@menchikatsu I think my photo shows another example of grilled Unagi sansho leaves and Hanasansho. It was so delicious and considered luxurious.
Some of the chefs use hybrid approach so they might slit the eel kansai style and grill it kanto style.
Resting is common technique. Leo mentioned it in his Young chef / Tempura Naruse, Shizuoka article. U should read it if u haven’t.
Resting is used to cook steak in many countries. Also, tonkatsu shimizu in Kyoto does resting after frying his thick tonkatsu. I wrote an article about a tonkatsu store in Yao which I mentioned the effect of resting to prevent the leaking of myoglobin. Maybe that article might elaborate more if u find this topic interesting.
You can look at the recipes of both Beef Wellington and duck pethivier.
The rice is on the hard side.
The rice is seasoned mainly with red vinegar with a good balance of acidity and richness to create a balanced finish that you will not tire of eating.
Sushi Ichijo - 8
Adding to Yeehow's review :)
Had Sushi Ichijo for lunch before the returning fight from Narita Airport. We ordered the 12-piece lunch set. The lunch last a good 50 minutes. From Ichijo, it takes about 1hr to reach Narita.
Shari is sour and umami. It seems that the chef had trained at Shimizu before, but his shari is not a pure recreation of Shimizu's shari. In addition to two vinegar blends, he told us that he had added something special. We enjoyed his shari a lot and ordered some plain shari to taste, without neta. Good sushi pieces included: hamaguri, kohada, chutoro, ika, kampyo.
The chef was very nice, funny, and down to earth. The lunch was 11k including tax and service, very good value. The place seems quiet somehow for a Saturday, maybe because it was rainy. We would love to go back again some time.
@localtaste In my younger years eating unagi... the rice, after the sauce from the unajyu had soaked into it, was the part I most looked forward to. Still is, in some ways, hard not to think of that as the main event. Although now, I look more to the quality of the actual eel.
In your evaluating section, #10 is one of the five major criteria of the Michelin inspector, and I think the one most chefs don't even know about or understand. #6 is a surprising red flag for them, if it comes to the table cold. The second part of your #4 seems to go hand in hand with #10: none of the present elements distracting from each other.
Actually, many of these are subsections of their 5 main criteria: attempt at mastery of cooking, ingredient sourcing, balance in equilibrium/harmony, consistency over time. The only one you've left off is creativity/personal touch. I can see your depth of experience in this list.
I believe the Ishikawa, Kochi, and Okinawa antenna shops are nearby to where you are. Although the Okinawa antenna shop is more awamori focused and I don't recall seeing any sake in there. Some of these antenna shop offerings do really sell the true jizake, not the high end brand name ones, but sake that is more local and common...some you could find elsewhere in Tokyo but some you can't, mostly at the Junmai or Junmai Ginjo (and honjozo) levels. Truly a nice walk just visiting all the various shops and area around Yurakucho, quite a lot to see! The Hyogo antenna shop apparently went through remodeling and looks more snazzy, and the Tatsuriki selection seems to have expanded, I believe there may be a sake bar in that building somewhere as well that's open in the evenings.
Most of the top hotel concierge services in Tokyo can easily book this shop, too. If you are staying at a 5 star hotel and they are telling you they cannot secure a reservation at Takamitsu, I'd recommend moving to a different hotel.
I guess I have to just eat more with pairings to get further experienced in it, and natural at spotting things. In some cases, if I'm already planning to bring a bottle out to dinner, I just wish for the best, and hope I can time it to the right dishes.
I have indeed experienced what it's like to try a bottle of something (beer, wine, cider...), but opening a second bottle much later, it not longer tastes the same. Not necessarily sake, but I suppose I will run into the same challenge here too.
If the food is no good, do you sometimes give up on opening the bottle, and wait until the next time?
I actually can't mentally picture sake going with Italian too well, in my head, haha. I eat a lot of tomato based dishes. But I get the seafood one. And probably clam linguine 'vongole'! And I've definitely tried certain little dishes at standing sake bars, that sort of resemble whipped butter. Sometimes it's more a cheese or spread. There's a trend lately I've come across: whipped beef tallow, in place of butter. Seems to be catching on.
Sake with pizza is a thought I've never had. But I'm starting to see different beverages served with neopolitan pizza, not just a beer and soda. Especially if you go into the realm of white sauce, anchovies, and with an egg on top. I think Pizza Studio Tamaki is a good place to do something like that. He is very interesting in conversation, and expresses interest in experimenting with different drinks. I also quite like Da Isa. Over here, the popular drink nowadays at any Italian place, is the cocktail negroni, or its variations using Campari/Aperol. Now that I think of it, if there's a decent champagne sparkling style sake out there, I would enjoy it with pizza.
That Kenbishi sake is quite famous right? I can definitely get this one easily! And yep, I do like head cheese, lardo, most charcuterie, etc... I really like that prosciutto wrapped around a bread stick. On this topic a bit, have you eaten at Pellegrino? I sat at the ham bar of a restaurant one day, and realized it's quite similar to what I imagine in pictures there. Same ham slicing machine.
I'm getting more careful at balancing acidity and such, with wine/sake paired with the right/wrong food. Probably I'm not advanced enough to mentally come up with creative ideas, as to what weird 'out of the box' foods could go with what sake. But from what I've seen so far at different places with odd food, it seems it's all fair game. At least I think most people know when something doesn't pair, because it tastes unpleasant, and you discover you shouldn't have eaten that. Sometimes I think this is why it's much better to leave a set course and pairing in the hands of the chef and sommelier, rather than order ala carte. The most common error I keep making, is eating something too sweet, and forgetting about my glass on the table.
I think the Toyo Bijin you recommended me before is a white label, with red script character? I see they have many different types of labels. Even a red font on blue sticker, and an all black bottle. Will get very lost trying to find out the differences. I will keep an eye out for that non dry white label. Hope I get to try a few on my next trip. I recall that their bottles are pretty big.
What sushi restaurants with strong sake pairings, are you excited to return, or try for the first time? We've spoken in depth on Kurosaki. I remember Amamoto paid rather close attention in describing sakes to his guests. I would like to perhaps know more about Japanese restaurants with an interesting approach to the beverage program, with unique personality. I think I commented in the past on my experience at Ichita, and the surprisingly good selection he had. I used to not really look at that 'drink' tab in the Tabelog photo gallery section. But I think I will be doing so from now on!
I’ve recently had Chef Tanaka’s cold noodles with sudachi citrus. It’s amazing and refreshing. I ate lots of neungmyeon in seoul and always hope to find excellent cold noodles in Japan.
His beef dashi got depth of flavor without pungent beef smell. Tanaka San is very proud of his beef sourcing. Very nice and friendly chef.
Exactly my thoughts Eric - I make tonkatsu at home, and since I'm coming all the way to Tokyo I want to be able to eat phenomenal tonkatsu, as opposed to a good/decent tonkatsu!
I think you have swayed me to try out Maruyama Kippei - would you say get there for 30 minutes early before a queue forms? I'll put Marugo next if I have any spare meal slots on this trip!
Can't wait!
Thank you for your advice!
Thanks for your reply. Would you pick Sushi Suzuki or Mizukami or Takagaki no Sushi?
Unfortunately Keita is already full for my dates as I was interested previously and checked.
Yes, Obama-san trained at Kyubey and then was involved with opening "Sushi Tokai". (The name "Tokami" is said to have been created using the first initial of the wives of the chefs at "Singapore Aoki", "Yamayuki", and "Obama".). It seems he has a very good pipeline with the largest tuna merchant in Japan "Yamayuki".
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