About food in Japan

Ootoya - real Japanese home-style dishes

Sushi, Sukiyaki, Kaiseki...these are surely Japanese food and also they are more for special occasions such as celebration, gathering party etc.

What kind of dishes Japanese people have in their home?

You can find a part of the answer at a casual Japanese chain restaurant Ootoya (大戸屋).

Ootoya started its history from a small Japanese restaurant focusing on "Teishoku" (定食, set meal) in Ikebukuro Tokyo in 1950's. The restaurant chain aims to provides "heartful homemade dishes", like what Japanese local people have at home everyday, which can never tire diners. So they may be  different from what you know as Japanese food, Sushi, Kaiseki, Shabu-shabu etc. The plates at Ootoya are instead similar to meals hand-made by mothers at home.

Set meal at Ootoya normally include rice, miso soup and a small side dish, in addition to a main dish. The style is very likely at daily dinner at home. What is good for Ootoya, unlike real home dinner, you can choose your main dishes from its wide selections (sorry for our mum...); as its grand menu from hamburg steak, grilled chicken, fried chicken, pork sour souce, Japanese cutlet, grilled dry fish, tuna with rice bowl to seasonal ones. These main dishes can be rather close to Western style meal than typical Japanese ones well known outside of Japan. The set menu price is around Yen 1000.

The casual Japanese restaurant chains, Ootoya, runs over 200 units across Japan and almost 50 in other countries such as Thailand, Taiwan, Indonesia or Hong Kong. On April 2012, it opened a new unit in New York. 

Let's try real Japanese homemade style meal at Ootoya.

Restaurant name: Ootoya

Official homepage: http://www.ootoya.com

 

Units in major area of Tokyo

*Shinjuku East Exit Chuo-street

Address: 3-34-11 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo

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*Shibuya Bunkamura street

Address: B1 floor, 2-25-12 Dogenzaka, Shibuya, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo

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*Marunouchi Shin-Tokyo building (between JR Tokyo and Yurakucho stations)

Address: B1 floor, Shin-Tokyo building, 3-3-1 Marunouchi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo

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*Roppongi

Address: 7-14-7 Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo

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*Akasaka Mitsuke

 Address: 2nd floor, 3-9-3 Akasaka, Minato-ku, Tokyo

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Unit in New York

Address: 8 West 18th Street, New York, New York 10011

Lineup for Michelin Guide Hokkaido 2012

Michelin Guide Hokkaido 2012 will be published on 20th April 2012, as special edition. The guide is availale only in Japanese version unfortunately though. Here we briefly introduce the Michelin Guide inspectors' evaluation for the nothern land of rich in nature and agricultural products.

 Total 475 restaurants, 133 hotels and 91 Ryokans are on the guide.

Among the almost 500 restaurans, 50 restaurants obtained Michelin 1 star(*), 12 did Michelin 2 stars(**) and 4 restaurants are awared as the highest rank Michelin 3 stars(***).

 It has 121 restaurants with "Bib Gourmand" mark which is considered as restaurants of high cost performance.

Other 288 restaurants even without star or Bib Gourmand are also recommended by the inspectors. The cusines category stretches across wider area from local specialities of Hokkaido region, ramen noodles and lamb hot pot (named after Mongolia emperor  Genghis Khan) to Spanish and pizza restaurants.

 

As introduced on our previous posts, Hokkaido region provides fresh high quality agricultural products in variety from the vast land with rich nature. 

It might be hard to choose only several restaurants to visit during your journey because of so many attractive choices beef, pork, chicken, lamb, seafood, salmon etc... 

 

Here we also place web links for the 4 newest Michelin 3-star restaurants. The first 3 are in Sapporo, the capital of Hokkaido region, while the last one is in Toya where G8 Summit was taken place in 2008.

Sushi Tanabe /鮨　田なべ     http://sushi-tanabe.com/  

The authentic Sushi restaurant, situated at Susukino night entertainment district, provides services by English speaking staff.      

 

Nukumi / 温味    http://r.gnavi.co.jp/h203501/lang/en/ 

The Japanese restaurant has only 16 seats fully-cared by the Sapporo-born master. The chef's recommendation course is in Kaiseki style with fresh seasonal ingredients of Hokkaido.

 

Moliere / モリエール http://www.sapporo-moliere.com/

French restaurant, looking over green scenery of Maruyama Park in Sapporo, makes its best effort to bring the best of local ingredients of Hokkaido at the best timing.

 

Michel Bras TOYA Japon     

http://www.windsor-hotels.co.jp/cms/en/restaurant/list/michel-bras

Needless to say about Michel Bras in Laguiole, France maybe? The only one unit in Japan is in a luxury hotel, The Windsor Hotel TOYA and headed by the French chef Cedric Bourassin with a plenty of experiences at Michelin star awarded restaurants in France.

 

The months of May to September are the best season to visit the northernmost region of Japan.  It's a pity the guide is only in Japanese version

 

Related links to our previous posts:

Michelin Guide Hokkaido will be issued in Spring 2012!

Yuuyoo cafe Hokkaido organic - organic food from Hokkaido (北海道)

 

Hideaway Izakaya, Nakame no teppen (なかめのてっぺん) near the popular cherry blossom spot

 

As many of you know already, around the end of March to beginning of April is the best season to appreciate Sakura (桜) or cherry blossom in Tokyo and other parts of Japan.

In Tokyo, Meguro river side becomes more popular among locals as a cherry blossom viewing spot year by year. 

Many restaurants standing along Meguro river side between Gotanda to Nakameguro area are fully booked during the season. 

 

Today we recommend alternative course to enjoy a real Izakaya near the cherry blossom spot in Nakameguro, maybe before night stroll along the river.

Izakaya "Nakame no teppen"  (なかめのてっぺん) is off from Yamate-dori, the busy main street of Nakameguro. It is a five-minute-walk from Nakameguro station on subway and Tokyu Toyoko lines. Arriving the multiple-tenant building, many will be confused with another izakaya facing onto the street and being the second unit by same owner.

Th entrance of Nakame no teppen is "hidden" inside of the building and is "too small to find" for many.  Don't worry you will see what that means and the Izakaya staff will find you soon.

Seen inside of the restaurant, it is exactly a typical izakaya that many imagine; wooden tables and a counter in center where the chef prepare yakitori (skewered chicken), hand-writing seasonal menu on walls and lively atmosphere.

 

 

We ordered some of Spring season icons before going out to the river side for cherry blossom.  

Firefly squid (ホタルイカ), sour miso suace

        

Grilled bamboo shoots (焼き筍)

 

    
Sashimi plate is one of "must" iteam for Izakaya dinner.

 

My favorite is tofu with crispy tiny whitebait (豆腐と揚げじゃこ)

 

 It also has fine selctions of Japanese alcohol, sake, shochu (distilled sake) served by a nice Japanese earth cup and Highball(left picture, whiskey soda).

 

Nakameguro is residential area just one or two stops from both Ebisu and Shibuya on Yamanote line. In Nakameguro, there are many interesting non-chain-affiliated restaurants. The town is always busy with local diners. Sidewalk way along the Meguro river is five minutes walk from Nakame no teppen. Just go strainght toward the river, crossing Yamate street. 

The restaurant, Nakame no teppen unfortunately does not have English menu. If you have the guts or Japanese speaking friend(s), try and enjoy the real typical Izakaya experience. 

Otherwise, this blog owner, Food Tourism Japan Consulting will be happy to help your unforgettable dining experience in Tokyo by making a reservation, providing translating menu and ordering some plates in advance etc.

For more information about our service, please visit the link. 

 

Restaurant: Nakame no teppen (なかめのてっぺん)

Address: 3-9-5 Kami-Meguro, Meguro-ku, Tokyo

Restaurant Information in English: http://r.gnavi.co.jp/b284900/lang/en/

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Zagat Tokyo & Kyoto special "Japan Travel Aid" Edition published

Zagat restaurant guide has had a great collaboration with Japanese public sectors, Japan Tourism Agency, JNTO (Japan National Tourist Organization) and other local organizations, all of which are eager to promote Japan as gastronomic destionation globaly.

"Zagat Tokyo & Kyoto Restaurants 2012 Japan Travel Aid Edition" includes selected restaurant reviews for these two cities as well as introduction of Japan's food culture and destination information.

The special edition restaurant guide is also named "Thank You Edition" because the collaborative work by private-public parties is expression of Japan's gratitude to the warmest support of many people around the world for the natural disaster in Japan last year. Its 50,000 copies will be distributed at free of charge through JNTO tourist informaiton center, JNTO offshore offices (New York, Los Angels, Toront, Singapore, Sydney, London, Hong Kong), Japan Embassy etc. 

It's only 50,000 copies around the world. If you have a chance, don't miss to get a copy

Link to the publisher's site (Japanese): http://zagat.jugem.jp/?eid=95

Link to information by Japan Tourism Agency: 

http://www.mlit.go.jp/kankocho/news08_000109.html

          

Instant Ryokan-like experience at Yagenbori Akasaka (やげんぼり 赤坂)

You do not have time to travel to a Ryokan (Japanese traditional inn) in country side? For those people, lunch at Yagenbori Akasaka will be a good alternative experience in central Tokyo. You will feel as if you were in a typical traditional Ryokan for a moment, while the cost is less than one-tenth of it.

Yagenbori is situated on a narrow path between two busy streets in central Akasaka district where many restaurants and bars are scattered. Finding the restaurant's gate nicely decorated in Japanese traditional style with a lantern-like sign, stones and green plants, you will be in the ancient Japanese atomosphere. Here you must be requested to remove your shoes off at the entrance by the restaurant's smiling staff in kimono. 

 

For dinner time, Yagenbori, a traditional Japanese restaurant originally based in Kyoto, provides Kaiseki style courses at around Yen 10000 per person, while its lunch sets are quite reasonable. 

Our recommendation for lunch is "Kamogawa" (鴨川, named after the river runing through central Kyoto) set with "tororo" (とろろ) rice.　Grazed Japanese yam potato or "tororo" is served with rice and pickles as Japanese traditional set meal. Some delicacies such as Ikura (salmon roe), tuna and seaweed paste are in the bowl of tororo. That is the original style of serving grazed "tororo", while usually no topping food is provided for tororo with rice. 

 

Tororo bowl

 

Mix up all ingredient in the tororo bowl.

Then it was put on top of rice.

This is the traditional "tororo gohan " or Yam with rice.

 

The way of providing rice is also unique at the Japanese restaurant. It brings rice in "Ohitsu" (おひつ, special wooden box to keep cooked rice warm on guest table) which is rarely found in modern days even even in this country. Take Japanese rice on your rice-bowl with "shamoji" (しゃもじ, big spoon specialized for rice) from Ohitsu. That must become a good souvernir experience of traditional Japanese dining scene.

 

 

Enjoying traditional Japanese meal surrounded by Japanese folk ojects and interior decoration, we, even Japanese, almost forget that we are in the heart of the busy metropolitan city.

Restaurant name: Yagenbori Akasaka

Address: 3-19-5 Akasaka Minato-ku Tokyo 

Website: http://www.yagenbori.co.jp/english/tenpo/akasaka/index.html

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