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Wan Chai is pretty crowded, so when my taxi took a wrong turn a few blocks from where I was staying, I decided it'd be faster to walk than drive circles. That's when I ran into this little take out gem. I'm not classifying (or rating) this in the pantheon of real sushi restaurants, but rather where it belongs: fast food concept meets takeout sushi. In that respect, it admirably competes with supermarket sushi and wins hands down.Chirashi with Red Snapper, Fatty Tuna, and Spring Onion: The rice is well seasoned with grain separation (unlike the mushy sushi-ruining rice at City Super). The snapper is slightly fresher than supermarket sushi with no off aromas. The fatty tuna could use some more seasoning, but even in its chopped state, it's better than most akami. I'm not a fan of imitation crab, but as far as imitation crab goes, this is the least overly sweet I've ever had. Altogether, it's better than supermarket sushi at a lower price point.tastecompendium…查看更多

Reputedly the best bakery in Hong Kong, I decided to stop by since I was in Central to taste some Penfold's Grange at Oliver's. I didn't realize they also made sandwiches, but the jambon-frommage looked too good to pass up. And it was delicious: oozy soft cheese over tender chunks of ham on a really good French baguette. In a country where deli meats are often the same brands found in the US for twice the price, it's refreshing to find ham that's moist, well-brined, cured with loads of honey and well, better than most cooked hams in the US. (And I'm only a week removed from Spain, so I remember what good ham tastes like.) This makes me miss Paris and it's an absolute steal for less than the price of the cheapest footlong at Subway here.- tastecompendium…查看更多

Update: I revisited Xenri No Tsuki for lunch on May 7, 2013. While food quality remained the same, the restaurant does not seem to honor the "choose your own sushi set of 16" menu price at HKD280. Instead, I was charged over HKD1500 for a la carte! I can no longer recommend dining here for ethical reasons. (proof sent via email)Original Review: Several online reviews mark this place as an outpost for quality bargain sushi, so I made it a point to visit early enough in my trip to return if I agreed. Located on the sixth floor of a fairly non-descriptive building, I can't imagine much foot traffic. Yet this place was packed on a Sunday night. When you enter, whole fish are lined up in the first section of the bar, suggesting the freshness of what they were serving. While I never saw a whole fish broken down in the two hour dinner, every piece of fish I had tasted fresh.One of the advantages of sitting at the bar is that you see every order being made. A little over half ordered sashimi platters. The other half were mostly individual pieces. If you're ordering omakase, you probably get better service sitting in front of the person responsible for your food. After seeing what everyone else is ordering, you can influence your own selections by pointing out things you like. I think I must have eaten one of nearly everything in the display case.Xenri No Tsuki is very good though no bargain, clocking in the US$150-200, HKD1200-1500 range. So it's cheaper than a Tokyo 3 Michelin, but you're not getting even close to that level of quality. I would probably order à la carte next time to stick to the real highlights. In ways, this performs at a 1 Michelin level; enough elements are off (such as the odd height seating with rail that hits your knees, slightly too soft sushi rice, ingredient selection, awkward service timing, etc.) that it's never going to be in the two star league, but it achieves that, "better than your average so-called high-end sushi place" status with a price to match.Gallery Text:1. Chicken Knuckles: Deep fried and crisp, these are crunchy bits of cartilage made edible through process.2. Clams and Vegetables: Seasoned with dashi and vinegar, these were a refreshing bite.3. Tuna Blood Line: Meaty, almost beefy flavor with sukiyaki marinade. It's like the dark meat part of canned tuna, but fresh with a springier texture.4. Houbou (Blue Fin Robin) Sashimi: Light, translucent slices of lean, mild white fish. There's a certain air dryness to the houbou that takes well to the ponzu-negi sauce. It's like slightly dried hirame (fluke).5. Snapper Sashimi: Semi-fatty and fleshy with a clean finish.6. Hokkaido Uni in Shell: It's weird seeing someone go through the pain of removing all the inedible parts from the shell for presentation when it's so much easier to just take the uni out of the shell, wash everything else out of the shell, and put the uni back in on top of some daikon. Lighter in flavor and creamier than California uni, this just comes across as too light compared to the California version, which is happily, half the price.7. Conch Sashimi: The chef threw this on the cutting board a few times to tenderize it, but this was cut a bit too thin. Crunchy, slightly briny, giving way to a sweet finish.8. Hokkiado Botan Ebi Sashimi: Sweeter and less gummy than the one at Shou Zen. I still think this should be torched.9. Kinmedai Sashimi: I love this fish, but this is sliced too thick. Slightly sweeter than snapper. Firm, with nicely balanced oils.10. Shima Aji Sashimi: Bigger and fattier than regular Aji, this fish swims deeper in the ocean. The larger size gives this belly cut less crunch on the entry than the cut at Shou Zen and a wonderful creamy mouth feel.11. Baby Squid Sashimi: Only in season for a few weeks, this has a great little burst of briny flavor with a hint of acid from the ink sac. I'd still prefer it lightly poached and served cold.12. Ida Aji Tataki: Served in seaweed wrap and dressed with negi, grated vegetables and soy. The seaweed overwhelms the mild aji varietal.13. Toro Sashimi: Two glorious rectangles of the most meltingly fattiest pieces of toro in recent recollection. Clean collagen. Tuna pudding. Glorious.14. Madai Sushi: Lean, clean fish. The sushi rice is slightly over-watered and just holds together but could use more tooth.15. Mejina Sushi: Clean, but lean and not very flavorful.16. Kampachi Sushi: Hello early 2000s throwback when this was wildly popular in San Francisco! A sweeter, slightly firmer hamachi with a clean finish.17. Ikura Sushi: Nicely briny with a slight false dashi aftertaste from the seaweed/rice/roe combination.18. Akamutsu (Red Bluefish) Sushi: Torched, this has a rich sea bass taste. The soy glaze is lightly caramelized on top. Underneath, a sprinkle of negi adds pungency and sweetness. This alone is worth the trip.19. Engawa (Fluke Fin) Sushi: Melty, fatty and torched with soy to release more room temperature collagen.20. Kani Miso (Crab Back Fat) Sushi: Concentrated crab back flavor with cucumber keeping it from soaking into the rice until it blends in your mouth.21. Tempura: The pumpkin is perfectly fried so the inside is just cooked through, but it's still pumpkin. The scallop with momiji (orange, daikon-like root vegetable) in ohba leaf is perfectly cooked, but nothing special.22. Broiled Salmon Fin: Rich and fatty, this in up there with the cheek in the delicious throwaways in the salmon aisle.23. Black Sesame Ice Cream: Faintly sweet with sesame oil flavors in a non-heavy way. This has been sitting out, as there are ice crystals laced throughout.…查看更多

After seeing this on the Travel Channel and reading so many rave reviews, I had to try this place. I decided to go late to avoid lines. And at 4PM, there were no lines, but the tiny place was still half-full.Prawn Wonton Soup with Noodles: The noodles are thin, around 22-24 gauge, and very springy. Being used to ramen, it seems awkward to have noodles like this in a soup. These would be great wok fried, where that texture is an asset. The wontons are fantastic with soft but firm skin that breaks to reveal a juicy prawn. The broth is medium bodied with a pork/chicken base. The onions (which I'm told are essential to prove authenticity) add a touch of pungency.- tastecompendium…查看更多

I haven't been through Japan's sushi circuit, so I decided to dine at the best of the Japanese sushi chefs who have made a second home in Hong Kong. Sushi Yoshitake has 3 Michelin in Tokyo and 2 Michelin in Hong Kong. The Miyabi menu that I ordered is the same as what they serve in Japan. There are two other menu options, both of which must be ordered in advance: Rin, a scaled down meal and Ho, a scaled up meal. Yoshitake allows outside wine, which is good considering the wine list's Bordeaux bias when it's Champagne or Burgundy you want with sushi.Yoshitake uses red instead of white vinegar in the rice, which gives it a less chemical tang and seems to bring out more meaty characteristics in the fish. The rice is from Niigata, but the sous chef serving me did not seem to know the city within the prefecture. If I understood correctly, it's not always sourced from the same city. What I was served was just barely sticky, more savory than sweet, with each pearly grain clearly delineated from the others. They take quality seriously here. Rice is made in the back and about 5 nigiri worth of rice are brought out at a time to the front from the kitchen chef whose sole purpose appears to be cooking and seasoning rice to order.Needless to say, the service is exceptional. On this night, I was the only guest (they can seat up to 8) at the 6PM seating. I counted at least 3 chefs and one waiter, just to serve me. 4:1! One chef only slices fish. A waiter/host changes my warm towel every time I use it for more than a quick swipe. He also pours sake from the ice bucket into a serving bowl, then pours from that bowl into a drinking vessel that holds maybe 2.5 ounces, so he must have repoured at least a dozen times that hour. Finally, my chef composed, explained, and served each dish.The meal starts with five small appetizers (2-3 bites each), followed by ten pieces of nigiri, dessert and miso. The appetizers are primarily cooked seafood items, and preparation takes place earlier in the day for efficient mise en place service. If I hadn't been taking pictures and notes, the meal could have taken about 40 minutes. But don't let the service efficiency fool you; it takes hours to develop some of the sauces and to break down whole fish into primal cuts.Sushi Yoshitake Hong Kong merits its third star. Everything here is a significant step up from the equivalent dish anywhere else. This comes down to both sourcing the very best ingredients and treating it perfectly. I can't fully rationalize the economics of massaging an octopus for hours for a couple perfect bites, but if you want the very best, this is a cut above. Sushi Yoshitake is the opposite of mass production and a model of deliciously painstaking craft.- tastecompendium…查看更多

Of all the restaurants in Hong Kong, I came to RyuGin with the highest expectations. Watch some of the training videos on YouTube and you'll understand the incredible care and respect each ingredient in a finished dish receives. Chef Hideaki Sato trained under founder Seiji Yamamoto in Japan for 3 years before taking charge of the 2 Michelin RyuGin in Hong Kong. The menu is different from the 3 Michelin menu in Tokyo but based on the same philosophy and techniques.In the days leading up to dinner, email correspondence was always answered in a timely manner. You're asked if there's anything you dislike or want to see. When the menu is finalized for the season, you're sent a copy and asked for feedback. I asked for fugu, but apparently that's both out of season and one of the few fine foods that's illegal in Hong Kong. The day of dinner, I received an email asking if I ate soft shell turtle or shark's fin because these take a while to prepare. I never saw the shark's fin that night, but ended up with something far more rare and fascinating.When you arrive, there's a small envelope with the menu in it. Before service, Chef Sato comes out to see if there's anything you don't like or want to try. In spite of his immense talent and craft, he wears a smock of humility. You settle into the amazing views from the 101st floor of the International Commerce Centre and wait for the first course.It's amazing to see a chef work this hard applying traditional and molecular gastronomy to fresh ingredients to get you to taste them the way you idealized they'd taste in the first place. Without a single bad dish and several stars, RyuGin belongs in the pantheon of must-visit restaurants in Hong Kong.Gallery Text:1. Ice Fish: Small, mild fish are battered and fried but not crispy, served with Japanese vegetables that have been poached (then probably glazed) in dashi. The vegetables have a great bit past al dente bite that's perfect for these and they exude sweet bonito through and through. The ice fish also has that great soup base flavor. It's truly transformational cooking presented simply when the chef has taken bitter greens and mild fish and turned them into a play on textures and accents that enhance a complex dashi stock.2. Agedashi in Three Textures: Agedashi is a traditional cooking method for tofu in Japan. In addition to tofu, there's a mochi cube and a yomogifu cube. The tofu was fantastic with the uni; it had just above soft density and added a creamy base for the intense uni to melt into. Less successful were the two chewier cubes that couldn't quite pull off the savory without seeming contrived. The dashi and uni combine to reconstruct red miso-like flavors, but in a way that's authentically sea-based. This reconstructed miso soup is what I wish all miso tasted like, but never fully does.3. Abalone and Hotaru Baby Squid: This simple looking dish hides a lot of behind-the-scenes effort. It takes hours of slow cooking a large abalone to make it this tender. The broth that it's cooked in needs to be properly seasoned for it to retain the abalone meaty sweetness. Then there are the baby squid with cartilage removed and quickly poached that are so plump and fresh they taste as if they'd been stuffed with the tartare other baby squid. The fresh wasabi, seaweed salt, and lime all bring out different sides to these two star ingredients, but it's the seaweed salt that really opens up the sea in this dish.4. Hamaguri Clam Soup: Two, big, beautiful clams in a soup made with clam juice and dashi. On the bottom are fresh peas in glutinous rice starch that add a complementary sweet note to the juicy and tender clams. Julienned bamboo shoots and seaweed add crunch. Sanshou leaf adds a mint-sorrel-purslane pungency that rounds out the complex flavor profile that's clearly anchored in clam.5. Baby Tuna Sashimi: Lime, poached onion, thinly sliced raw onion, and baby shiso leaf give this a Japanese crudo character. The dipping sauce, a blend of three soy-based sauces gives it necessary anchoring salt. Baby tuna is definitely better than akami maguro, being milder and more tender, but it's still not in the class of even chutoro.6. Whale Tongue Soup: Braised for hours in fish stock and served in dashi with Japanese vegetables. The tongue is porous, gooey and delicious. In texture (not taste), the closest analogy I can make is that it's like a cross between an aged tofu that's been simmering for so long that it's porous and soft, but filled with fresh mozzarella with it's chewy bite. In flavor, it's a blend of the collagen on otoro with the dashi that it soaked up in the long braise. There's also a side dish of a yellow pepper paste that taste like mild bird peppers and adds a nice optional kick.7. Kinmedai: Roasted alfonsino fillet crusted with rice, served with thinly sliced green apple and bitter greens / seaweed. Alfonsino has a bright red skin and big eyes that distinguish it from snapper or bream. It tastes like a firmer snapper with more well-integrated collagen. If alfonsino were fresh Spanish baby lamb leg, red snapper would be vacuum-packed US supermarket lamb leg in the bargain bin. This is worlds better with cleaner, more tightly integrated fish flavors without the off-putting bitter blood line character that taints the finish on red snapper. The crispy rice adds toasty notes and texture. The apple acids are a welcome break between bites, as are the bitter greens that remind you of the purity of the alfonsino's flavors.8. Wagyu Sirloin Sukiyaki: Very East-meets-West with white asparagus and morels in this subtly sweet teriyaki broth. The 63 degree egg that takes 40 minutes in an immersion circulator to make adds the extra touch of texture and cream that blends the flavors together. The sirloin is A3-6, cooked to medium-rare and sliced thinly enough to remain tender. The classic combination works with the asparagus being the grassy element growing from the earth element (morels), that gets eaten by the cow that all gets eaten by you!9. Rice with Sakura Shrimp: This looks like a standard Asian dish of rice with dried shrimp seasoning, but is executed with such great ingredients and skill that it becomes fine dining. Intense, sweet and briny nose. The shrimp have a little crunch and a lot of sweet flesh before they melt into fluffy rice. The aftertaste is shrimp consommé all over. The cold greens with fried tofu halt the shrimp aftertaste long enough for you to appreciate just how fantastic it is when you return to the rice. The miso is slightly intense and delicious with soft bean curd skins adding a more texturally interesting feature than simple tofu.10. Soft Shell Turtle: What a beautiful rice dish, with everything melting into place! The soft shell turtle is raw and tastes a bit like mussels but combined with the 66 degree egg yolk, it takes on a uni character. Mochi strips are thin enough to just melt into the rice grains, adding a textural rice-on-rice play against the urchin. Seaweed builds up the umami.11. Tomato with Plum Shaved Ice: After seeing the strawberry and peach desserts in prior seasons, this was a bit of a let-down because the savory part of the tomato isn't fully tamed. You break the candy bubble to cut open the ripe tomato. The plum gratinée is the right choice in bridgeable acidity to bring the tomato towards the sweet, but the finish returns to the savory. It's refreshing and technically flawless, but in ways more intellectually than physically pleasing.12. Sakura Meringue, Almond Ice Cream, Fresh Strawberries: Break through the crispy, melt-in-your mouth meringue to get at the fantastic almond ice cream that has such a velvety texture you want to roll around in it on a hot summer's day. It's just lightly almondy, bringing you the best sweet almond flesh center taste and none of the bitter husk. The strawberries add a sweet tartness. The poached sakura leaf is salted and adds brine that helps each sweet element more clearly delineate itself.-tastecompendium…查看更多

After hearing great things about 22 Ships from multiple sources and really missing Spain, I had to give this place a chance. They don't take reservations, but they will take your number at the door and call you. On a Sunday night, the wait was around 20 minutes for a table for two. But that still beats the pit of straight elbows standing room only at popular tapas places in Spain on Thursday through Saturday nights. But you'd hardly eat these tapas with your hands either.You get a sense that 22 Ships is clearly overwhelmed and rushing orders out, but there are technical flaws that go beyond execution. Even on a calmer night, I suspect that dishes will be very hit/miss here. The success here relies on a crowd of primarily English-speaking tourists looking for something only mildly exotic to eat.Gallery Text:1. Hamachi with Gazpacho: Good quality hamachi that's presently so tamely you'd think this were a shy crowd. The gazpacho is mostly tomato puree with very little in the way of peppers or onions. Given the mildness of the fish, you'd expect more punch in the sauce. In fact, the only bold move on this plate is a tiny piece of basil that helps, but not enough.2. Pressed Pork Belly: Crispy and fatty but a bit dried out, I suspect this was shallow fried in a cast iron skillet with a cast iron weight on top to press it. The quince aioli helps fill the moisture void and adds a nice exotic sweetness, but it doesn't make up for what should have been a wonderful vacuum braised then seared cube. The Chinese greens probably reference some dish that combines these greens and pork, but it's a bit lost on the plate.3. Grilled Wagyu Sirloin: This is about Grade 6/12 marbling, so it has fine flavor, but it's not meltingly tender. It is perfectly seared rare to medium rare and well-seasoned. But the real star of this dish is the black pudding which is richly porky with no real pork grain or intrusive fat; it's just grains of rice that have been deftly bound by blood and fat and pan seared. There's also a piperade sauce that adds some sweet pepper flavor to round out any bitter edges in the other two ingredients.-tastecompendium…查看更多

Based on prior three dining experiences at Gagnaire's restaurant in Paris, I decided to give his Asian venture a try. Walking in, there is beautiful view of the bay over which the restaurant seems to levitate and the place is dark, decorated in black with accent mirrors. It feels like a date place.There are two tasting menus and a short à la carte menu to choose from. The four-course tasting is an abridged version of the seven-course. Both have wine pairing options, which I recommend because, a. the sommelier's selections do pair well with the dishes, and b. the few gems on the wine list are not rare and priced around 2.5x auction.The food philosophy is French with a combination of French and Asian ingredients. The best dishes generally stuck to French roots.While this does not live up to Pierre Gagnaire Paris, there are enough food sparks to make Pierre Hong Kong worth a visit. If Pierre can overcome food inconsistencies, it'd clearly merit 2 stars.Gallery Text:1. Amuses-bouches: This was a set of fun little bites along the same lines as Gagnaire Paris. The black pudding with apple compote was a slightly meaty croquette ball. The brunoise with squid powder was a bit more than a palate cleanser. The beet chip in olive oil was the most harmonious combination with the sweet of the chip cutting the slight bitter of the oil. There was also a marshmallow made savory with shrimp powder, a cheese cracker, a yam, and goat cheese with beet gelée. To get to the Gagnaire standard, execution needs improvement. (I still remember Gagnaire's perfect tater tot on a toothpick in his amuses set over a decade ago.) To move to the San Sebastian 3 star standard, gain storied harmony and flavor development throughout the set.There are only three places that I've ever been to (restaurant and retail included) where I remember the quality of the bread: the bread sticks at Daniel in NY, half the portfolio of Blue Oven Bakery in Cincinnati, and the mini-baguettes at Pierre Gagnaire in Paris. They have nearly the same mini-baguettes here: crispy and slightly fire kissed crust, doughy interior with just the slightest tinge of sour.They also have the greatest compound butter in the world here. It's a beurre aux algues from Jean-Yves Bordier and it's one of the few beurre de barattes left in the world; they churn this butter in wood barrels by spinning milk in the barrel. It tastes like great Russian pressed caviar whipped with a great European butter. It's so good that I would trade my best-of-every vintage Italian olive oil source for a local supplier of this.2. Yabbies with Osetra Caviar: Yabbies are large Australian crayfish. Here, they are poached just long enough to remove them from their shells whole, then served in that not-cooked-through state that allows the slightly-firmer-than-amaebi texture to come through. Under the Pouilly-Fuisse cream is a Japanese citrus gelée with grapefruit vacuoles. The whole dish is garnished with radishes, flowers, sugar crisps, and caviar. The play on textures in dish is really quite remarkable. You have the soft yabbies mixed with cream, then the gelatin elements as they break up in your mouth, crispy-fresh radish slices, crunchy sugar cracklin, and bursts of caviar and grapefruit sacs. The yabbies are pulled in different directions with each bite, from the traditional creamy shellfish to the citrusy shellfish and finally with that pop of brine from the caviar.3. Hokkiado Scallop with Asparagus: The scallop is slightly overcooked, but benefits from the spinach puree (which gives it a green minerally character) and the scallop cream (which adds body). That green/white contrast is reflected also in the two colors of asparagus. The green has more mid-palate bite and astringency. The white is more mild; you get the mildly sweet vegetal finish of cooked asparagus before you swallow. Finally, there's a small roulade of black truffled chicken with scallop in the middle on two perfectly crisp crackers that reference one of the traditional preparations of Coquilles St. Jacques, sliced horizontally and layered with black truffles. This is an incredibly harmonious dish and were it not for the slight overcooking on the scallop, would have been the dish of the night.4. Roasted Abalone with Foie Gras Soup: Nested atop braised leek, celery and fennel, the abalone is reasonably tender, but it has bite from being a small abalone. The foie gras is tinged with green curry and is probably a reference to crab back fat but constructed from earth. There's certainly a sense that each spoonful is like digging into sea mud in a good way. Julienned fresh celery strands add a bit of freshness, but it's still not quite balanced. This is the first of a few dishes that would have benefited from the omission of Asian influence. The green curry brings in an odd bitter that accentuates the worst aspect of foie gras, the part that's usually masked through careful deveining, salt, and cream.5. Grilled Red Mullet with Tomato Relish: Very Mediterranean preparation that recalls a cross between ratatouille and bouillabaisse in flavor profile. Tomato, olive, artichoke and zucchini bring out the meaty character of the mullet; but the best part of this dish is the diced mullet that's barely torched on one side which contrasts so well with the roast pieces, the later being fleshy and briny to the prior's crunchy tang.6. Smoked Pigeon Salad and Potato Soup: While it's still tender, smoking accentuates the gaminess on this bird. Fresh peas and salad greens offer minimal relief. The creamy potato soup has pieces of shredded pigeon and tomato on the bottom, which add depth and acidity.7. Cheese Course: Three cheeses are presented, each with its own accompaniments that work well. The Gruyere comes across as creamier because of the white chocolate shavings and the shredded green beans are a fine textural go-between for flavor balance. The Fourme d'Ambert soup is rendered with cream and strained. It has beautiful layered overtones of blue cheese. The Moelleux du Revard is slightly mushroomy with a Camembert consistency. The caramelized pecans and fantastic spice paste (that's kind of like a modified achiote) really anchor cheese.8. Grand Dessert: Having this at Gagnaire Paris made me look forward to the Hong Kong version. Sadly, too many of the small dishes were marred by Asian medicinal notes. The wild strawberries with grated Parmesan was sweet and savory, but missing the necessary balsamic to pull it together. I also question the choice of grated vs. shave Parmesan. The champagne granité with grapefruit is pulled in an overly sweet direction with the simple syrup on the bottom. The dragon fruit, cream, exotic citrus and tapioca dish had an odd Chinese medicinal aftertaste. The meringue with citrus and angelica seemed disjointed by the slightly bitter rhubarb that is angelica. The vanilla cream and panna cotta set was a happy play on the textures of crème anglaise. The chocolate cake with pistachio ice cream and blackberries was a classic winning combination.-tastecompendium…查看更多

Late on a Sunday afternoon, this place was nearly empty. From the decor, you can tell management is trying to be a bit upscale/modern, which kind of clashes with the democratization of food that you expect from a good ramen house. You can tell their upscale aspirations on the menu which includes ramen with Kagoshima A5 Wagyu Beef or a Caesar Salad Soup the includes crispy chicken skin and umami foam. While these are certainly interesting offerings, I wasn't sure I trusted a place this empty to execute anything more than basic quite yet. So I stuck to the basics.Signature Shio (salt) Ramen with Pork Belly: The broth has just the right amount of Mongolian rock salt to bring out the chicken and sea flavors, as well as a light dash of well-integrated fat to separate the noodles. This lighter broth had plenty of punch and they pair it with their thinnest 22 gauge noodles, which have excellent bounce and slurpability. The six hour braised Okinawa pork belly is sliced off a roulade that's textured like championship barbeque: perfect pull, super moist, with a lightly caramelized crust. The scallion and chive freshen up a bowl of pure umami.…查看更多

On the recommendation of a couple I met at the Krug Room the night before, I decided to check out this, "moderately priced sushi joint." Compared to starred sushi places, this is indeed moderately priced, but by no means cheap. I arrived early enough to get one of the only two seats open on a packed night. Asking for anything that might not be on the menu, I happily learned that kinmedai (alfonsino) was available, which was so amazing at RyuGin cooked that I had to try it as sashimi. This is also my first encounter with the small black fish, mijina. Then I ordered a few things that looked good as they passed by.Shou Zen is a nice place to go early to check out the selection of daily specials items. Given their rice style, go with sashimi over sushi. If they aren't slammed, they do a pretty good job at deep frying. And while I didn't try any, the flaming beef dishes looked good with the pieces served rare on hot slate.Gallery Text:1. Garlic: marinated in dashi and sprinkled with bonito, these have lost most of their garlicky flavor but not the garlic crunch.2. Aji Belly, Swordfish Belly, Toro Sushi: All of these used medium grain rice that's a bit overcooked. Without the textural separation of great short grain, the overall experience suffers. At least it's well-seasoned. Aji/ This close to the skin, there's a bit of crunch before the beautifully fatty interior on this cut of aji. Swordfish/ Scored to increase the perception of tenderness, this still has a bit too much crunch. It's flavor profile is close to hamachi but fishier. There's a fair amount of oil here, but it's not very refined. Toro/ Nicely melty fat make this some kind of wonderful. Sadly, there's an untrimmed strand of silverskin in this piece.3. Mijina and Kinmedai Sashimi: Mijina/ Slices of translucent white mijina resemble fluke. They have a fairly neutral taste with a little crunch (thus necessitating the thin slices) and pomelo sac grain. Kinmedai/ After the spectacular rice-crusted kinmedai at RyuGin, I had to try this ingredient raw. It's not on the menu, but that's the reward for dining at 6PM before everyone else arrives; you get to inspect the best of what's come in before the masses. Well this certainly did not disappoint. It's richer and fattier than the mijina in a aji meets red snapper kind of way. It doesn't have the initial crunch of the fattiest part of aji (which I don't consider a great attribute on a fatty fish anyways). And it has cleaner oil than either aji or red snapper. The flesh pulls apart beautifully with a slightly lighter flavored collagen and more bite than chutoro. Could this be the turbot of Japan?4. Mijina Bones: The head and bones from the mijina get whisked away and return deep fried. They're perfectly seasoned and the light batter works well here. The head and gills are great, but some of the bones aren't fully cooked through. Delicious, but caution required.5. Botan Ebi Sushi: Beautiful, medium sweet shrimp. It's not as sweet as amaebi. It's closest to langoustine with a slight bitter edge and a gummier texture. This would have been better torched to alleviate both issues.6. Botan Ebi Head: Overbattered compared to the mijina bones but still good. The head fat resembles a cross between Dungeness crab back fat and amaebi head fat is hot and juicy under that crunchy shell.High res photos and ratings at tastecompendium(dot)com…查看更多