Yoooooosh (iki). As of today, I no longer lunch in Greater Otemachi. I trust that the 453 entries for Otemachi, Marunouchi, Nihonbashi, Tokyo, and Kanda will tide you over if you need ideas for lunch or dinner.
But for now, let’s party! Several weeks ago, Shaft and I entered into a long process of negotiation that ended up with us having lunch today. She finished her pre-lunch meeting and off we went – I had booked Yoshiki, and a good job of it, because it’s the highest-rated non-ridiculous sushi ‘joint’ in the area that’s open for lunch. It never ceases to amuse me how foreign writers love to say ‘sushi joint’, even when paying $100+ for their sushi. It also never ceases to amuse me to make vague and unamusing jokes about foreign writers, like my writing is somehow better. You know what this picture shows? Yes. The sign and stairs. It’s right across from the Mandarin, and would actually be a good option if you were staying there.
Nice interior – you can tell it’s a cut above a lot of places. There was no particular abuse or anything going on between the two chefs, but the waitress was notably unable to keep up with business. We think she must be related to the owners. While we’re on it, let me mention that they have quite a decent list of sake for a sushi place. We went crazy and had a go of Ugonotsuki, but could equally have gone for a special-class Shimehari Tsuru jungin, or even Juyondai Honmaru (theoretically).
They did a nice job of pacing, not rushing us to eat (the Y3.2k tokujou nigiri set). This is a snapper, then squid, then golden-eye, and all three pieces were notably delicious as well as a bit thicker and warmer than usual. This lets you taste them more, and they were really worth tasting.
Next ‘course’ was a whole akagai (see the ‘skirt’ pieces hanging off?), incredible chutoro, and excellent vehicle shrimp. You can see by my use of adjectives that I enjoyed these; they really were a level up from the usual sushi lunch that you have, even (for example) the similarly-priced one that I was embarassed to take Victorious to in Asakusa.
Mmmmmmmmm.
Obvious points here – salmon eggs (nothing special), crab that made us both go “Wow” because it tasted strongly and deliciously of crab (admit it, this is not common in crab sushi) and otoro (meh. I prefer chu; it’s more cohesive and integrated.).
A piece of eel. Very interesting style, extremely soft and with a distinctive sauce not like other places. Rollz, meh. Expecially too bad that the akami wasn’t nearly as good as the other tunaz.
I was sitting there looking at the rolls of fish liver in the case (which was all ice-cooled, by the way, old school) and Shaft admitted as to how she likes them, so I ordered two pieces, tan-pin, as we say in New Jersey. They were good, but the first batch I made at home (Christmas) was better.
Throwaway dessert after the very good miso soup (which, again, they didn’t try to foist on us during our meal) – peach jelly with whipped cream. Still, it’s in the course, so not bad.
I know it’s crazy, but right now I’m thinking that Y3.2k for sushi of this caliber at lunch is in fact of the Highest Cool.
Yo-ho-ho-hoooooosh. Iki.
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