tokyo food file

dinner at Les Chanterelles: mushrooms & much more

 

There's not much to add to my write-up of the most aptly named Les Chanterelles — my latest column in The Japan Times — except to reiterate: now Chef Nakada has his own place and is finally free of the limitations involved in working for someone else (as he was at L'Artémis), he is stretching his wings and his cooking is really taking flight. 

Here's an illustrated run-down of our dinner there last month (plus a few images from one of the great-value weekend lunches), shortly after Nakada launched his mushroom-centric autumn menu.

Even though he would like to be incorporating local mushrooms in his cuisine — there are so many wonderful kinoko here in Japan — he has ruled that out, due to concern about levels of radioactivity even in fungi sourced from the other end of the country. That is why he is only serving imported mushrooms. [Thanks for raising this issue in your comment, Gio.] 

A couple of glasses of bubbly to go with the opening nibbles. Which were a light, creamy paté and a couple of one-bite mushroom-filled croque-monsieurs.

 

The first course: girolles, lightly sautéed with kuruma-ebi prawns and served on a thick,creamy sauce deeply infused with the heady aroma from a mixture of mushrooms. Nakada doesn't use much dairy produce in his food — but when he does, it's outstanding.

 

Alongside this, he served the legs and heads of the prawns, deep-fried crunchy — a tasty touch of the kind you'd expect at a high-end tempura restaurant. 

 

Second hors d'oeuvres: Sazae (aka turban shells), with a texture halfway between abalone and escargot, sauteed and dressed with a sauce made from their black, bitter livers, and topped with shards of black truffle. This came with a small side salad and a crisp flaky pastry (of the type known in Japanese as "pie").

 

Carpaccio of kamasu (small baracuda), served with slices of beautiful green zebra tomatoes, Kyoto mizuna and chrysanthemum petals, scattered with powdered truffle, and seasoned not with oil and vinegar but just tomato juice freshly squeezed and strained so finely it barely has any colour.

 

Pan-fried foie gras: encased in a crisp layer of almond and fine panko breadcrumbs, it was served on a mound of soft-cooked beans, with a small side salad (with truffle), and a scoop of sweet-savory fig chutney and a dab of creamed silver onion. Wonderful!

 

Nagada's signature hors d’oeuvres is his classic pairing of salmon and egg. This is a dish he served throughout his time at L'Artémis — I first ate it (and raved about it) seven years ago — but it's even better now. To quote myself...

"The fish (Tasmanian) is marinated and lightly smoked, just enough to deepen the umami savor without overpowering its inherent flavor, then topped with sour cream and a delicate dressing of minced shallots and fresh tomato. On one side he places a perfectly cooked onsen-tamago (lightly poached egg) covered with slices of black truffle; on the other, a small seasonal “salad,” such as bulgur topped with green soybeans, garnished with chrysanthemum petals and yet more truffle. 

 

Joue de boeuf (ox cheek), long simmered till meltingly tender in a red wine jus infused with black pepper and juniper, with a generous serving of deep-fried chanterelles on the side.

 

Quail stuffed with wild rice and minced mushrooms, wrapped in bacon and oven-baked, accompanied by half a matsutake, soft-cooked small sato-imo taro yams, a light onion puree, a couple of raisins, and one of the richest gravies we’ve had in a long while.

 

Here's a close-up of what it looked like dissected...

 

Dessert 1:  chocolate terrine with cassis sorbet

 

Dessert 2: wine-simmered fig served in Champagne granité.

 

Again: this really is my sort of place. Simple but stylish, relaxed but worth dressing up for; well away from the bright lights of central Tokyo, but far above the standard of the average "neighbourhood" joint; and full-on restaurant cuisine with subtlety and finesse — make no mistake, this is not bistro cuisine.

Highly recommended if you live (or intend to be) anywhere on the Yoyogi side of the city.

Here's a map link...And here is the Les Chanterelles home page...

 

UPDATE Nov. 2014: In the Michelin Tokyo Guide for 2015, Les Chanterelles won its first Michelin star.

UPDATE Nov. 2017: Les Chanterelles has retained its one-star status for the 4th straight year.

Three brilliant flavours fresh from @TheMarketSE1

Milk chocolate; matcha; and the truly remarkable Miyakojima dragonfruit.

 

Picked up late this afternoon just before closing time from The Market SE1.

 

The dragonfruit tasted every bit as amazing as it looks. Unfortunately, I just checked his twitter feed, and this seems to have been the last time Yasu-san will be making it this year...

it's the season for (high-end) watermelons

I spotted this whopper in the window of a fancy fruit parlor right by the crossing in Shibuya. It's a Taiyo Suika — "Sun Watermelon" — highly appropriate for this time of year.

It's the size of a basketball and pretty much the same colour. Inside, though, they look quite normal, red and juicy just the way they should be. Apparently, they are extra sweet, though I've never actually tried one. For one thing, they're pretty unusual; for another, at ¥5,250 apiece they're not cheap...

Although compared to one of these whoppers (below) they are. Shikaku ("square") watermelons are status symbols, intended as prestige offerings for the mid-summer gift-giving season. Hence the ribbon on top. And the ¥12.600 price tag.

To produce these cuboid fruit, they have to be raised, handled and packed with extreme care. One advantage: their shape make them much more convenient for fitting in a box and transporting. And for fitting in your fridge.

premium panini and mulberry gelato: back again to The Market SE1

Down on our favourite stretch of the coast again and feeling peckish: the perfect excuse for another visit to The Market SE1.

 

Atarashi-san's panini are great. That's chicken on the left; nice and juicy and slightly piquant, it's a stonker. The other one (on the right) was even better: a special order of grilled Mediterranean veggies and mozzarella laid out on a layer of his own home-cooked sweet-savoury onion chutney, which he slow-simmers and seasons with a dash of good old Bulldog Sauce. 

Here's an aerial view...

 

And obviously we wouldn't visit the best little artisan ice cream shop in Kanto without sampling some of the gelati. Atarashi-san always has a range of seasonal flavours: light-orange local Kugenuma kabocha pumpkin; pineapple flown up from Ishigakijima; and early-season tomato, as beautifully pink and appetising as strawberry, but with a remarkable different sweet/tartness that's perfect in the summer heat.

 

They're all tempting. But the one we couldn't miss was the mulberry special. It's made with fruit shipped down from Yamanashi which are used both whole and also cooked as a compote. Atarashi-san blends this into a portion of Yama-Milk gelato (made with high-grade non-homogenized milk from Shimane), studded with crunchy bits of caramelized walnut and flakes of chocolate. Outstanding!!

There's more about the mulberries on Atarashi-san's blog here...

And for more about The Market SE1, my blog post from last year is here...

a tasty little springtime "snack" at Ryugin (continued): the denouement

Our little celebratory "snack" at Ryugin closed memorably — and very sweetly indeed.

Following in the much lauded footsteps of the famous Ryugin Candy Apple, this is Chef Yamamoto's new Candy Strawberry.

Just as with the apple, the "strawberry" is nitro-frozen — all the way down to -196° Celsius. That burnished outer shell of candy contains a frozen powder that literally melts in your mouth as it warms up.

And it's served with a hot "jam" — with lots of chunks of the actual fruit — heated to an almost bubbling-hot +99°.

It's such a jewel-like creation it seems a shame to crack it open. But the combination of textures and of course temperatures — a differential of almost 300 degrees — gives for a remarkable taste experience.

Here's what it looks like as the jam gets ladled over the candy...

  

Truth to tell, I think the apple works better. The strawberry is every bit as beautiful, but it lacks the slight underlying tartness of the apple. That jam is very sweet indeed.

But there was another dessert to come, this one rather more subtle on the palate.

A mikan orange — a thin-skinned varietal from Shikoku, Yamamoto's home territory — carved out and filled with tiny morsels of shortbread-like cake, and topped with wedges of the unadorned fruit.

This one is a winner all the way.