Ohhhhhh, now we move deep, deep into depressing territory. Descend to the basement. Low ceilings. Sad little places cranking out teishoku, curry and Chinese. Smoke-yellowed walls and customers. You know you’re in Japan.
This was my first visit to the basement of the JA Building, and one might reasonably expect it to be exactly this sort of environment considering what sort of organization JA is (protectionist and crusty are the two words that spring to mind for me. How about you?). There are really a wealth of options down there, except that they’re all in roughly the same vein. Disturbingly, as we walked by the Indian place (real Indians in the kitchen! Have to try it.) the waitress recognized me and came out to say hello. I knew the face, but she had to remind me that she works nights at Ichiriki in Monnaka. It freaks me out when this happens.
Well, in fact we picked this place because it was the MOST retro-looking. The windows facing the corridor have crappy old curtains, the plastic food is severaly old and abused, it’s a little dark, and it’s definitely smoky. But the menu caught our eye for some reason. Actually it was the plastic sample of katsu curry that got me…
I had the Y1050 A set – hambagu, kani cream croquette, salad, side plate of rice. Never trust a place that gives you rice on a plate. In fact, I had the option of toast, and maybe I should have gone for that. But the hambagu was quite tolerable, and the croquette actually had some crab in it. The salad was fresh-ish. The katsu curry ordered across from me was a decent katsu, and the curry was very light-colored, sweet and spicy. Pretty much the way one likes it, in fact!
Somehow I walked away unsatisfied, but the food wasn’t bad at all. I think next time will be the Indian place down there, or at the very least one of the other mass of teishoku places.
Errr…I’m thinking there’s no web site for this one.