Tokyo day 18 - Fine Dining

Tokyo day 18 - Fine Dining

After arriving home at 3am and sleeping in we got up and went to Shinjuku for a walk and bought some glasses for Kims sister, the shopping center was hip and had just random clothing. We walked around for an hour and then had to leave to go to Shibuya.

We caught the train and it was only a 15 minute train ride. We got a photo with the Hutchiko statue. Hutchiko is a beautiful story about a dog that follows its owner to the station every day, you can watch a movie with Richard Gere about it called Hatchi : a dogs tale.

After walking around we went to Tokyu Hands and it is only 7 level high. Each level has 3 mini levels that are big. It has EVERYTHING including magic.

We left at 6pm to get home so we could get changed then go to Narisawa. It was rated Asia's best restaurant and it was a magical experience.

Narisawa is a very inventive restaurant that makes you use all your senses and makes you feel like you could be in all those magical places where they picked the fruits or hand caught the animals that would be consumed that night.

The first thing was had was a glass of champagne with white peach , it was slightly fizzy but sweet and refreshing from the white peaches, the dough arrived first and yes dough as it proved then they cooked it in front of you.

 They let the dough prove for about 15 minutes then brought out a stone bowl that was heated up to about 300 degrees then they put the dough in it in front of you and it cooked while sitting there.  The bread had lime in it but was crunchy on the outside but soft and chewy on the inside almost had the consistency of a hot cross bun

The first dish was Essence of the Forest and Satoyama Scenery.

It had wood flavoured water that you sipped on as you foraged deeper into this dish to find the yoghurt underneath. It was smoky from the charcoal seaweed but has fresh seaweed. It had green tea on it so it was sweet. When you get this as your first dish you really don't know what to expect for the rest of the dishes.

The second dish was Horse Mackerel with onion and it was smoky and crunchy.

At the start of the meal the waiter asked if there was anything we would not eat and said i would happily eat most things and i was not expecting Soft shelled turtle as a course. The third course was turtle and it had the texture of chicken but was crispy and slightly salty. I wanted more but will have to find it somewhere else.

The fourth course was Sea Snake but it was soup that the snake had been brewing in for hours before the meal. The soup started off being slightly fishy but as you got further own it became less fishy and more peppery.

The next dish was Sea Urchin and Botan Shrimp soup, the soup was salty like a miso soup but slightly fishy from the sea urchin. Sea urchin is soft and slightly chewy but was an experience to try.

I am not really one to eat clams or oysters but this was different as it tasted fruity and sweet and the clam was meaty.

We really had an assortment of courses like Spiny Lobster cooked two ways, both sides are steamed but one side was fried quickly so it was slightly crunchy and it came with a range of vegetables. One of the vegetables was very bitter and sour, this was not a favourite dish but i still enjoyed it.

 It was time for some eggplant, eggplant is actually a fruit not a vegetable. This fruit looked like a small forest with tiny flowers placed inside. It had a tomato jelly on top to keep everything in place. It was a sweet and savory dish. It was such an attractive dish i did not want to eat it.

It was time for some meat, the meat we had was  Baby Pork. This pork was cooked for an hour at 190 degrees. The crackling was crunchy and the pork was juicy and the sauce was sweet.

We got given Conger Pike Eel next which was very lightly battered with a peach foam and seaweed. The sweetness from the peach mixed well with the salty seaweed. The batter was so light and crispy and the eel was very meaty and i would have never guessed it was eel.

Up next was the dish i was really excited about Kagoshima Beef Grade A5, I never knew about the grades of meat and all i knew was good or bad. This was absolutely sensational.

This magical piece of meat was smoky and very smooth and rich, juicy and just melted as you ate it. It had not much fat as it is whats called marbled, marbled fat is very thin layers in the meat. It really was the best meat i have ever had. This was our last course then it was onto our desserts

 Our first dessert was a Umeboshi  plum gelato, it was very red but so sweet to start then you have a sour tartness aftertastes . It is used as a palette cleanser.

We had a Bellini cocktail that had white peach jelly and almond jelly with champagne in it. The fruitiness from the champagne  mixed well with the white peach and the almond had a light nutty flavour that lingered after you ate it.

I was actually really full and did not eat much bread which is a good thing but we still had more desserts.

 We had an assortment of desserts and every single one was completely different to the next. This restaurant really lived up to its expectations and I would suggest if you get the opportunity to go you should. Next time i am in Japan i will go again.
Thanks for reading.
Kind regards
Dale Stewart