Mmmmmmm, natural and healthy. I don’t mean that sarcastically, actually. Despite being focused on healthy food (and serving brown rice), this place was quite tasty. That’s probably why this visit marked an unheard-of third visit for Shaft (though of course a first for me). It’s in the basement of the new JA building, which I mentioned recently in the context of accidentally visiting a completely different restaurant for the second time. Or not.
Here’s an interesting point about natural and healthy restaurants – they’re popular with a certain, well-defined clientele. As we were leaving I noticed that the counter was populated heavily with Office Ladies of a certain age and style. This is not a bad thing.
The food here is not a bad thing either. There are half a dozen normal lunch sets like mackerel in miso sauce, pork with ginger, and fried chicken. I had the fried chicken, and it was an excellent specimen – good breading, skin-on but fried to crispness, juicy and sweet inside. Mmmmm. One of the schticks is that you can get brown rice with your meal, but their rice emphasized the chewy-nuttiness of genmai to a fault. Either that or it was just undercooked. I noticed that the other two items at the table didn’t get heavily eaten, but you know how it is with office ladies, and I’m sure it’s nothing to do with the flavah.
Like a Polaroid picture.
03-6269-9800