tokyo food file

al fresco lunch at Cucina 13 Aprile — the full post

It's all about the setting. Screened from the sun by a wide parasol and surrounded by shrubbery, you settle in sipping Prosecco and nibbling on focaccia. Ensconced in this oasis of calm, you might almost forget you're just steps away from the Nishi-Azabu Crossing, with its looming expressway flyover and ceaseless roar of traffic.

Inside is nice, with its whitewashed walls, scrubbed wood floors and well-patinated wooden chairs drawn up to crisp white tablecloths. But that outside table is really where it's at. A nice touch: your name inscribed on an ivy leaf to mark your reservation...

 

As nibbles: focaccia and other breads with some good olive oil to dip them in...

Starter #1: Cipolla spuma, prosciutto e pomprori [sic] — fruit tomatoes, from the market in Kamakura; Parma prosciutto; and a foam of fresh (and lightly sweetened) cream...

 

Starter #2: That excellent salad with slices of seared tairagi/tairagai. The salad itself is an eclectic mix of wild greens and herbs, including mange-tout peas, seri, ice plant, a couple of strands of wild asparagus and a single fiddlehead fern. Together with this you get several slices of the shellfish, like a coarser, meatier, country-cousin version of hotate scallops, anointed with a lively dressing of horseradish, mustard and shallots. For an antipasto, it's a substantial serving — and very attractively "plated" on the massive black triangular shell of the very same clam.

 

The pasta course: first up the trofie: small circles of dough rolled up into fat strings a couple of centimeters long — which he serves all'arrabbiata in a rich sauce prepared from fruit tomatoes. Remarkably sweet, and only very lightly piquant, it contains generous amounts of the delicate meat from kegani horsehair crabs.

 

Second, the gnocchi all fave: The broad beans, crushed and mixed with the dough, give the gnocchi an extra smoothness of texture as well as a distinctive dark-green hue. Served with creamy white ricotta cheese and crisp curls of salty pink guanciale (pork jowl bacon), it's not just a great mix of flavors — it's the quintessential Italian color combination.

 

And as a main course, a very tasty fillet of pan-fried amadai with very lightly cooked hamaguri clams. Like everything Chef Hidaka prepares, very attractively presented...

 

Dessert 1: biancomangiare with grappa-infused gelato...

 

Dessert 2: fresh mango served on a mango sorbet, imbued with plenty of vanilla... 

 

Bottom line: a great setting, delicately prepared Tokyo-Italian cucina, and a warm sense of it being a family-run operation. 

The full review is up in my Japan Times column here...

And the Cucina 13 Aprile web site is here...

code kurkku: Kyoto-Italian in Yoyogi Village

Arriving at code kurkku in the evening, through the cluster of converted freight containers that constitute Yoyogi Village, is pretty memorable, with that living wall of vegetation glowing through the massive picture window.

It's very easy on the eye in the daytime too...

The lobby leads past the gleaming open kitchen, with the chefs in their well-worn white baseball caps...

The dining room has a nice simple spacious feel, the height of the ceiling moderated by the random clusters of lights hanging overhead.

As I wrote in my Japan Times column last week, we had the upper of the two set lunch menus (¥5,000), which started with this excellent "cigar" of anago wrapped in filo pastry and deep-fried till crisp. This was draped over a fragrant asari-jiru, a clear broth derived from clams, containing plenty of mitsuba herb and a soft, freshly poached egg prepared in onsen tamago style. That's sansho scattered around the rim of the bowl, lending its distinctive aromatic presence without dominating the flavors in the mouth.

The antipasto was buri yellowtail, the slices lightly seared in tataki style, just enough to whiten their exterior but still sashimi-rare inside. These were paired with thin slices of apple and a small mound of mustard leaf salad topped with a white foam (also with a faint apple perfume), and served on a delectable sauce of grated raw apple mixed with daikon oroshi (from tangy karami-daikon), further spiced up with red peppercorns.

Spaghettini tossed with spring nanohana greens and plump, pink ama-ebi shrimps so lightly cooked they were almost raw, it was scattered with bright yellow bottarga and just a hint of tōgarashi chili. Bursting with understated flavor, this more than anything else on the menu gives meaning to the term Kyoto-Italian cuisine.

The main course: fricassee of Iwate free-range jidori, rolled and pan-fried, then finally seared in the oven over sumi charcoal to give it a lovely golden skin. Carefully arranged on the plate with a colorful selection of vegetables — potato, button mushrooms, yellow squash, Brussels sprout leaves and scarlet kyō-ninjin carrots — it came with a swoosh of pureed broccoli and a creamy vegetable-based sauce that was remarkably rich and satisfying for something containing no butter or dairy.

Dessert (hers): matcha tiramisu, with hojicha ice cream.

Dessert (his): panna cotta packed with espresso, sozzled with a dark, boozy caramel sauce and topped with a simple milk gelato.

The verdict: excellent. and a beautiful example of the evolving genre that has come to be called Kyoto-Italian. Just as we had expected, given the involvement (as executive chef) of Yasuhiro Sasajima of Il Ghiottone fame. Not quite up there on the same level as at his main Kyoto restaurant, but certainly as fine and inventive (and beautiful) as when we ate at Il Ghiottone Cucineria, Sasajima's more casual second restaurant.

OK, the view from the dining room is not as spectacular — Cucineria sits on the bank of the Kamogawa river in Kyoto. But screen out the looming Docomo high-rise and that exotic garden is still quite something for Tokyo.

In fact, illuminated at night, it's quite atmospheric.

I wrote up the original kurkku kitchen restaurant when it first opened. I haven't been back for a couple of years now, but I still hear great reports, especially of the café.

The web site for Yoyogi VIllage/code kurkku is here...

gibbous moon over Ch. Robuchon

The last warm night of the year (this was last week), so unseasonably balmy that they had the outside tables primed at the chateau in Yebisu, even for dinner.

We had other plans for the evening, so we did not linger. But it was a reminder of just how pleasant the little secluded garden of Table de Robuchon is when the weather is clement.

There aren't likely to be any more evenings this mild for quie a few months. But we will be looking forward to spring...

La Table de Joel Robuchon...

 

And then just a few days later — on the full moon — we were treated to a magical eclipse...

...and what we ate (at Casa Vinitalia): the pics that didn't make it into print

Actually a couple of these did. But I still think they look better on this page than on the Japan Times web site. The descriptions are taken from the original column here...

"…Before, the folding glass doors were always closed, but now the idea is to keep them open year-round."

"The first course, bagna cauda, is mandatory — not that we were complaining."

"The vegetables were crisp and colorful, and the anchovy dip (gorgonzola is also an option) was just the right degree of tangy/salty/oily to keep us nibbling happily until the first of our antipasti arrived."

"We followed this with a fritto of trippa, batter-fried honeycomb tripe with seasonal vegetables, which combined robust and delicate flavors."

"…a delicious, Parmesan-rich bechamel sauce with large fleshy cuts of fresh porcini mushrooms."

"These were topped with a generous scoop of chicken liver pâté which melted nicely into the thick, hot sauce surrounding it."

"…the promise of riso pilaf was too tempting to ignore. Cooked in a cast-iron mini-cocotte, it featured three types of crab. The rice was mixed with kani-miso (the rich paste from Shanghai swimmer crab) and topped with the grilled legs and pincers of king and queen crab. Powerful and rich, the resulting flavor was as much Japanese as Italian. We loved it."

"The December special is guancia di bue al vino rosso, beef cheek soft-simmered in a red-wine sauce with aromatics — star anise was detectable — until delectably soft. This is served with three kinds of Japanese mushroom and topped with generous shavings of white truffle. Was it as good as it sounds? Better!"

[cut from the original text] "The beef was accompanied by the most amazing sweet potato, cooked soft in a small cast-iron casserole.  Called anou-imo, these yams are bright yellow and amazingly sweet, which is why they have been given the name mitsu-imo (syrup yams).

"…you are offered a second round of pasta, this time spaghetti (though not hand-cut), and you even get to specify how much you want: 30, 60 or 100 grams. It's a nice touch, equivalent to the rice course that comes at the end of a Japanese meal."

"Both our desserts were outstanding: A whole Aomori apple baked in a miniature cast-iron cocotte and topped with honey ice cream…"

"…a wonderful semifreddo, a gelato studded with dried fruit with a hot coffee-chocolate sauce poured over it."

[also excised] "…little nibbles to go with the coffee/tea — ganache chocolate; some coconut eclairs; and rasperry halves prepared so they have the texture and flavour of fruit pastilles."

"We did not go home hungry."

"There are space heaters to keep you warm in winter, as you gaze out on the trees, shrubs and pot plants — and currently a beautifully decorated Christmas fir — that constitute this unexpected hidden garden."

Yabu Soba — noodles with a traditional rhythm

A spare hour or so in the mid-afternoon and I'm hungry. The lunch break is over and most restaurants have their doors shut. No worries — they stick to a more traditional rhythm at the city's classic soba houses. It's a great chance to get over to one of my all-time favourite places in Tokyo, the wonderful bucolic Kanda Yabu Soba.

The advantage to arriving outside of regular eating hours is that you have the pick of the seats. I like to install myself on the raised zashiki area, sitting cross-legged on the simple zabuton cushions.

The garden is beautiful at this time of year and, apart from a group of old boys having a leisurely boozy reunion lunch in the other part of the dining room (the section with tables and chairs), I have the place to myself.

To start, a small Yebisu: these small (334 ml) bottles are just perfect for the middle of the day. I love the soba-miso, a dark rich sticky savory mix containing nutty roasted buckwheat groats and specks of tangy ginger, which is served (gratis) with your drink.

And then a couple of ippin snacks: you can't beat the ai-yaki (slices of duck breast grilled with negi)...

... and then a serving of anago tempura, in classic Edomae style.

This is not "gourmet" soba. Yabu just serves its noodles the way it always has, hand-rolled and chopped, with no fuss or foodie pretensions. Ditto with the side dishes, they're not "fine" they're honest.

If I want genteel tradition I'll go down to Kyoto. What's so great about Yabu Soba is its no-nonsense Edokko character. That and the fact that it feels like it exists in a time warp, an oasis of low-rise old-time charm in a city that's already turned its back on the 20th century. 

I try to get over to Yabu Soba as often as I can — especially around the New Year (when it boasts splendid decorations) — though recently I consider myself lucky if I make it more than once a blue moon. 

For more on Yabu Soba, here's my JT column from 2003...

And here's the map link...