Hey, for starters, I didn’t make up the name. The kanji are a jokey reinterpretation, but evidently the expression is a mnemonic for “three sixes are eighteen,” and it was described to me as “Japanese math”. Really. Strikes me as one of those things like “Wow, man, it’s so mystical – if you take 2, and 2 again, you get fooooour. Four is very spiritual, and the ancients were totally into four.”
But this brand-new exterior is lovely. Really.
Actually the interior is great too, if you’re into new, clean, and very elegant in a minimalist Japanese way. I would love to have dinner with 5 or 6 friends, sitting around this kotatsu. It doesn’t hurt that the cooking seems very good, and the sake is top-notch, all with an Aomori theme (plus nationally-famous sakes).
The sets are all Y1k, which seems pretty swell of them when you consider that two options (that I didn’t get) are grilled sea urchin or steak over rice. What I did get was boiled golden-eye, which was very sensitively-cooked, and not overly sweet (although after making this at home for the first time, I wonder why I’ve ever had a crappy version; it’s just not hard.).
The sides were excellent – the little dish of blobs was a soy-soaked steamed fish cake, while the tangled bowl top right was, if I reckon correctly, trimmings from the tops of bamboo shoots being prepared for dinner. The rice was too soft, boo, but this could be a real winner with the Y6k dinner course.
They have two branches on roughly the same block, and their sake selection is really good. Really.
03-3242-1008