tokyo food file

uni and kuruma-ebi @ Sukiyabashi Jiro Roppongi

Outstanding uni. Beautiful kuruma-ebi.

And much much more. Thank you, Ono-san.

And big big thanks Jon and Suz!

wineterroirs.com on François Dumas, pioneer of French natural wine in Japan

There's an extensive post in the excellent blog www.wineterroirs.com on bio wine importer/pioneer (and also longtime Tokyo resident) François Dumas.

We had the chance recently to meet François Dumas, who is possibly the first to have set up a wine-import business in Japan centered around French natural wines : his company Le Vin Nature is entirely centered on the distribution of (mostly French) natural wines. His story is passionating because more than business, his career is about passion and intuition moves. First, he is a trained architect in France, then he organized music shows in Japan and ended up setting up a wine import business... François came to Japan first 1979, he was a trained architect and he came for a one-year study on traditional Japanese houses, from the far north to the Japanese south. Back in France in 1981 he worked for the newly independant radio network Radio Nova, this was the time the World-Music was very strong in France and the new freedom in the radio waves was very exciting. Then he went back to Japan and organized music shows there with African musicians as well as people like Gainsbourg, Charles Trenet, Jane Birkin, Marianne Faithful, Maceo Parker and others. Serge Gainsbourg was not known in Japan then and he has become sort of a cult singer since. When the techno-music era began, he decided to stop this job, leave the business to his associates and begin do something with wine, even though he remained the president of this concert business (Highlife international) until 2006. So, in 1997, he decided to explore another field and gather a list of organic and biodynamic wineries and import their wines here. There weren't any specialized import of natural wines here then, the wine lansdcape was almost limited to Bordeaux which he felt was boring. From the start he had the wines of Overnoy, Chateau Le Puy (before it turned organic and discovered how not to use SO2, he adds) and many others...

             The full post is over at  www.wineterroirs.com

Good to see the word is spreading about natural wines. Kudos is also due to Katsuyama-san, who besides being the master of Shonzui (and Grape Gumbo) is a legend in the Tokyo wine world.

A few years ago I wrote up Shonzui in the Japan Times... I don't make it into Roppongi so often. You're more likely to find me in another favourite bar that specialises in natural wines, Ahiru Store.

Happy New Year 2012. Best wishes to one and all.

Akemashite omedetou gozaimasu!

Good health and good eating in the year ahead!

And since we're embarking into a Dragon Year, it's only right and fitting that I revisit this particular blog post...

This is also a chance for me to again congratulate chef Yamamoto and his team at Ryugin for gaining their third Michelin star last month. Omedetou gozaimasu.

temaki-zushi at Shichi Jyu Ni Kou

This was the fourth course of our lunch at Shichi Jyu Ni Kou and in some ways the most memorable. The rice, long grain akamai (though only barely flecked with red), was lightly vinegared and formed into an oblong block. It arrived carefully positioned on the spoon of black lacquer, topped with freshly shucked tsubugai whelks...

The instructions were simple. Carefully ease the rice onto the square of toasted nori seaweed...

Then gently fold the nori sheet to enfold the rice and shellfish, to convey it to your mouth. It was only a couple of bites, but it has lingered in the memory because it was very different to anything I ever recall being served at a sushiya...

Finally, here's a shot from closer-up — not so much to show the spoon (lovely and gleaming as it was) than the block it was resting on, which was carved freshly out of a piece of daikon.

More photos of the meal to follow later today...

Roppongi Nouen — connected with the soil in so many ways

The full story is up on the Japan Times website. Here are a few more visuals to go with it...

Roppongi Nouen (that's Japanese for "farm") is no gimmick. The connection with the soil is genuine: It is actually run by people from farming families, who are proud of their rural roots and hope to make the Japanese countryside seem as chic as, say, Tuscany, Dordogne or Napa.

The first thing that grabs your attention is the handsome rough-textured wall by the entrance to the dining room. The bands of hand-packed mud are made from different kinds of soil sent from all over Japan, from Okinawa up to the far north.

Beyond that is the dining room, with its simple furniture, whitewashed walls and glimpses of the open kitchen. It's simple but sophisticated, compact and comfortable and, as likely as not, filled with a warm, happy buzz of conversation.

The cooking is best described as "country-casual," well put together and basically Japanese in inspiration though with a few inventive flourishes. 

There are many good reasons to order a la carte, high among them the venison jerky, which we nibbled on with great enjoyment as we scanned the menu.

Given the care lavished on the vegetables here, the mixed salad is as good as you'd expect. Ours had fresh herbs mixed in with the usual salad greens, plus tomatoes of three different colors: juicy red chunks; one-bite orange cherry tomatoes; and, also whole, slightly larger purple-black Toscana tomatoes fresh off the vine.

Just about anything from the grill is going to taste great here, whether it's the yakitori-style grilled chicken (basted with piquant-citron yuzu-kosho paste)...

...the koji-marinated grilled Miyaji pork; or the farmhouse sausages...

One item that didn't work for us was the thick, Korean-style chijimi pancake made with grated yamato-imo yam. It's an interesting idea, but the it tasted too much of raw tororo yam that even a jug-full of gravy-like sauce failed to disguise...

No such problem with the selection of nabe hot-pots. Our favourite to date was a spring version featuring hamaguri clams with bamboo shoots and asparagus spears, cooked in a stock with freshly harvested green tea leaves.

The rice at Nouen tastes great — whether you order it simply as onigiri rice balls...

...or cooked up in ceramic casseroles...

And then there is the chicken curry — it's colourful, reassuringly spicy and highly recommended (though you'll probably need to order extra rice to go with all that flavourful juice)...

 

Desserts are simple, usually either something Japanese, such as warabi-mochi; or the home-made gelato...

A few weeks ago, I wrote about Nouen's 'Eat For Japan' program. Though it's over now, the results are up on the top page of their website. Outstanding job. Respect!