Japanese Cuisine Quotes

I have come to the conclusion that just as the Japanese live to work, Asians live to eat.

Hōjicha is a variety of tea created by roasting green tea leaves over a charcoal fire. It has less caffeine and a mellower, richer taste than regular green tea.

Japanese cuisine did not change all at once but in stages.

Gyokuro is one of the highest quality (and most expensive) green teas in Japan. The major difference between the processes of growing gyokuro and regular green tea is that the gyokuro bushes are shaded with clod or reed screens for several weeks before harvesting, which gives the leaves a sweeter flavor and more intensely green color.

Koji is at the core of Japanese cuisine—it’s the key to sake, soy sauce, miso (the fermented soy paste used as a basis for soup), vinegar, and tofu. Technically, it’s the fungus Aspergillus oryzae, and if you were an infectious disease specialist, that would freak you out a little bit because most of the Aspergillus genus is poisonous.

Unlike Japan, Italy's cuisine has long centered on meat dishes. In their home province of Tuscany, duck, rabbit, and even boar would be served in the right season. I suspect that is how they learned how to butcher and dress a duck. The breast meat was glazed with a mixture of soy sauce, Japanese mustard, black pepper and honey to give it a strong, spicy fragrance... the perfect complement to the sauce. Duck and salsa verde. They found and enhanced the Japanese essence of both... ... to create an impressive and thoroughly Japanese dish!

Finally, we would have been offered either a spring takiawase, meaning "foods boiled or stewed together," or a wanmori (the apex of a tea kaiseki meal) featuring seasonal ingredients, such as a cherry blossom-pink dumpling of shrimp and egg white served in a dashi base accented with udo, a plant with a white stalk and leaves that tastes like asparagus and celery, and a sprig of fresh sansho, the aromatic young leaves from the same plant that bears the seedpods the Japanese grind into the tongue-numbing spice always served with fatty eel.

In summer, most ramen restaurants in Tokyo serve hiyashi chūka, a cold ramen noodle salad topped with strips of ham, cucumber, and omelet; a tart sesame- or soy-based sauce; and sometimes other vegetables, like a tomato wedge or sheets of wakame seaweed. The vegetables are arranged in piles of parallel shreds radiating from the center to the edge of the plate like bicycle spokes, and you toss everything together before eating. It's bracing, ice-cold, addictive- summer food from the days before air conditioning. In Oishinbo: Ramen and Gyōza, a young lifestyle reporter wants to write an article about hiyashi chūka. "I'm not interested in something like hiyashi chūka," says my alter ego Yamaoka. It's a fake Chinese dish made with cheap industrial ingredients, he explains. Later, however, Yamaoka relents. "Cold noodles, cold soup, and cold toppings," he muses. "The idea of trying to make a good dish out of them is a valid one." Good point, jerk. He mills organic wheat into flour and hires a Chinese chef to make the noodles. He buys a farmyard chicken from an old woman to make the stock and seasons it with the finest Japanese vinegar, soy sauce, and sake. Yamaoka's mean old dad Kaibara Yūzan inevitably gets involved and makes an even better hiyashi chūka by substituting the finest Chinese vinegar, soy sauce, and rice wine. When I first read this, I enjoyed trying to follow the heated argument over this dish I'd never even heard of. Yamaoka and Kaibara are in total agreement that hiyashi chūka needs to be made with quality ingredients, but they disagree about what kind of dish it is: Chinese, Japanese, or somewhere in between? Unlike American food, Japanese cuisine has boundary issues.

Every dish I cooked exhumed a memory. Every scent and taste brought me back for a moment to an unravaged home. Knife-cut noodles in chicken broth took me back to lunch at Myeondong Gyoja after an afternoon of shopping, the line so long it filled a flight of stairs, extended out the door, and wrapped around the building. The kalguksu so dense from the rich beef stock and starchy noodles it was nearly gelatinous. My mother ordering more and more refills of their famously garlic-heavy kimchi. My aunt scolding her for blowing her nose in public. Crispy Korean fried chicken conjured bachelor nights with Eunmi. Licking oil from our fingers as we chewed on the crispy skin, cleansing our palates with draft beer and white radish cubes as she helped me with my Korean homework. Black-bean noodles summoned Halmoni slurping jjajangmyeon takeout, huddled around a low table in the living room with the rest of my Korean family. I drained an entire bottle of oil into my Dutch oven and deep-fried pork cutlets dredged in flour, egg, and panko for tonkatsu, a Japanese dish my mother used to pack in my lunch boxes. I spent hours squeezing the water from boiled bean sprouts and tofu and spooning filling into soft, thin dumpling skins, pinching the tops closed, each one slightly closer to one of Maangchi's perfectly uniform mandu.

The key to this risotto is Japanese peppers of all things?!" "It's sharp, refreshing aroma highlights the mellow body of the cheese... while making the eel's umami flavor flash like an explosion!" "And that one key ingredient that quietly ties it all together... ... is garlic!" "Garlic?! In traditional Japanese cuisine?! That's almost unheard of!" "Those are special smoked garlic chips a junior of mine made. They were smoked using wood from a walnut tree, which is known to emphasize seafood flavors well. By lightly crushing those chips and sprinkling them on as a topping, I added a pleasantly crunchy texture to the dish. But the most critical feature of my dish... is that I broiled the eel using the Kansai region Kabayaki style. Unlike the Kanto region style, there's no steaming step. Leaving all that oil in gives the eel a more fragrant aroma with a heavier texture and stronger flavor... ... meaning it pairs much more naturally with a flavor as powerful as garlic. *Steaming the eel makes much of its natural oil seep out, leaving the flesh light and fluffy.* But what makes these chips so extraordinary... is that they're infused with Ibusaki's earnest passion and the pure sweat of his helpers, Aoki and Sato. There's no way they could not be delicious!" "Ew! Don't say they're infused with sweat! That's gross!" "This much alone is already an impressively polished gourmet course. What's in store for us in that teapot?" "That is eel-liver broth, my lady. I dressed the eel's liver and then sautéed it in olive oil with some smoked garlic chips. Then I poured the sake Sakaki and Marui made over the top and let the alcohol cook off before adding bonito stock to make a broth. It matches beautifully with the cheese that Yoshino and Nikumi made, creating a soft flavor with a splendid aftertaste.

There are succulent loins of fatty pork fried in scales of thin bread crumbs and served with bowls of thickened Worcestershire and dabs of fiery mustard. Giant pots of curry, dark and brooding as a sudden summer storm, where apples and onions and huge hunks of meat are simmered into submission over hours. Or days. There is okonomiyaki, the great geologic mass of carbs and cabbage and pork fat that would feel more at home on a stoner's coffee table than a Japanese tatami mat.

What a pretty color... A kind of goldish-green, with an emerald tint to it... Mmm...! A sweet, gentle, slightly bitter flavor with a soft aftertaste... It's as if a breeze from a mountain stream has just blown through my body... I probably wouldn't have understood this flavor if you had just given it to me the moment I arrived here after walking under the sun. It's all because I drank that hot hōjicha first... Now I get it! You made me walk under the scorching sun so that I'd understand the flavor of this tea... This house... the mild breeze from the rice paddies... the sound of cicadas... the dragonflies... What luxury..." "This gyokuro is the last thing I've prepared for you today." "Ōhara, I'm going to get angry if you give me anything else. I've just had a taste of real Japan. The spirit of Japan. As long as the Japanese do not lose this spirit, they'll be fine. This is that essential ingredient all those expensive feasts were lacking. So what more could I ask for?

Kombu is a species of edible kelp (Laminaria japonica) that thrives in long streamers about a palm's-width wide that can reach up to thirty feet in length. Along with katsuobushi, it is the other main ingredient for making dashi. Kombu contains a high level of the amino acid glutamate, which is the source of the "fifth taste", umami, and a precursor to the flavor enhancer MSG. Japan consumes about 50,000tons of kombu a year--- about half wild, and half farmed--- most of it harvested off the coast of the northern island, Hokkaidō.

This is an item used in Chinese cuisine. It's made from the same beans you use to make Chinese vermicelli, but it's been formed into a thin sheet instead of into noodles. Because it's tasteless and odorless in itself, we're obviously meant to focus on the mouthfeel, enjoying the firmness with our teeth and the silkiness with our tongues. As far as the taste goes, the important thing is the dressing... Hmm... the dashi is perfect, and the balance of flavors is well done too. There's vinegar in it, but the strength of the vinegar has been skillfully toned down.

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.

If you draw the full length of the blade through the fish in one gentle sweep, the resulting cross section is smooth and the cells are cleanly cut. But if you force the blade down on the fish to cut it, the cross section becomes ragged and the cells are squashed. If the surface of the slice is rough, more of the fish is exposed to air, and so it oxidizes faster and its flavor deteriorates. This becomes even more apparent with water-chilled sashimi. The ragged surface of the slices allows the water to penetrate the fish and leech out its flavor." "That's why the sashimi becomes watery and tasteless.

Katsuobushi is dried bonito, or skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis). Chunks of the fish are smoked and dried into hard blocks, which keep for several months. Along with kombu, katsuobushi is the other main ingredient used in making dashi. Throwing the whole block of fish in the water won't work; it must first be shaved into flakes with a tool that resembles an inverted carpenter's plane. However, almost no one actually prepares the flakes by hand anymore; home cooks buy bags of them at the grocery store or use instant powder preparations instead. Although bonito is the most popular type of dried fish for making dashi, many others are used as well, such as mackerel (sababushi), bluefin tuna (magurobushi), and sardines (niboshi).

The word gochisō not only means "feast," but also... ... "to run" or "rush." The host rushes around to gather the ingredients, get them ready, and then cook the food. The vegetables and chicken were homegrown... ... and you must have sought out the halfbeak and quail yourself. Miyasato sensei expended a lot of time and effort to treat us to this meal. The dishes we had are all common ones so that we'd easily be able to compare them with versions we've eaten before. For the wakame and green onion with miso, you pulled the onions out of your own vegetable patch, and you also used fresh wakame and homemade miso. And that's why it tasted so much better than usual. The care you've put into getting all these dishes ready... ... is what made this a real gochisō.

Because this tea kaiseki would be served so soon after breakfast, it would be considerably smaller than a traditional one. As a result, Stephen had decided to serve each mini tea kaiseki in a round stacking bento box, which looked like two miso soup bowls whose rims had been glued together. After lifting off the top dome-shaped cover the women would behold a little round tray sporting a tangle of raw squid strips and blanched scallions bound in a tahini-miso sauce pepped up with mustard. Underneath this seafood "salad" they would find a slightly deeper "tray" packed with pearly white rice garnished with a pink salted cherry blossom. Finally, under the rice would be their soup bowl containing the wanmori, the apex of the tea kaiseki. Inside the dashi base we had placed a large ball of fu (wheat gluten) shaped and colored to resemble a peach. Spongy and soft, it had a savory center of ground duck and sweet lily bulb. A cluster of fresh spinach leaves, to symbolize the budding of spring, accented the "peach," along with a shiitake mushroom cap simmered in mirin, sake, and soy. When the women had finished their meals, we served them tiny pink azuki bean paste sweets. David whipped them a bowl of thick green tea. For the dry sweets eaten before his thin tea, we served them flower-shaped refined sugar candies tinted pink. After all the women had left, Stephen, his helper, Mark, and I sat down to enjoy our own "Girl's Day" meal. And even though I was sitting in the corner of Stephen's dish-strewn kitchen in my T-shirt and rumpled khakis, that soft peach dumpling really did taste feminine and delicate.

Cool green foods became the natural choice in restaurants and teahouses. Matcha, the powdered green tea used for the tea ceremony, flavored ice cream, jewel-like gelatin cubes, and sweet whipped cream eaten in parfaits and layered with grapes, pineapple chunks, and chewy white mochi balls. There were Japanese-style snow cones, huge hills of shaved ice drizzled with green tea syrup, along with green tea-flavored mousse and tea-tainted sponge cake. Matcha flavored savory items too, including green tea noodles served hot in dashi soup, as well as chilled and heaped on a bamboo draining mat with a cold dipping sauce of dashi, mirin, and soy. There was green tea-flavored wheat gluten and the traditional Kyoto-style dish of white rice topped with thin petals of sashimi that you "cooked" at the table by drenching it with brewed green tea from a tiny teapot.

I think that the essence of the tea ceremony lies in how sincere you are toward your guests. Human life is a fragile thing. We may be alive and kicking right now, but we could die at any moment. That's why you have to put your heart and soul into the way you treat your guests, and conduct yourself as if it's the last time you'll ever see them. The tea ceremony is a practice through which you show your consideration to others. The manners and utensils are all part of that. That's why I think people who brag about how expensive their utensils are, or who take pride in the fact that they know the right manners, do not understand the spirit of the tea ceremony. Putting your heart and soul into it means you must get rid of all vanity. And that's why the governing aesthetic of the tea ceremony is to get rid of what's non-essential, in order to pursue the essence of things.

Memories fill my mind, as though they are my own, of not just events from Gideon's life, but of various flavors and textures: breast milk running easily down into my stomach, chicken cooked with butter and parsley, split peas and runner beans and butter beans, and oranges and peaches, strawberries freshly picked from the plant; hot, strong coffees each morning; pasta and walnuts and bread and brie; then something sweet: a pan cotta, with rose and saffron, and a white wine: tannin, soil, stone fruits, white blossom; and---oh my god---ramen, soba, udon, topped with nori and sesame seeds; miso with tofu and spring onions, fugu and tuna sashimi dipped in soy sauce, onigiri with a soured plum stuffed in the middle; and then something I don't know, something unfamiliar but at the same time deeply familiar, something I didn't realize I craved: crispy ground lamb, thick, broken noodles, chili oil, fragrant rice cooked in coconut milk, tamarind... and then a bright green dessert---the sweet, floral flavor of pandan fills my mouth.

To understand how seriously the people of Noto take the concept of waste, consider the fugu dilemma. Japanese blowfish, best known for its high toxicity, has been a staple of Noto cuisine for hundreds of years. During the late Meiji and early Edo periods, local cooks in Noto began to address a growing concern with fugu fabrication; namely, how to make use of the fish's deadly ovaries. Pregnant with enough poison to kill up to twenty people, the ovaries- like the toxic liver- had always been disposed of, but the cooks of Noto finally had enough of the waste and set out to crack the code of the toxic reproductive organs. Thus ensued a long, perilous period of experimentation. Locals rubbed ovaries in salt, then in nukamiso, a paste made from rice bran, and left them to ferment. Taste-testing the not-quite-detoxified fugu ovary was a lethal but necessary part of the process, and many years and many lives later, they arrived at a recipe that transformed the ovaries from a deadly disposable into an intensely flavored staple. Today pickled fugu ovaries remain one of Noto's most treasured delicacies.

Other than chicken and rice, you'll find Tokyo restaurants specializing in fried pork cutlets, curry rice, ramen, udon, soba, gyōza, beef tongue, tempura, takoyaki, yakitori, Korean-style grilled beef, sushi, okonomiyaki, mixed rice dishes, fried chicken, and dozens of other dishes. Furthermore, even if you know something about Japanese food, it's common to come across a restaurant whose menu or plastic food display indicates that it specializes in a particular food you've never seen before and can't quite decipher. Out of this tradition of single-purpose restaurants, Japan has created homegrown fast-food chains. McDonald's and KFC exist in Tokyo but are outnumbered by Japanese chains like Yoshinoya (beef-and-rice bowl), CoCo Ichiban (curry rice), Hanamaru Udon, Gindaco (takoyaki), Lotteria (burgers), Tenya (tempura), Freshness Burger, Ringer Hut (Nagasaki-style noodles), and Mister Donut (pizza) (just kidding). Since the Japanese are generally slim and healthy and I don't know how to read a Japanese newspaper, it was unclear to me whether Japan's fast-food chains are blamed for every social ill, but it seems like it would be hard to pin a high suicide rate on Mister Donut.

What luxury ingredient will it be this year? Matsutake mushrooms? "Returning" Skipjack? Fresh soba?" "IT'S MACKEREL PIKE!" "Really? Pike?!" "Umm... that's kind of a letdown, to be honest. They're such common fish..." "Not so fast, folks. It is true that throughout Japanese history, pike was viewed as a common fish that only the peasantry ate. But recently, high-class restaurants have begun serving it... ... and it now appears on the menus of restaurants across the world. It has become an unspoken representative of the Fall Fishing Season. A dish that uses pike in some way... ... is the theme for the final round of this year's Fall Classic!" "Mmm, pike! The first thing that springs to mind is yummy salt-grilled pike! The crispy skin... the hot, succulent meat... the savory smell of its juices... A dollop of grated daikon radish on top, and it's yum, yum, yum!" "It's been showing up on sushi menus recently too. That's a general ingredient for you. You can do tons of stuff with it." "As you all know, pike can be used in a wide variety of dishes. But strangely enough, this one ingredient... ... has connections to all three of our contestants. A pike.. ... with its fatty meat is known for its robust fragrance. It is a prized ingredient in seafood dishes across the world. And it has a long history of use in what is viewed as common cuisine!" "Oho! It has facets that appeal to all three chefs." "That means it's an ingredient that can play to each of their strengths!

It's basty!" "There's definitely a soup underneath the crust. I see carrots. Gingko nuts. Mushrooms. And... Shark fin! Simmered until it's falling apart!" Aah! It's all too much! I-I don't care if I burn my mouth... I want to dive in right now! Mm! Mmmm! UWAAAAH! "Incredible! The shark fin melts into a soft wave of warm umami goodness on the tongue... ...with the crispy piecrust providing a delectably crunchy contrast!" "Mmm... this piecrust shows all the signs of the swordsmanship he stole from Eishi Tsukasa too." Instead of melting warm butter to mix into the flour, he grated cold butter into granules and blended them... ... to form small lumps that then became airy layers during the baking, making the crust crispier and lighter. A light, airy crust like that soaks up the broth, making it the perfect complement to this dish! "Judge Ohizumi, what's that "basty" thing you were talking about?" "It's a dish in a certain style of cooking that's preserved for centuries in Nagasaki- Shippoku cuisine." "Shippoku cuisine?" Centuries ago, when Japan was still closed off from the rest of the world, only the island of Dejima in Nagasaki was permitted to trade with the West. There, a new style of cooking that fused Japanese, Chinese and Western foods was born- Shippoku cuisine! One of its signature dishes is Basty, which is a soup covered with a lattice piecrust. *It's widely assumed that Basty originated from the Portuguese word "Pasta."* "Shippoku cuisine is already a hybrid of many vastly different cooking styles, making it a perfect choice for this theme!" "The lattice piecrust is French. Under it is a wonderfully savory Chinese shark fin soup. And the soup's rich chicken broth and the vegetables in it have all been thoroughly infused with powerfully aromatic spices... ... using distinctively Indian spice blends and techniques!" "Hm? Wait a minute. There's more than just shark fin and vegetables in this soup. This looks just like an Italian ravioli! I wonder what's in it? ?!" "Holy crap, look at it stretch!" "What is that?! Mozzarella?! A mochi pouch?!" "Nope! Neither! That's Dondurma. Or as some people call it... ... Turkish ice cream. A major ingredient in Dondurma is salep, a flour made from the root of certain orchids. It gives the dish a thick, sticky texture. The moist chewiness of ravioli pasta melds together with the sticky gumminess of the Dondurma... ... making for an addictively thick and chewy texture!

Soy Even though a wide range of products made from soybeans have been marketed as a health food in recent years, research proves that (unfermented) soy is extremely unhealthy. Most soy products in the United States are not fermented. Unfermented soy is a problem for the following reasons: 1. It contains dangerous quantities of antinutrients, which are substances that block the body from absorbing important nutrients. The most notable are hemagglutinin, goitrogens, and phytic acid. Hemagglutinin promotes unhealthy blood clotting and blocks oxygen. Goitrogens prevent iodine from reaching the thyroid. Without iodine, the thyroid can enlarge and malfunction. Phytic acid blocks the body's absorption of essential minerals like calcium and magnesium. 2. It has lots of phytoestrogens, which do damage by mimicking estrogen inside the body. 3. It contains lysinoalanine, a known toxin, and nitrosamines, which are known carcinogens. 4. It has harmful levels of the mineral manganese and dangerous amounts of aluminum from being processed in aluminum containers. 5. It has a high risk of contamination with mycotoxins. 6. It is almost always genetically modified. As you can see, soy has pretty much everything going against it. Fortunately, it's easy to avoid processed soy in the United States because it must be listed as an ingredient on product labels. Most soy in Asian cuisine is different because it's been fermented. Fermentation greatly decreases the antinutrient and phytic acid levels. Fermented soy products include tempeh, miso, and natto. Most of these products are still highly processed and artificial, though, and soy sauce naturally contains MSG. To avoid GMO soy, make sure that any fermented soy product you eat is organic, or better yet just don't eat it at all. Even in areas of the world like Asia where fermented soy is common, people actually don't eat much of it. A 1998 study found that Japanese men eat only about eight grams of soy per day (a teaspoon or two). The average misguided American consumes far more than this when he drinks a glass of soy milk or eats a soy burger (and these soy products aren't even fermented).

It has been said of Japanese food that it is a cuisine to be looked at rather than eaten. I would go further and say that it is to be meditated upon, a kind of silent music evoked by the combination of lacquerware and the light of a candle flickering in the dark.

We entered the Takashimaya department store through the basement level, and my eyes were joyfully assaulted by the sight of an epic number of beautiful food stalls lining the store aisles. "This is called a depachikaThe depachika was like the Ikebana Café with all its different food types, but times a zillion, with confectionaries selling chocolates and cakes and sweets that looked like dumplings, and food counters offering dazzling displays of seafood, meats, salads, candies, and juices. There was even a grocery store, with exquisite-looking fruit individually wrapped and cushioned, flawless in appearance. The workers in each stall wore different uniforms, some with matching hats, and they called out "Konichiwa!" to passersby. I loved watching each counter's workers delicately wrap the purchases and hand them over to customers as if presenting a gift rather than just, say, a sandwich or a chocolate treat. As I marveled at the display cases of sweets- with so many varieties of chocolates, cakes, and candies- Imogen said, "The traditional Japanese sweets are called wagashi, which is stuff like mochi- rice flour cakes filled with sweet pastes- and jellied candies that look more like works of art than something you'd actually eat, and cookies that look gorgeous but usually taste bland." "The cookie tins are so beautiful!" I marveled, admiring a case of tins with prints so intricate they looked like they could double as designer handbags.

We entered the Takashimaya department store through the basement level, and my eyes were joyfully assaulted by the sight of an epic number of beautiful food stalls lining the store aisles. "This is called a depachika- a Japanese food hall." The depachika was like the Ikebana Café with all its different food types, but times a zillion, with confectionaries selling chocolates and cakes and sweets that looked like dumplings, and food counters offering dazzling displays of seafood, meats, salads, candies, and juices. There was even a grocery store, with exquisite-looking fruit individually wrapped and cushioned, flawless in appearance. The workers in each stall wore different uniforms, some with matching hats, and they called out "Konichiwa!" to passersby. I loved watching each counter's workers delicately wrap the purchases and hand them over to customers as if presenting a gift rather than just, say, a sandwich or a chocolate treat. As I marveled at the display cases of sweets- with so many varieties of chocolates, cakes, and candies- Imogen said, "The traditional Japanese sweets are called wagashi, which is stuff like mochi- rice flour cakes filled with sweet pastes- and jellied candies that look more like works of art than something you'd actually eat, and cookies that look gorgeous but usually taste bland." "The cookie tins are so beautiful!" I marveled, admiring a case of tins with prints so intricate they looked like they could double as designer handbags.

The skills she has chosen to hone are presentation and charm! Having traveled around the world experiencing so many cultures... she's learned that, at times, it's necessary to change up a dish's presentation... so that, for example, those not accustomed to cuisine such as Japanese... ... will still recognize its deliciousness by its presentation. "There." "Wooow! In a matter of seconds, that entire juicy tenderloin roast... ... has been transformed into a lovely, giant peony blossom! How beautiful! The gleam of the meat is like dew on petals... ... boosting the attractiveness of the dish two- no, threefold!" It's a refined expression of Megumi Tadokoro's hospitality. Her dishes will shine in the spotlight of this year's BLUE, I'm sure.

From the perspective of almost everyone else in the world, the Japanese have an enviable relationship with food. Japanese cuisine - with its focus on fresh vegetables, even fresher fish, delicate soups and exquisitely presented rice dishes - has a global reputation for healthiness.

There are signs that the Japanese themselves consider their excellent cuisine as an essential part of what it means to be Japanese.

Umami is the savoury meatiness in seaweed and miso and soy sauce. It is, to a large extent, the concept that enables Japanese cuisine to be healthy and attractive at the same time.

Japanese people may find this surprising, but eel is a common ingredient in European cuisine. Kurokiba's Eel Matelote from the Classic's Semifinal Round is one such European dish." "Southern Italy in particular has a tradition of eating eel right around Natale, which is Christmas. It's often served during the feasts for La Vigilia on Christmas Eve night. The eels are supposed to symbolize devils, and eating them is thought to be a charm warding off bad luck and evil spirits.

Something is simmering wildly throughout the American South. Every time I look around, I see bold new expressions of Southern cuisine waving a proud flag. Every time I look around, I see bold new expressions of Southern cuisine waving a proud flag. And this expression of food has captured people’s attention, because it is the story not only of Southern cuisine, but also of America’s identity. In my short time as a professional chef, I have seen the spotlight pass over every cuisine, from French to Italian to Japanese to Spanish, from nouvelle to comfort to molecular. However, what is happening now in the American South is not part of a trend: It is a culinary movement that is looking inward, not outward, for its inspiration. Every innovation that moves it forward also pulls along with it a memory of something in the past. As Faulkner famously said: "The past is never dead. It’s not even past.

What do Japanese artisans, engineers, Zen philosophy, and cuisine have in common? Simplicity and attention to detail.

The cuisine was French and Japanese, snow peas or glazed carrots arranged with surgical precision around thin and, to Jonny, mostly tasteless cuts of beef. When he commented on this to Conover, the smuggler explained to him that the meat came from Canadian herds that still consumed grain and grazed in open fields, not the genetically altered beasts that hung from straps, limbless and eyeless, in the Tijuana protein factories.

They shared the monkfish-liver pâté and the finely chopped tuna and scallions with ginger sauce. "Remember the time we had puffer fish at that restaurant in New York?" Isaac asked as he tasted the monkfish. Elliott slowly shook his head as he answered. "How can I forget? I was scared to death. Every time I have liver, no matter where it comes from, the puffer-fish liver crosses my mind. I sat there praying that the chef knew what he was doing when he cut out the poison part." "You didn't seem scared," said Isaac. "That's because I didn't want you to think I was unadventurous. We had just met then. I was trying to impress you." "Well, you did," said Isaac. "I'd been in town for only a few months, and I thought you were such a sophisticated New Yorker. I was trying not to seem like a rube." "You know," said Elliot, "I read that Japanese fish farmers are mass-producing poison-free puffer fish." Isaac shrugged. "Kinda takes the mystique away, doesn't it? I mean, where's the thrill? Where's the risk? You might as well be eating tuna.

In Japan, the most honored guest eats first. That's me. "Itadakimasu," I say, keeping my back straight as I take a bite of prawn. In kaiseki, the focus is on the food's essence and is reflective of the rhythms of the seasons. The meal is heavily influenced by nature. It's May, so our menu will be inspired by spring and feature bamboo.

A special treat has been prepared----ayu, a troutlike fish caught in the Nagara River from the Gifu area. It is served whole over a bed of rice, once a currency and now a sacred grain. "Very fresh," the chef informs us with a proud smile. "Caught this morning." "It's considered a delicacy," my father says as the chef leaves. I haven't managed a taste yet. I'm watching my father, observing how he'll eat the fish. He brings the bowl to his face, then uses the ohashi to grasp the tiny sweetfish and take a bite, staring with the head. I blink. Oh, okay. That's how it's done. I pick up my ohashi and copy his moves. My teeth sink into the fish. I wait for my gag reflex to kick in, but it doesn't. The skin is crunchy and salty, but gives way to a softer, sweet inside, tasting like watermelon. My saliva glands kick into overdrive. Just like that, I'm all in. If ayu is on the menu, I'll have two.

An indigo bottle is placed in front of us. "First rule of sake." Yoshi picks up the flask and one of the matching ceramic cups. "Never pour for yourself." He pours a shot for Taka and me. I reciprocate, pouring one for Yoshi. We hold the cups close to our faces and sniff. Sweet notes rise up and we toast. "Kanpai!" Then we sip. The rice wine goes down cold but warms my belly. A few more sips and my limbs are warm, too. Scallops and yellowtail sashimi are served. We sip more sake. By the time the yakitori arrives, our bottle is empty and my cheeks are hot. The group of salarymen have grown rowdy, their ties loosened. Yoshi winks at the pink-haired girls and they collapse into a fit of giggles. My God, to have such power over the opposite sex. Gyoza is next. The fried pork dumplings dipped in chili oil burn my mouth but soak up some of the sake, and I sober a little, just in time for the group of salarymen to send us a round of shōchū, starchier than the sake but delicious all the same. We toast to them, to the bar, to the night, to Tokyo. My stomach is near bursting when the chef places agedashi---fried tofu---in front of us. Finally, Taka orders fermented squid guts. I don't try it, but I laugh as he slurps them up.

Sweetfish with pickled plum. I like it!" "This is the season for pike conger, but since they're better down in Kyoto I decided instead to use sweetfish that was caught this morning in the Kano River." "Wow, this one is such a pretty, light pink color. The flesh is smooth, and it has a nice, firm texture..." "It's saltwater eel sashimi. Tastes rich." "Lessee, then the last one is..." "It's flyingfish sashimi from Sagami Bay. Please try it with the miso vinaigrette." "Hmm... flyingfish has a strong taste that's probably too much for most people. But this miso dressing gives it a nice, rich flavor.

Ruibe is a traditional Hokkaido dish using salmon or trout. It uses frozen salmon, thinly cut into sashimi slices. The fish is not thawed, but eaten frozen with soy sauce and wasabi. The origin of the name for ruibe is from the Ainu word ruipe in which ru means "melt" and ipe means "food.

Cubes of Mita's Kuroushi Beef." "Oh, raw meat? At first glance, it looks raw, but it's actually been cooked. And when you bite it all the juice from the meat comes seeping out!" "Ohh... if it was raw, you wouldn't get such a succulent juice coming out of it. This has been cooked very skillfully." "One has soy sauce with Japanese mustard, and the other has soy sauce with wasabi on it. Two different sauces to enjoy." "We slowly roasted a prime tenderloin of the Mita Beef, and then cut away the meat on the outside... ... to take out the meat on the inside." "What an extravagant thing to do." "Hmm, this meat is top-notch, but Mamiya's skills have definitely improved. It's not easy to cook the meat so delicately..." "This one is wrapped in a bamboo sheath... I wonder what's inside. Oh, it's tilefish." "And underneath is..." "It's shredded snow peas with tilefish on top... ... wrapped in a bamboo sheath and steamed. Please pour some kuzu sauce on it... You can also place some wasabi on it if you want to." "The fish has been steamed to perfection. If he had steamed it any more, the flesh would have become tough, but if he had steamed it any less, it would still be a bit raw. It is just soft enough, and the juice is still left in it too..." "The snow peas have sucked up the flavor of the tilefish and have bloomed in flavor.

Takikomi gohan and maze gohan are two methods of cooking rice mixed with other ingredients, and they cover a wide range of similar dishes. Roughly speaking, takikomi gohan is a dish where the ingredients are cooked together with the rice, while maze gohan is a dish where the ingredients are mixed into the rice after it is cooked.

Even though hiyashi chūka is a dish that was developed in Japan, does it make a difference or not if one prepares it using Chinese ingredients? The most important things--- the noodles and the broth--- are both items borrowed from Chinese cuisine and are prepared using Chinese cooking methods. The barbecued pork on top is also Chinese-style. Which obviously means that Chinese condiments would be better suited to it. Chinese soy sauce and Japanese soy sauce taste different. The same goes for the sake and mirin. Shirō used the best ingredients he could get his hands on in Japan. That is perfectly fine as long as you're making Japanese food. But the Chinese condiments have a far better chemistry with the dish. Shirō paid great attention to each of the ingredients individually but neglected to consider the dish as a whole. Because the ingredients are Chinese, by using Chinese condiments... ... he was able to blend the flavors into one, which is impossible to do with Japanese condiments.

What do Japanese artisans, engineers, Zen philosophy, and cuisine have in common? Simplicity and attention to detail. It is not a lazy simplicity but a sophisticated one that searches out new frontiers, always taking the object, the body and mind, or the cuisine to the next level, according to one’s ikigai.

Karasumi is salt-cured, sun-dried mullet roe. A specialty of Nagasaki, it is similar to the Italian bottarga, Greek avgotaraho or Turkish tarama. Kuchiko is pressed sea cucumber ovaries and comes in small, triangular sheets that can be eaten either raw or grilled. It's called kuchiko when raw and konoko when dried.

You can enjoy the rich, deep color and smooth feel of ebony chopsticks... ... or the mellow beauty and soft touch of lacquer chopsticks, which can be almost like works of art in themselves. And I think you can get in touch with nature by holding those natural cedar chopsticks.

SALSA VERDE. A sauce made primarily of finely minced Italian parsley and cured anchovies... it is often a garnish for grilled meat or vegetable dishes... and is considered a staple sauce in Italian cuisine. "What was he thinking? This was supposed to be a Japanese dish! Making something Italian means he automatically fails!" "No, he does not. This salsa wasn't made from cured anchovies. Instead, it primarily uses uruka, a specific type of shiokara sauce made from sweetfish. *Shiokara is salted, fermented fish viscera.* Uruka typically requires over a week to make. However, this is an "instant" version, is it not?" "Correct! Wash sweetfish viscera and boil them in saké for two minutes. Then flavor with soy sauce, salt and mirin. The result is a quickly made, yet still rich and appropriately bitter, uruka. "Instant uruka?!" "I didn't know that was possible!" "That wasn't the only place he was creative. Instead of parsley, he minced Japanese perilla leaves and green onion to give it a bright green color and refreshing kick. And since garlic is hardly used in traditional Japanese cuisine, he chose yuzukosho, a seasoning made from chili peppers, yuzu fruit peels and salt, to give it a distinctly Japanese flavor." "Exactly. With instant uruka as its base... ... I made a Japanese-style salsa verde!

Many of the featured establishments have been around for generations, some for hundreds of years. The reason is that whilst Kyoto is a modern city, it is also an ancient city where much of Japanese culture sprouted and developed, including many aspects of the Japanese kitchen. Visiting these establishments, experiencing their hospitality, and sampling their wares is literally taking a tour through a significant part of Japanese culinary history, often in the original setting. It’s a unique opportunity for anyone with an interest in Kyoto and Japanese culture more generally. Through these establishments, you can feel the Kyoto style and by extension a core aspect of Japanese style.

Miso is another fermented whole soy food. This thick paste is commonly mixed with hot water to make a delicious soup that’s a staple in Japanese cuisine. If you want to give it a try, I suggest white miso, which has a mellower flavor than red miso.

Chestnuts have always been an ingredient that goes well with gamy meats. And in French cuisine, chestnuts are often seen in combination with venison. But the mildly sweet flavor and tender texture of these sweet chestnuts makes them melt in the mouth! That flavor combined with the smoky aroma of the charcoal grilling, makes the juicy meatiness of the venison stand out in stark contrast! This flavor isn't something that could be created with regular chestnuts. It's a deliciousness made possible precisely because he chose to use sweet chestnuts! "He minced some of them and added them to the sauce as well! Doing that spread their mild sweetness throughout the whole dish!" Soma's Chestnut Sauce Starting with a base of Fond de Veau (a brown stock usually made with veal), he added a cinnamon stick, orange zest and minced sweet chestnuts and then set the sauce to simmer. "Wait a minute. How odd! Charcoal grilling usually adds a unique and very distinctly bitter taste to ingredients. A taste that is decidedly outside the canon of French flavors! Yet this dish has taken that bitter taste and somehow made it fit seamlessly! Is there some secret to it?!" "That would be the coffee." "What?!" "Coffee?" "Yep! You guessed it! That's the Divine Tongue for you. One of the things I learned at Master Shinomiya's restaurant is that cacao goes really well with game meats. I've never used cacao much, though, to be honest... So instead I grabbed some instant coffee! The bitterness of coffee is similar enough to pure cacao that it paired up nicely with both the charcoal grilling and the gamy venison... ... resulting in a deeply rich and astringent flavor that's perfect for a truly French sauce. I added both coffee and chestnuts as secret ingredients to my sauce! This is a Yukihira Original and a brand-new French dish. I call it... ... Charcoal-Grilled Venison Thigh with Chestnut Sauce." In formal Japanese cooking bowl dishes, such as soups and rice bowls, are constructed from four elements: the main ingredient, the supporting ingredients, the stock and the accents. Similarly, the French dishes are constructed from three different parts balanced in harmony: the main ingredient, the sauce and the garnishes. But this dish... this is eccentric and novel and entirely unconventional while still remaining undeniably French! It's almost as if it's a nugget of flavor found only by cracking and peeling away the shell of common sense...

So that's the Wanmono Soup made by Satoshi Isshiki... ... the so-called Master of Aggressive Japanese Cuisine." "Look how beautifully it's plated! Even the ingredient colors are coordinated!" "A true work of art!" "Just looking at it sucks me in." "But the taste... how does it taste?! Is it as delicious as it is gorgeous?!" "Just one sip of the broth was enough to send a shock wave surging through my body. Delicately constructing a wanmono soup out of just hare and konbu is difficult enough. But to incorporate clam stock as well?! And so seamlessly too!" "Clams?!" "Wait, the soup broth is hare... and also clam?! How does that even work?!" "There are four major components of a proper wanmono soup. Suiji --- the broth that forms the backbone of the dish Sukuchi --- the ingredients that accent the dish's aroma Wandane --- the main ingredient of the soup Wanzuma --- the side ingredients that complement the wandane Blending the hare and clam stocks in a seven-to-three ratio infused the suiji broth with the mellow, salty body of the clams... ... putting a new, delicious spin on the traditional wanmono soup broth! And the fresh, tangy aroma of yuzu fruit in the suikuchi accent neatly underscores that flavor, making it stand out all the more! With this, he's done nothing short of innovatively reinventing a traditional Japanese soup stock!

As Tomiko and I sank to our knees on floor pillows, her mother filled our sake cups with an amber-green liquid. Called toso, it was a traditional New Year's elixir made from sweet rice wine seasoned with a Chinese herbal-medicine mixture called tososan. Meant to ward off the evil spirits, the drink was honeyed, warm, and laced with cinnamon and peppery sansho. To display the contents of the lacquer boxes, Tomiko's mother had arranged the various layers in the center of the table. The top layer always contains the traditional sweet dishes and hors d'oeuvres, while the second layer holds steamed, boiled, and vinegared offerings. The third box consists of foods that have been grilled or fried. Since not everything fit into the lacquer boxes, Tomiko's mother had placed a long rectangular dish at everyone's place holding three different nibbles. The first one was a small bowl of herring eggs to represent fertility. Waxy yellow in color, they had a plastic pop and mild saline flavor. Next came a miniature stack of sugar- and soy-braised burdock root cut like penne pasta and tossed with a rich nutty cream made from pounded sesame seeds. Called tataki gobo (pounded burdock root), the dish is so named because the gobo (root) symbolizes the hope for a stable, deeply rooted life, while the homonym for tataki (pounded) also means "joy aplenty." The third item consisted of a tiny clump of intensely flavored soy-caramelized sardines that tasted like ocean candy. Called tazukuri, meaning "paddy-tilling," the sticky fish symbolized hopes for a good harvest, since in ancient times, farmers used chopped sardines along with ash for fertilizer.

I had made a sort of Japanese antipasto to accompany a bottle of French Bordeaux I had bought in the food hall of Daimaru department store. So while John sat on a blue cotton cushion hunched over the low unfinished wooden table sipping red wine from a small glass tumbler, I presented him with a succession of nibbles: chili-speckled rice crackers and peanuts; boiled edamame tossed with coarse salt; chewy strands of dried calamari; and chilled steamed asparagus that I had bought fresh that morning at Nishiki market. For a taste of home, I sautéed pudgy slices of herb-flavored wheat gluten, soft as gnocchi, in garlic butter with sliced shiitake mushrooms. Dinner ended with snappy red grapes and imported coconut sables that broke into buttery splinters in our cupped palms.

We began with two buttery sweet edamame and one sugar syrup-soaked shrimp in a crunchy soft shell. A lightly simmered baby octopus practically melted in our mouths, while a tiny cup of clear, lemony soup provided cooling refreshment. The soup held three slices of okra and several slippery cool strands of junsai (water shield), a luxury food that grows in ponds and marshes throughout Asia, Australia, West Africa, and North America. In the late spring the tiny plant develops leafy shoots surrounded by a gelatinous sheath that floats on the water's surface, enabling the Japanese to scoop it up by hand from small boats. The edamame, okra, and water shield represented items from the mountains, while the shrimp and octopus exemplified the ocean. I could tell John was intrigued and amused by this artistic (perhaps puny?) array of exotica. Two pearly pieces of sea bream, several fat triangles of tuna, and sweet shelled raw baby shrimp composed the sashimi course, which arrived on a pale turquoise dish about the size of a bread plate. It was the raw fish portion of the meal, similar to the mukozuke in a tea kaiseki. To counter the beefy richness of the tuna, we wrapped the triangles in pungent shiso leaves , then dunked them in soy. After the sashimi, the waitress brought out the mushimono (steamed dish). In a coal-black ceramic bowl sat an ivory potato dumpling suspended in a clear wiggly broth of dashi thickened with kudzu starch, freckled with glistening orange salmon roe. The steamed dumplings, reminiscent of a white peach, was all at once velvety, sweet, starchy, and feathery and had a center "pit" of ground chicken. The whole dish, served warm and with a little wooden spoon, embodied the young, tender softness of spring.

To our surprise and delight, dinner was stupendous. Served in our room at the low polished wood table, it exuded a freshness and artistry we had not seen since leaving Kyoto. The sashimi- sea bream, squid, and skipjack- tasted as clean as a freshly sliced apple. Rusty-red miso soup had a meaty fortifying flavor enhanced with cubes of tofu and slithery ribbons of seaweed. The tempura, served in a basket of woven bamboo, shattered to pieces like a well-made croissant. Hiding inside the golden shell was a slice of Japanese pumpkin, a chunk of tender white fish, an okra pod, a shiitake mushroom cap, and a zingy shiso leaf. Pale yellow chawan-mushi also appeared in a lidded glass custard cup. With a tiny wooden spoon we scooped up the ethereal egg and dashi custard cradling chunks of shrimp, sweet lily buds, and waxy-green ginkgo nuts. In a black lacquer bowl came a superb seafood consommé, along with a knuckle of white fish, tuft of spinach, mushroom cap, and a tiny yellow diamond of yuzu zest. A small lacquer bucket held several servings of sticky white rice to eat with crunchy radish pickles and shredded pressed cabbage. A small wedge of honeydew melon concluded the meal.

I celebrated my arrival in Kyoto with a dinner of grilled eel, a sublime delicacy in Japan. In the water the fish resembles a ferocious jagged-toothed snake. But when sizzled over hot charcoal it looks like a fillet of sole that has spent the winter in Palm Beach. The skin turns crisp and smoky and the fatty white flesh, basted with a sweet soy syrup, becomes deeply tanned and as succulent as foie gras.

The tour concluded with our buying the ingredients for shabu-shabu to enjoy that night with Tomiko and her husband. Sitting around the wooden table in Tomiko's kitchen, we drank frosty Kirin beers and munched on edamame, fresh steamed soybeans, nutty and sweet, that we pulled from their salt-flecked pods with our teeth. Then Tomiko set down a platter resplendent with gossamer slices of raw beef, shiitake mushrooms, cauliflower florets, and loamy-tasting chrysanthemum leaves to dip with long forks into a wide ceramic bowl of bubbling primary dashi. I speared a piece of sirloin. "Wave the beef through the broth," instructed Tomiko, "then listen." Everyone fell silent. As the hot dashi bubbled around the ribbon of meat, it really did sound as though it was whispering "shabu-shabu," hence the onomatopoeic name of the dish. I dipped the beef in a sauce of toasted ground sesame and soy and as I chewed, the rich roasted cream mingled with the salty meat juices. "Try this one," urged Tomiko, passing another sauce of soy and sesame oil sharpened with lemony yuzu, grated radish, and hot pepper flakes. I tested it on a puffy cube of warm tofu that Tomiko had retrieved from the dashi with a tiny golden wire basket. The pungent sauce invigorated the custardy bean curd.

Savor the fragrance." He gently squeezed the lacquer rim of the bowl to loosen the cover. I did the same and a savory jet stream of duck, citron, and toasted mochi rushed up from the bowl. I sipped the limpid broth. It had a delicate gamy flavor underscored with soy, minerals, and cured fish. The duck tasted juicy and tender. The carrot had a treacly crunch, while the gooey mochi draped with soft spinach had a smoky sweetness.

With the first glass of wine, the stilted silence prevails. A plate of warm buffalo mozzarella appears, speckled with pink peppercorns, and something about that combination of tang and spice, cream and crunch, tells you that tonight will be different from the others you've spent in Japan. With the second glass of wine, your neighbors look over and offer a kanpai. Another plate arrives, this one a few pieces of seared octopus, the purple tentacles curled like crawling vines around a warm mound of barely mashed potatoes.

But the accompanying steamed rice, pressed into the shape of a chrysanthemum, had a clean, delicate sweetness unlike any rice I had ever tasted. The tray also held a plastic bowl and sipped the savory liquid enriched with diced tofu and emerald wisps of wakame seaweed. In a shallow dish sat a small block of bean curd splashed with soy sauce and topped with pinkish curls of dried bonito that looked like pencil shavings. I cut into the silky white cube and tried to balance the craggy chunk on the slender pieces of wood. It tumbled off. After trying again, success was rewarded with the sweet taste of milky custard mingled with dark soy and smoky fish flakes. There were pickles too, crisp neon-yellow half-moons of sweet daikon radish and crunchy slices of eggplant. Although I had not expected culinary brilliance from a mall restaurant, dinner was exceeding expectations. The ingredients were plain, but exceptional in their purity and freshness.

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.

The meal begins the way all kaiseki meals begin, with hassun, a mixed plate of small bites- fish and vegetables, usually- used to set the tone for the feast to come. In a bowl of pine needles and fallen leaves he hides smoky slices of bonito topped with slow-cooked seaweed, gingko nuts grilled until just tender, a summer roll packed with foraged herbs, and juicy wedges of persimmon dressed with ground sesame and sansho flowers. Autumn resonates in every bite. While the rice simmers away, the meal marches forward: sashimi decorated with a thicket of mountain vegetables and wildflowers; a thick slab of Kyoto-style mackerel sushi, fermented for a year, with the big, heady funk of a washed cheese; mountain fruit blanketed in white miso and speckled with black sesame and bee larvae.

In the U.S., to have a personal relationship with a Japanese chef across the counter, you have to go for sushi. I enjoy sitting at a sushi bar, but there is always the whiff of haute cuisine in the air (or, if you pick the wrong sushi place, the whiff of something worse). You can visit an expensive, artisan counter in Tokyo and order unusual and impeccable seafood, but come on: tempura is fried stuff. You drink frothy mugs of cheap beer and call for more food any time you like. Bacon-wrapped cherry tomatoes on a stick, tempura-fried? Sure, we had that. A bowl of dozens of whole baby sardines, called shirasu? Absolutely. (Iris claimed these for herself.) Why aren't there tempura bars in every city in America?

So, Rachel, what do you want to get?" he asks, even though we still haven't opened the menu. I throw open the cover and quickly scan my choices. I am hungry for everything. I want to taste their teriyaki sauce and see how they've worked yuzu into a salad dressing and sample their tempura batter. I want to sit up at the sushi bar and chat with the chef about different fillets of raw fish. And I want to be on a date with a guy who wants to hear the chef's answers too. Still, Rob Zuckerman is nice, and he's obviously smart and successful, and he has a full head of brown hair (one cannot discount that full head of hair). So I close my menu and ask him to suggest a few things since he has obviously been here before. "Why don't we start with a bowl of edamame and an order of tatsuta-age chicken?" "I made that this week," I exclaim, excited that he'd pick that off the menu since I was eyeing it. "I'm learning how to cook and it's actually really easy. You just marinate the chicken and then coat it in potato starch before you fry it." I notice that Rob is staring at me as if I've just started reciting the recipe in Japanese. "I can't believe I've ordered it all these years when I could make it at home.

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.

Takoyaki are octopus balls- not, thankfully, in the anatomical sense. They're a spherical cake with a chunk of boiled octopus in the center, cooked on a special griddle with hemispherical indentations. If you're familiar with the Danish pancakes called aebleskivers, you know what a takoyaki looks like; the pan is also similar. Takoyaki are not unknown in the U.S., but I've only ever seen them made fresh at cultural festivals. Iris is a big fan, but I've always been more into the takoyaki aesthetic than the actual food. Takoyaki are always served in a paper or wooden boat and usually topped with mayonnaise, bonito flakes, shredded nori, and takoyaki sauce.

Escoffier set the table. He'd found a Japanese kimono, an obvious prop from some theater production, to use as a tablecloth. Paris had secretly fallen in love with all things oriental. It was red silk brocade, covered with a flock of white flying cranes, and made from a single bolt of fabric. The neckline and cuffs were thickly stained with stage makeup but the kimono itself was quite beautiful. It ran the length of the thin table. The arms overhung one end. Outside the building he'd seen a garden with a sign that read "Please do not pick." But it was, after all, for a beautiful woman. Who would deny him? And so Escoffier cut a bouquet of white flowers: roses, peonies and a spray of lilies, with rosemary stalks to provide the greenery. He placed them in a tall water glass and then opened the basket of food he'd brought. He laid out the china plates so that they rested between the cranes, and then the silver knives, forks and spoons, and a single crystal glass for her champagne. Even though it was early afternoon, he'd brought two dozen candles. The food had to be served 'à la française'; there were no waiters to bring course after course. So he kept it simple. Tartlets filled with sweet oysters from Arcachon and Persian caviar, chicken roasted with truffles, a warm baguette, 'pâté de foie gras,' and small sweet strawberries served on a bed of sugared rose petals and candied violets.

There's also dessert--- sorry, I mean the mizugashi course. So please take your time,' said Koishi, shrugging her shoulders. 'That's right, Koishi. There's no such thing as "dessert" in Japanese cuisine. The fruit served at the end of the meal is called mizugashi. We're not in France, after all!' said Tae, her nostrils flaring. 'Really, Tae, you never change, do you? Always fussing over the strangest things... I'm not sure it really matters,' said Nobuko, setting down her bowl. 'No, it does matter. If you mess around with language like that, it's culture that suffers. Traditional Japanese sweet dishes are in decline precisely because people insist on calling them English words like "dessert"!

In the bottom right is the grilled fish of the day--- in this case, teriyaki yellowtail. Top left is a selection of sashimi and pickled dishes.: Akashi sea bream, Kishu tuna, and flash-grilled Karatsu abalone. Seared Miyajima conger eel, served with pickled cucumber and myoga ginger. And in the bottom left is the matsutake rice--- the mushrooms are from Shinshu, and wonderfully fragrant. I'll bring some soup over shortly. In the meantime, enjoy!' Nagare bowed and turned back to the kitchen. 'Let's tuck in,' said Tae, joining her hands together in appreciation before reaching for her chopsticks. 'It's delicious,' said Nobuko, who had already reached into the bento and sampled the sea bream. 'The sashimi looks wonderful, but these appetizers are simply exquisite. Let's see... rolled barracuda sushi, dash-maki omelette, and those look like quail tsukume balls. And this simmered octopus--- it just melts on your tongue!

As Hideji's gaze skipped between the various dishes, Nagare went on: 'Stewed arame and deep-fried tofu. Okara croquettes. Kikuna leaves dressed with sesame and miso. Kurama-style sardine. Hirosu tofu ball in broth. Pork belly simmered in Kyobancha tea. Fresh tofu curd with sour plum paste. Oh, and Kioshi's rice-bran-pickled cucumbers. Nothing too extravagant. If anything, the highlights are probably the firmly cooked Goshu rice and the miso soup with ebi-imo taro. Anyway, enjoy the meal. Oh, and make sure you put a good sprinkle of sansho pepper on the soup--- it'll warm you right up.

Miyajima oysters, simmered Kurama-style, miso-glazed baked butterburs with millet cake, bracken and bamboo shoot stew, chargrilled moroko, breast of Kyoto-reared chicken with a wasabi dressing, and vinegared Wakasa mackerel wrapped in pickled Shogoin turnip. In the bottom right you have a hamaguri clam broth thickened with kudzu starch. Tonight's customer asked me to create something that evoked both the lingering winter and the onset of spring, which led to the dishes you see here.

Starting from the top left: thinly sliced Akashi sea bream sashimi, with a prickly ash bud and miso dressing-- to be enjoyed with the ponzu dipping sauce. Miso-glazed Kamo aubergine. Maizuru cockles sandwiched between slices of myoga ginger. Gizzard shad marinated in sweet vinegar, served in a miniature sushi roll. Fried matsutake, conger eel grilled two ways, Manganji sweet pepper tempura, abalone pickled in Kyoto-style sweet white miso and then grilled. Fish paste noodles, Kurama-style local chicken, smoked mackerel with a pine nut stuffing. Fresh soy milk curd and vegetables pickled with red perilla.

Seeing as it's cherry season, I've gone for an imitation of a lunchbox from a blossom-viewing picnic. On top of that folded kaishi paper is the wild vegetable tempura. Ostrich fern, mugwort, devil's walking stick, koshiabura and smilax. There's some matcha salt on the side, or you can try it with the regular dipping sauce. The sashimi is cherry bass and halfbeak. Try it with the ponzu. For the grilled fish dish, I've gone with masu salmon in a miso marinade, together with some simmered young bamboo. Firefly squid and wakame seaweed dressed with vinegared miso, overnight Omi beef, and deep-fried chicken wing-tips. In that wooden bowl is an Asari clam and bamboo shoot broth.