not a dedicated tempura-ya built around one fryer counter. It is a broad Japanese kitchen covering sashimi, sushi, teppanyaki, sukiyaki and kaiseki-style sets, which suits mixed groups: one diner can order a full tempura tray while another eats wagyu off the teppan grill at the same table.

Chef Teruya Noriyoshi leads the kitchen as Executive Japanese Chef. His official biography traces a career that began in Oregon in 1995, passed through Nobu New York alongside Masaharu Morimoto and Nobu Milan, and included Syun at Resorts World Sentosa. Eric Yong runs the grill as Head Teppanyaki Chef. That division shows on the menu, where tempura turns up inside gozen trays, noodle bowls, sushi rolls and even the teppanyaki courses rather than as a stand-alone counter omakase.

Seating runs to 128 guests, with tatami and western-style private rooms for smaller parties who want a door they can close. A separate Garden Pavilion, clad in shoji-inspired screens that open onto the lawn and koi pond, seats up to 40 for private lunches, dinners and receptions. Couples get the most from the setting by requesting a table facing the pond when they book, because that outlook is what separates this room from the other hotel restaurants around Raffles Boulevard.

Tempura Moriawase, listed as the chef's selection of tempura, costs S$40 on the current à la carte menu and is the clearest way to judge the batter. Ebi Tempura brings three pieces of prawn for S$25, and Yasai Tempura, the vegetable plate, is also S$25. Two people sharing one moriawase and one yasai get a sense of range without turning lunch into a fried-food marathon, and still have room for sashimi or a bowl of hamaguri clam soup.

Noodle fans can order Tempura Soba at S$28, where buckwheat soba or thin Inaniwa udon from Akita Prefecture arrives with assorted tempura. Ebiten Maki wraps prawn tempura with a spicy sauce and sits in the makimono section beside the Spider Maki, made with deep-fried soft-shell crab and fish roe. Those two rolls work as a shared opener for a table that plans to move on to teppanyaki or a wagyu sukiyaki pot for the main course.

Teppanyaki diners are not shut out of the fryer either. Keyaki's Classic teppanyaki multi-course, priced at S$190, offers a choice between three kinds of assorted sashimi or prawn and vegetable tempura before king prawn in the signature golden sauce and Japanese A4 wagyu sirloin with crab meat fried rice. Choosing the tempura option there lets one person taste both the fryer and the grill in a single sitting, finished with matcha mizu chocolate and sasashigure mochi.

Gozen trays are where tempura appears most often at midday. Sashimi and Tempura Jyu Gozen pairs the chef's selection of sashimi with three pieces of prawn and assorted vegetable tempura over steamed rice for S$70. Bara Chirashi and Tempura Gozen combines chirashi sushi with assorted tempura for S$72, and the Vegetarian Gozen builds a meal around vegetable tempura, vegetable soup and corn flan for S$60. Each tray comes with chawanmushi, mozuku-su, Okinawa tofu, miso soup, pickles and dessert.

Saturdays and Sundays bring the Japanese Boozy Weekend Brunch, which the hotel calls a kaiseki-style brunch presented in an okonomi concept. Diners pick one dish per course, and the agemono course includes prawn and vegetables tempura alongside fried seasonal fish ankake and Hokkaido white pork cutlet. The set is listed at S$88++ per person, with optional Prosecco or Champagne free-flow packages whose last pour is at 2:00pm and a Mini Bara Chirashi or Inaniwa udon to close the savoury courses.

Reservations go through TableCheck, linked from the Keyaki page on the Pan Pacific website. Eric Yong's weekday teppanyaki lunch set, priced at S$40++ and running until 30 December 2026, is capped at the first 12 guests per lunch period, so that counter fills fastest. Lunch orders close at 2:00pm and dinner orders at 10:00pm, and the dress code is smart casual, so swap beach sandals for something tidier before riding up to Level 4.

Allergy notes belong at the very start of the meal. Every page of the Keyaki menu asks guests with food allergies or intolerances to tell the service team, which matters here because prawn and wheat batter run through most of the tempura dishes. Menu prices are quoted in Singapore dollars before service charge and prevailing government taxes, which is what the double plus sign on the brunch and lunch offers means.

Marina Square, the shopping centre that wraps around the hotel, gives a covered route out of the building when afternoon rain arrives. Across Raffles Avenue, Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay sits on the waterfront with its spiky twin domes, and the riverside promenade in front of it is a good place to walk off a tempura lunch while watching boats cross the bay toward the Merlion and the Fullerton Hotel on the far bank.

Heading the other way along Raffles Avenue leads toward the Singapore Flyer and the Helix Bridge, whose curved steel footway crosses to Marina Bay Sands. A full loop from the hotel over the Helix Bridge, along the Marina Bay Sands promenade, past the Merlion and back across Jubilee Bridge to the Esplanade suits the hours after dinner, when the air is cooler and the skyline is lit. On wet nights, the covered link back through Marina Square shortens the return leg.

Address: Keyaki, Level 4, Pan Pacific Singapore, 7 Raffles Boulevard, Marina Square, Singapore 039595. Promenade, Esplanade and City Hall MRT stations are all within walking distance, with Promenade on the Circle and Downtown lines the closest.

Lunch is served daily from 11:30am to 2:30pm, with last order at 2:00pm, and dinner daily from 6:00pm to 10:30pm, with last order at 10:00pm. From 1 November to 30 December 2026 Keyaki adds Seasonal Winter Omakase menus at both lunch and dinner. Menus for lunch, dinner, omakase, Hisui sushi and weekend brunch are all posted as PDFs on the Keyaki page, which makes it easy to pick a tempura set before you arrive.