Izakaya Quotes

get wound up. Kimura was a short, stocky fellow with a tight-permed hairstyle reminiscent of the yakuza from my internship story. When he was sober, he was a great guy. He was a mean drunk, however, and he’d been putting it away all night. He kept picking on me as we entered the next izakaya, and once we were sitting down, he looked over at me and sneered. “I look at you, Adelstein, and I can’t figure out how we lost the war. How could we lose to a bunch of sloppy Americans? Barbarians with no discipline, no culture, and no honor. It beats me. Long live the Emperor!

What to eat? You've crossed a dozen time zones to get here and you want to make every meal count. Do you start at an izakaya, a Japanese pub, and eat raw fish and grilled chicken parts and fried tofu, all washed down with a river of cold sake? Do you seek out the familiar nourishment of noodles- ramen, udon, soba- and let the warmth and beauty of this cuisine slip gloriously past your lips? Or maybe you wade into the vast unknown, throw yourself entirely into the world of unfamiliar flavors: a bowl of salt-roasted eel, a mound of sticky fermented soybeans, a nine-course kaiseki feast.

trends fade as they were usurped by competitors (those same fajitas and sushi platters giving way first to burritos and ramen soups and then to fish tacos and izakayas), while trends like espresso coffee have assumed a permanent role in my diet. I’ve also seen heavily hyped trends vanish as suddenly as they have appeared, like thin snow hitting the ground. Watching Superbowl XXVII in 1993, I, like millions of others, was spellbound by the halftime commercial for Crystal Pepsi, with its new-age messages saying, “Right now, the future is ahead of you,” set to the tune of Van Halen’s “Right Now.” Suddenly

While I struggled with the menu, a handsome middle-aged guy from a nearby table came over to help. "You like sashimi? Cooked fish? Sushi?" he asked. His English was excellent. He was originally from Okinawa, he said, and a member of Rotary International. I know nothing about the Rotarians except that it's a service organization; helping befuddled foreigners order food in bars must fall within its definition of charitable service. Our service-oriented neighbor helped us order pressed sweetfish sushi, kisu fish tempura, and butter-sauteed scallops. Dredging up a vague Oishinbo memory, I also ordered broiled sweetfish, a seasonal delicacy said to taste vaguely of melon. While we started in on our sushi, our waitress- the kind of harried diner waitress who would call customers "hon" in an American restaurant- delivered a huge, beautiful steamed flounder with soy sauce, mirin, and chunks of creamy tofu. "From that guy," she said, indicating the Rotarian samaritan. We retaliated with a large bottle of beer for him and his friend (the friend came over to thank us, with much bowing). What would happen at your neighborhood bar if a couple of confused foreigners came in with a child and didn't even know how to order a drink? Would someone send them a free fish? I should add that it's not exactly common to bring children to an izakaya, but it's not frowned upon, either; also, not every izakaya is equally welcoming. Some, I have heard, are more clubby and are skeptical of nonregulars, whatever their nationality. But I didn't encounter any places like that. Oh, how was the food? So much of the seafood we eat in the U.S., even in Seattle, is previously frozen, slightly past its prime, or both. All of the seafood at our local izakaya was jump-up-and-bite-you fresh. This was most obvious in the flounder and the scallops. A mild fish, steamed, lightly seasoned, and served with tofu does not sound like a recipe for memorable eating, but it was. The butter-sauteed scallops, meanwhile, would have been at home at a New England seaside shack. They were served with a lettuce and tomato salad and a dollop of mayo. The shellfish were cooked and seasoned perfectly. I've never had a better scallop.

We took a short ride on the Oedo line and surfaced near a sashimi-oriented izakaya called Uoshin. The upstairs counter snaked through the room so everyone could have a seat at the bar, and tucked into nooks at various parts of the arrangement were white-coated chefs, each with a knife and a wooden board full of freshly sliced sashimi. We ordered a few selections from the board, and then Mark, who is apparently one of those wiry guys with a boundless appetite, started calling for cooked food; gesoyaki (grilled squid tentacles, one of my favorites), tamagoyaki (seasoned rolled omelet, and yellow-tail teriyaki, all of which were exceptionally good, especially the meaty broiled yellowtail with its sweet and salty glaze.

With six thousand miles separating me from sleep, I stumbled down into the subway at dawn and emerged on the outskirts of the Tsukiji market just as the sun broke across Tokyo Bay. Inside the market, I saw the entire ocean on display: swollen-bellied salmon, dark disks of abalone, vast armies of exotic crustaceans, conger eels so shiny and new they looked to be napping in their Styrofoam boxes. I stumbled onward to a tuna auction, where a man in a trader's cap worked his way through a hundred silver carcasses scattered across the cement floor, using a system of rapid hand motions and guttural noises unintelligible to all but a select group of tuna savants. When the auction ended, I followed one of the bodies back to its buyer's stall, where a man and his son used band saw, katana blade, cleaver, and fillet knife to work the massive fish down into sellable components: sinewy tail meat for the cheap izakaya, ruby loins for hotel restaurants, blocks of marbled belly for the high-end sushi temples. By 8:00 a.m. I was starving. First, a sushi feast, a twelve-piece procession of Tsukiji's finest- fat-frizzled bluefin, chewy surf clam, a custardy slab of Hokkaido uni- washed down with frosty glasses of Kirin. Then a bowl of warm soba from the outer market, crowned at the last second with a golden nest of vegetable tempura.

Sardines have been considered a low-grade fish since the old days. Unlike sea bream, left-eyed flounder and sweetfish, they're never used in first-class restaurants. They've always been used as fertilizer in the fields or food for fish farms. People treat them as the lowest fish there is." "Hmm..." "Recently the size of the sardine catch has decreased, so people have begun to value them. But the chef here has been making sardine dishes since back when people thought of them as worthless. You could almost say the chef here... ... has staked his life on this fish. This place may seem shabby compared to a luxurious ryōtei that takes pride in using expensive ingredients... But the food here is sincere and earnest. This restaurant is far more attractive to me than the average first-class ryōtei. It may look shabby, but his spirit is noble. That's because the chef believed in himself and created this place from scratch by his own effort.

Ooh! The firm, moist texture and flavor of the yuba... ... suits the gratin's white sauce made with lots of milk and butter!" "Yuba, a traditional Japanese food... ...perfectly matches the sauce in the gratin, which is a Western dish!" "I made the white sauce with flour, butter and milk... ... and added chopped onions, sliced mushrooms and yuba cut into bite-sized pieces. I brought the white sauce to a boil after seasoning it with salt and pepper. Then I placed that inside a gratin dish, covered it with grated cheese and baked it in the oven until it turned golden brown." "Wow. I don't believe it." "I never thought yuba and white sauce would taste good together. But come to think of it, yuba is basically soy protein." "It has a rich yet simple taste... ...so I guess it goes well with any kind of dish." "I know I'm contradicting myself... ...but this is light and heavy at the same time! Yuba is made from soy milk, and white sauce is made from regular milk. Both beverages are very good for the human body. So it's no surprise that they come together to make such a delicious flavor in yuba gratin.

There's caviar inside the prawn dumpling!" "I used fresh live Japanese tiger prawns and minced the meat, then mixed it with an egg. I wrapped the caviar with it and fried it in peanut oil." "The sweetness of the prawn and the rich taste of the caviar complement each other! Nice work, Yuichi!" "Ah, no..." "There are various kinds of fried prawn dumpling dishes, but it was Yuichi's idea to wrap caviar in it. He got all the ingredients and made it himself on his day off." "Tayama senpai created this?" "Yuichi, make something else for us." "Please let me off the hook now." "Yuichi, make the scallop rice." "Master!" "Just do it." "The rice has been steamed and lightly flavored with dashi and soy sauce. I basted the scallop with a mop sauce made from sake and soy sauce, and grilled the outside but left the meat half-cooked. Then I placed the scallop onto the rice just before it finished steaming--- steam it for a moment, and it's done." "Aah! The flavor of the scallop has seeped into the rice, but the scallop itself still retains its flavor too. This only works if you perfectly calculate how long to grill the scallop and how long to steam it on the rice." "He saw me making steamed clam rice... ... and that's where he got the idea to place the teriyaki scallop instead of the clams on top of the rice." "The fact that you made the scallop into a teriyaki was a nice touch." "This is great ." "One more dish, Yuichi!" "Oh, please..." "Yuichi, I've got some engawa. You want me to help?" "No way. I'll do it myself! I wrapped young spring onions with the engawa of a left-eyed flounder, brushed on a mop sauce made from soy sauce and sake, and grilled it lightly. Please sprinkle some powdered Chinese pepper or shichimi onto this, if you want to." "Yum! The scent of the grilled spring onion and engawa draws out my appetite." "I took Yuichi to a restaurant that cooked garlic chives wrapped with eel dorsal fins... ...and Yuichi said he wanted to try it with left-eyed flounder engawa and young spring onions." "I thought it would be a waste to grill the engawa, but it turned out surprisingly good when he made it that way.

Sardine sashimi. It tastes better when you eat it with ginger instead of wasabi." "Look at the shine on that skin! These sardines are fresh!" "They're small but fatty." "And they don't smell fishy at all. As a matter of fact, they have a nice scent." "Marinated sardines. You half-dry the sardine with the backbone still in it, and then marinate it in vinegar. Then you add small amounts of sugar, soy sauce and chopped red chili... ...and leave it in the refrigerator for a day." "Hmm... it feels nice biting into the firm flesh." "The spicy and sour flavor goes well with the fatty sardine." "Fried sardine fish cakes. You mash the sardines after removing the head and the organs, add chopped spring onions, ginger juice and salt for the flavoring... ... then make them into an oval shape and deep-fry them." "It's very crisp, and it must be nutritious since the bones have been mashed inside it too.

And the last one is the chicken-skin hot pot. The best parts of a chicken to eat are the skin and the innards. There are many ways of cooking them, but this chicken-skin hot pot is easy to make, and it tastes great. First you heat the pot, place the chicken inside... ... and slowly cook it inside the pot. Once the oil from the skin comes seeping out, you add the innards to the pot. You basically use the oil from the skin to stir-fry the innards. After the innards have been slightly cooked, you add some spring onions which have been cut around two inches long... ...and finally add sake and soy sauce to it. The oil from the chicken skin and soup from the innards have not been thinned down with any kind of broth or dashi, so the young people will love its rich, strong taste and scent. And anybody can make it once they see it being made.

Each person has a different idea about how they want to finish off a meal. The Japanese are avid noodle lovers. Eating ramen after having a drink is a classic thing for the Japanese. And then there's curry udon; the Japanese people love curry. So I'm sure there are many people who want to finish off the meal with that. If those two are a little too heavy, then kitsune udon or warm sōmen would be a lighter alternative." "Hmm?! So that's what you mean..." "Some people want to eat something sweet after a drink. And for them, there's red beans with shiratama dumplings... ... and anmitsu for those who want something a little heavy. For those who don't have a sweet tooth, there's tokoroten... ... and we also have grilled rice cakes wrapped in nori. And for the extreme sweet lovers, we've made Western style desserts as well: frozen yogurt, chocolate parfait, vanilla milkshake and donuts.

Is this a potato? It's so smooth! It doesn't have that muddy, earthy smell to it! It's not fluffy or dry, and it just melts away in my mouth!" "This is 'potato stewed in butter.' It's a dish I learned from Ajihyakusen, an izakaya in Sapporo. For the soup, you use the ichiban-dashi of a katsuobushi. That way you won't waste the scent of the potato. And for ten potatoes, you place half a pound of salted butter into the dashi... ...flavor it with a very slight amount of salt and sugar, and stew it over extremely low heat. In about forty minutes, the potatoes will start to float in the dashi. If you keep boiling the potatoes, they'll sink again and then come floating back up in two and a half hours. All you need to do after that is to boil it for about thirty more minutes, and it's done." "Then you boil it for almost four hours total?" "Right. It takes a whole day to cook this, so even though this dish only costs 600 yen, you have to order at least a day in advance to eat it at the izakaya. The dishes Kurita and I made the other day were all made to your order. They were dishes that avoided the true nature of the potato. But this is a dish that draws out the full taste of the potato in a very straightforward way. By cooking the potato for several hours over low heat, the flavor of the potato seeps out into the dashi, and when that happens, the unique muddy smell of the potato disappears. The potato can be easily broken apart in the soup, and it melts away on your tongue." "That's the biggest difference from the other potato dishes." "You can taste the true flavor of the potato with it.

Ah, chopped horse mackerel." "Yeah, but it's not just an ordinary chopped horse mackerel." "Oh? What?! You're wrapping the chopped horse mackerel in a dumpling skin?! And you're going to deep-fry it?!" "Here you go. Deep-fried chopped horse mackerel dumplings. It's another one of Tatsu's ideas. Eat it with Japanese mustard, ginger and soy sauce." "So this is another one of your creations, Tatsu. Ha ha! That's a pretty wild taste! The chopped mackerel is half raw. And the spicy Japanese mustard and ginger sting your nose and wrap up the flavor of the dumpling!" " Ha ha . Just playing around!" "Playing around, huh..." "Here. Tatsu's special 'Everything Rice.'" "Whoa! It's got so many things on it! Curry, omelet, hayashi-rice, salted cod roe and nori, three slices of deep-fried pork cutlet with demi-glace sauce and stewed offal. Ha ha ha ... this is so sumptuous, it's over the top!" "Heh heh. You know how we homeless people collect leftovers and eat 'em all together, right? Interestingly, they kinda taste better than when ya eat 'em on their own." "I see! You've got a point... this really is a dish that only you could've come up with, Tatsu." "Just playing around!" "Playing around!

First I shell the oysters, then coat them with flour... ... and I deep-fry that. I make a sauce with soy sauce, ground sesame, sesame oil, chili pepper and some mirin. And I dip the oysters in the sauce. Here you are. Give it a try. Deep fried oysters and kimchi over rice!" "Ah, this smells great! " "Let's eat!" "Ooh! The oysters have been fried perfectly! They're soft and when you bite into them, the juice comes spurting out... ... and the flavor of the oyster combined with the sourness and spiciness of the kimchi creates a wonderfully complex taste!" "Yeah! The deep-fried oysters go great with the kimchi!" "It would have been a bit heavy with just the fried oysters... ... but the hot and sour flavor of the kimchi makes this very tasty!

This is an eel roll-up skewer. It's thinly sliced eel meat wrapped around a skewer." "What do you mean by the eel meat?" "Take a look at the diagram behind you." "Hmm! It's been separated into so many different parts! It's soft, meaty and fatty... I can enjoy the flavor of the eel to the fullest!" "I must say... this skewer tastes good." "The taste of the eel is a lot richer since it hasn't been steamed like a Tokyo-style kabayaki! And it's a lot more soft and succulent than the kansai-style kabayaki!" "It's the very essence of the eel's flavor." "This is the liver. I can only get one liver out of an eel, so I can only provide the customers with a limited amount each day." "Oh, but isn't the liver the guts?" Ah, look at the diagram. At my place, the liver is one specific part while the guts are the whole thing." "Ooh, I see. That's what it means." "Animal guts have a distinct smell to them. But the eel liver has no smell at all!" "Unlike an ordinary liver skewer... I've taken out the gall bladder, so it's not bitter. Next come the grilled ribs. The ribs are the abdominal bones in the eel that you get rid of when making kabayaki. I skewer and grill them.

This one is skewered guts. It's all the guts except the liver." "It's got that unique texture of a gut, with a slightly bitter taste!" "The flavor of the guts tends to seep out when you make soup with it, but this retains all its refreshing original flavor!" "This is a fin skewer. As you can guess from its name, it's the dorsal fin of the eel... ... wrapped around a skewer with ribs and garlic chives." "This is my favorite one!" "They throw these parts away when they make kabayaki." "Ah! I understand why this is your favorite, Yamaoka-san! The eel and the garlic chives create a rich, savory flavor!" "I never thought eel and garlic chives would go so well together!" "The dorsal fin of a left-eyed flounder is called an engawa, and it's considered a delicacy. It's the most active part of the fish's body, so it's fatty and good to eat." "The same goes for the eel." "This one is the collar. It's the meat around the neck, below the eyes... ... which I cut open and skewered after taking the head off. The head bone is very tough, so this is the only part of the eel I throw away." "Hmm, so it's called the "collar" because it's the area around the neck." "It has a complex flavor to it too. It's totally different from the stomach meat, the guts or the dorsal fin!" "It kind of tastes like a mixture of fish and lamb meat! There are so many other skewers, right?!" "Yahata-maki, which is eel meat wrapped around burdock. Tanzaku, where the meat has been cut like strips of paper. Smoked eel. And of course, we can't forget the famous kabayaki.

Try this smoked chicken with a dressing made from wine vinegar and herbs. Than the liver sashimi with just salt. Try the gizzard and chicken leg sashimi with salt and sesame oil. This one is from Nakagomi-san's Yorozuya brewery. It's a Shunnoten Junmaishu, 'Takazasu.' I've warmed it so that it'll be 108 degrees when poured into your sake cup." "108 degrees! Do you have to be that precise in warming the sake?!" "Of course. That's why the Okanban's job is so important. I've made it slighty lukewarm to stimulate your taste buds, It should be just the right warmth to enjoy the delicate differences of the various sashimi." "Wow. You really put a lot of thought into warming the sake." "Okay. Let's try the sake and food together." "The chicken leg is sweet! And the warm sake wraps that sweetness and enhances it in your mouth!" "The warm sake spreads out the aftertaste of the liver on your tongue!" "The more I chew on the gizzard, the richer the taste becomes!" "Man, it's totally different from cold sake! Its scent and flavor are so lively!" "Exactly. That's what's important. Warming the sake brings the flavor and scent to life, so they're much stronger than with cold sake. That's the reason you serve sake warm." "I see... I never knew there was a reason like that behind warming sake." "And now the main dish--- yakitori. Please start with the chicken fillet, heart and liver. This is a Shunnoten Junmai Daiginjo that has been aged a little longer than usual. It's made from Yamadanishiki rice that has been polished down to 45 percent and then dry-steamed to create a tough malt-rice... ... which is then carefully fermented in low temperatures to create the sake mash. Many people think I'm out of my mind to warm such a high-class Daiginjo. But when sake like this, which has been aged for a long time, is warmed to be 118 degrees when poured into the cup... you can clearly taste the deep flavor of the aged sake." "Wow!" "But 118 degrees is a little hot, isn't it?" "I wanted you to taste the succulent, savory chicken heart and other skewers... ...with a hot Daiginjo that has a rich yet refreshing flavor and can wash away the fat." "I think Junmai Ginjoshu tastes good when you warm it. People who claim that it's wrong to warm Junmai Ginjoshu don't know much about sake." "Aah... the sake tastes heavier since it's warmer than the last one!" "The flavor and scent of the sake fill my mouth and wash away the fat from the chicken too!" "This sake has such a rich, mature taste!

Chicken meat, gizzard, chicken skin and chicken wing. This time, I added about 10 percent more water to the Takazasu I gave to you... ...and let it sit for about a week to blend the alcohol and flavor together. And I've warmed it just like the last one so that it will be 118 degrees when poured into the cup. If the temperature is any lower than that, the sweetness of the sake becomes too distinct and it loses its lightness." "Hmmm! This one tastes so light, even though it's the same temperature!" "After eating for a while, people tend to start getting a bit tired. If you warm this sake up to the right temperature, it helps you continue to eat." "That's right. And this sake is not only light, but it also has a strong, rich taste... ... so it can capture the fatty parts like the chicken skin and chicken wing and boost their flavor." "This way, you can continue to eat, and you'll never get tired of drinking.

The stewed offal here is motsunikomi. It can also be translated as "stewed giblets." It is made by stewing beef or pork giblets with ginger and vegetables, and flavored with either soy sauce or miso.

Kabayaki-style means brushed with sauce, skewered on sticks and then grilled over charcoal. For a Tokyo-style eel kabayaki, the eel is split open from its back, grilled without the sauce, steamed and then grilled again with the sauce. For the Kansai-style, the eel is split open from its stomach, and then grilled right away without being steamed.

It’s estimated that Tokyo has 120,000 bars and restaurants – more than any city in the world – so it’s fair to say that Japan has a thriving drinking culture. It’s very common to head out after work to an izakaya to eat, drink and smoke oneself to oblivion before crawling home in the early hours of the morning.

If I died in a freak accident while hurrying through Shibuya's notorious "scramble" intersection, where thousands of pedestrians crossed from all directions at once when the WALK light shifted to green, I hoped whoever performed my funeral service would know I died satisfied. Shibuya felt like being in the center of the vertical world, with tall buildings flashing advertisements, neon lights, and level after level of stores and restaurants visible through glass windows. So many people, so hurried, so much to look at and experience. Fashionista women wearing skinny pants with stiletto pumps riding bikes down crowded sidewalks. Harajuku girls with pink hair and crazy outfits. Loud izakaya bars where men's conversations and laughter spilled onto the street, and women walking by wearing kimonos with white socks tucked into flip-flops. Young people strutting around dressed in kosupure ("cosplay," Nik translated) outfits from their favorite anime, like it was Halloween every day here. TOO MUCH FUN. I didn't want to die, but if I did, I would tell the souls I met in the afterlife: Don't feel bad about my premature end. I saw it all in my short time down in the upworld of Tokyo.

Later, we deepen our investigation into the drinking-while-standing phenomenon at Mashika, an Italian izakaya in a hip pocket of Nishi-ku. The Italian-Japanese coalition is hardly new territory in this pasta-loving country, but Mishika is a different kind of mash-up. To start with, the space isn't really a restaurant at all. During the day, grandma sells cigarettes out of the small space. When the sun goes down, grandson fires up the burners as a crowd of thirtysomething Osakans drink Spritz and fill up on charcuterie, sashimi, and funky hybrids like spaghetti sauced with grated daikon and crowned with a wedge of ocean-sweet saury tataki. The menu follows no particular rules at all. Nobody seems to notice.