"Kakiage" tempura, two kinds かきあげ ２種類

When I posted soft shell crab tempura, I used a new recipe for the tempura batter which included Vodka. Soft shell crab tempura, however, was not the best way to assess the tempura crust. As promised, I did another test with "kakiage" tempura. Kakiage is tempura made of small pieces of ingredients bound by batter/crust. I made two kinds of kakiage.   

Sakura-ebi and onion kakiage: I used boiled and dried Sakura-ebi 桜 海老 which I kept in the freezer and thinly sliced red onion. To extract moisture from the onion, I mixed the onion slices with cake flour and a small pinch of salt. After 10 minutes, moisture came out and the flour sticks to the onion. I lifted the onion and shook it slightly to remove excess flour and mixed it with the sakura-ebi (whatever amount you like) before adding it to the tempura batter.

Fresh corn kakiage: This is the same as the one I posted before. We had fresh corn (not locally grown for sure). I removed the kernels by slicing them off the cob with a knife.

Tempura batter: This is the same as I posted before and based on the recipe from America's test kitchen. To briefly reiterate, I made the wet component by mixing water (or seltzer water, but I do not think this makes any difference) and Vodka in 1:1 radio. For two cups total, I added one whole egg, beaten. (The amount of egg should be proportional to the amount of water and vodka so reduce or increase the egg accordingly. For example, is the amount of water and vodka is reduced by half then use half and egg. The dry component is a mixture of cake flour and potato starch in 4-5:1 ratio.

First put the dry ingredient in a bowl and add the wet component to mix. The consistency I was looking for is like a runny pancake batter. For the fresh corn kakiage, I added corn and mixed in the batter. The amount of the batter is just enough to coat all the corn kernels and a bit more. Using a spoon, I put the mixture into hot oil (as usual peanut oil, 370F or so), turned over once during the frying. For the red onion and Sakura-ebi, I mixed them into the batter and just using cooking chop sticks, I put the mixture into the hot oil. I tried to make both kakiage into a sort of flat disk. Again, I turned it over once during the frying.

The results? Well, this new batter does create a lighter and crispier crust, although the difference is not gigantic. Both the traditional and Vodka batters produced good kakiage. As you can see we were in portion control mode here.

A few days later, I made a small "Kakiage donburi" かき揚げ丼 as a "shime" 〆 or ending dish from the leftover. I baked the kakiage in a 400F preheated toaster oven for 7-8 minutes placing the kakiage on a perforated metal tray over another deeper metal tray so that any excess oil which exuded from kakiage dripped down into the lower tray. The baking made the edges a bit dark but made the kakiage crispy and hot again.

I made a sauce with dashi, mirin, and soy sauce. I made it rather strong in taste but small in amount. I heated the mixture in a sauce pan and poured it over the kakiage and rice. I garnished it with blanched broccolini. For leftover kakiage, this was pretty good.

Chestnut kakiage 栗のかき揚げ

One more dish made from North American chestnuts. This time I made “Kakiage” かき揚げ with onions and chestnuts.

Chestnuts: I prepared the chestnuts the same way as before. In brief, I boiled them and removed the outer and inner skins while they were still hot. For kakiage, you can use fragmented chestnuts.
Onion: Since I did not have any other vegetables such as carrot or gobou (burdock root), I just used sliced onion (halved first and then thinly sliced. The amount is totally arbitrary. You could add other items.
Batter: I lightly salted the sliced onion first and then sprinkled on cake flour and let it sit for 30 minutes so that the moisture from the onion came out.  To make this kakiage a bit richer I added one egg yolk (optional) and more cake flour and cold water and mixed. I tried to make a rather thin tempura batter.

In a deep frying pan, I added fresh vegetable oil and heated it to 350F on medium flame. When the oil was hot, I placed a flat disk of onion and chestnuts mixture using a slotted spoon (below). To make kakiage crispy, I fried it longer than I would usually fry tempura (5 minutes) and turned them over and kept frying for another 4-5 minutes until the edges of the onion were brown and crispy.

This is a good autumnal dish. The sweetness of the onion and chestnuts enhance each other with different textures. As usual, I served this with green tea salt and wedges of lemon.

Fresh corn Kakiage tempura トウモロコシのかき揚げ (Mark's book P47)

I found corn in the husk for the first time this year in our grocery store. I asked the woman, stocking the shelf, where the corn came from (thinking it must have come from a foreign country like Mexico). She showed me the mark on the crates they came in. It was clearly stamped "U.S.A." but she did not know where in the U.S. It appears that seasonal items become available earlier and earlier every year.  So I bought 8 ears (less than $2). They were white corn and rather small but the kernels were full and sweet when I tasted them raw. So I decided to make kakiage tempera かきあげ. Kakiage is a version of tempera where small items (sliced onions, julienned Burdock roots, small shrimp or fish etc are fried with a batter as a binder).

The "corn kakiage" appears on Mark's book p47, but it is a rather standard recipe except the use of corn is a bit uique. I made my tempura batter with cake flour (1/2 cup), potato starch or "katakuriko" (1 tbs) and egg yolk (1/2) and mixed in ice cold water (about 1/2 cup) to a desired cosistnecy. For Kakiage, I made it to the consistency of a loose pancake batter. I removed the kernels from the cob (one ear of corn yielded about 1/2 cup) using a knife and placed them in a bowl. I added enough tempura batter to coat every kernel and a bit more. Using a soup spoon, I slipped the batter and corn mixture into hot oil (170C or 340F) and fried until crispy and lightly browned, turning once (about 2-3 minutes on each side). I drained and served while hot and crispy. I also made my usual green beans and shiitake mushroom tempura. I served this with green tea salt and wedges of lime. The corn was very sweet with a nice light tempura crust. The lime juice added a nice citrus acidity and made the salt stick better. We had a bit of red wine left but switched to cold sake for this dish.

Mint and pea kakiage ミントと豌豆のかき揚げ

Sometime ago, I saw this recipe in the web version of a Japanese newspaper. I thought mint and pea kakiage (a type of tempura made with several small food items) かき揚げ was very interesting and unique but was dragging my feet in actually making it. The mint crop is flourishing in our herb garden and my wife harvested some to make mint tea recently. She reserved some mint leaves for me to use for this kakiage (so I found myself fresh out of any excuses for not making it.) Finally, I made this dish one weekend evening. I served it with wedges of lemon and green tea salt.

I did not remember the details of the original recipe (and I could not find it any longer) but I used cake flour and carbonated water to make rather thin tempura batter and it came out very light and airy.

Ingredients (I did not precisely measure anything but it made four kaiage tempura).
About 1 cup of fresh mint leaves, washed and dried.
About 1/2 cup of peas (I used frozen petit peas, thawed).
Cake flour for dusting.
Peanut oil for frying.

For Tempura batter
About 1/2 cup cake flour
Cold carbonated water.

Directions:
Lightly dust the mint leaves and peas with the cake flour (#1 in the third picture)
Mix the cake flour and the carbonated water to make thin tempura batter and add the peas and mint leaves (#2)
Using a slotted spoon, I scooped up the mint and peas and slid the clump into the hot oil (350F) (#3)
Turning once, I fried them until crispy and slightly golden then drained them (#4)

We couldn’t taste much of the peas but this was very light, airy and crunchy with refreshing mint flavor. Perilla leaves, which are a bit similar to mint leaves, are a standard tempura item which I have used in several variations but mint leaves are certainly unique. Since we have a good supply of fresh mint leaves during the summer, we might try this in different combination...asparagus and mint immediately comes to mind.

Addendum
I made this dish again a few days later. I also found the original recipe and only thing I missed was adding potato starch (should equal 1/2 the amount of cake flour used). I also added fresh corn. I lowered the hot oil temperature to avoid browning. All worked better.

Deep Fried Items 揚げ物

Squid Tempura イカの天ぷら

Like any bar food in United States, deep fried items 揚げ物 are very popular in Izakaya. Mark's book contains quite a few deep fried goodies. Deep fried chicken nuggets ("tori no kara-age" 鶏の唐揚げ and "Tatsuta-age" 竜田揚げ, recipe in Mark's book p84) are definitely Izakaya teiban 定番 (regular or classic) items.  On our last trip to Japan, we were in Kanazawa in June. It was the season for small white shrimp called "Shiraebi" 白エビ.  The Izakayas we ate at in Kanazawa offered this seasonal treasure in either "kara-age' (simply fried) or as "Kakiage" かき揚げ (more about this later). We loved the kara-age version of it. In addition, it was also the season for tiny, fluorescent squid called "Hotaru-ika" 蛍イカ or "firefly squid" (firefly for obvious reason). We had this squid in a very simple preparation called "Okizuke" 沖漬. What a treat!

The picture  above shows a fried squid dish I happened to make the other night since relatively fresh squid was available at the near-by Barducci's gourmet market. Talking about squid in U.S., nothing comes even close in terms of quality, variety, and freshness to the squid available in Japan. An extreme example of which was the "live" squid sashimi (生き造り) we had at the port city of Hakodate in Hokkaido. (I am sure we will have a chance to share our experience with that regional delicacy with you another time). You could use legs げそ as tempura especially in a form of "kakiage" but I used only the body parts this time. The problem with squid is that it contains lots of water which makes it splatter in the hot oil while cooking and makes it difficult to achieve a crispy crust. Also, cooked squid meat could be very chewy. A few preparation steps required to prevent this.

1) After cleaning the squid (if it is not already cleaned), cut open the tube, and make sallow criss-cross cuts. These are called "kanoko-giri" かのこ切りor "matsukasa-giri" 松かさ切り (see the diagram on left). Then, cut into small bite sized pieces. This will make the squid meat less chewy and easy to bite off.
2) Dry the squid by sandwiching it in a paper towel.  If you have time, you could refrigerate the squid in the paper towel "sandwich" for 10 minutes.
3) Before dipping into tempura batter, coat the squid with flour (I use potato starch).
4) There are many version of tempura batter but I use a whole egg (classical recipes use egg yolk only), 1 cup of cake flour and ice cold water mixed to the desired consistency. But do not over mix. You want a light flour so you do not want to develop the gluten in the flour. For vegetables, I prefer a thin watery batter--for shrimp and squid a slightly thicker batter.
5) I use peanuts oil since it imparts a nice peanut flavor to the squid and has a high smoke point. To test if the oil is hot enough I drip a very small amount of the batter into it. If the batter sinks into the oil half way and then immediately floats back to the surface, the oil is ready. (another method I use to check if the oil is ready, that was taught to me by my mother, is to put the tip of a bamboo cooking chopstick into the oil and if bubbles come out of the chopstick, the oil is ready). Depending on how things go, you may want to "double" fry the squid. Be careful to take out any stray pieces of tempura batter left in the oil ("tenkasu 天かす which can be used as a topping for needle in a soup dish and has other use) after the squid is cooked through and removed, otherwise they will burn making an unpleasant taste. Increase the heat and crisp up the crust for the second time (just 15 -20 seconds). You may need to try this several times before you will get it right.

6) Traditionally, tempura is eaten using a warm dipping sauce "tentsuyu" 天つゆ (dashi, mirin, sugar, soy sauce or buy in a bottle) with grated daikon and ginger root. But we usually eat it with "green tea salt" 抹茶塩 (a mixture of Kosher salt and powered green tea) and lemon. The  night I made this tempura, we went more traditional .

Autumnal kara-age with chestnuts and ginkonuts 秋の栗と銀杏のから揚げ

Since I am running out of dishes to make with North American chestnuts, this is my last attempt this fall. Here is "kakiage" かき揚げ with the essences of autumn; ginkonuts 銀杏 and chestnuts 栗.



Although it is possible to harvest ginko fruits (which nobody here does except some dedicate Japanese expats), clean off the smelly skin, broil and crack open to produce ginkonuts, but it is too smelly and messy work for even for me. I tried it on a very small scale once in the past but that was more than enough for one lifetime. In the center of the kakiage shown in the above picture is a chestnut surrounded by three small yellow ginkonuts (out of a can).



I used whatever vegetables were available. They included: onion (thinly sliced) and carrot (julienned). The amount is all arbitrary. I first put the vegetables in a bowl and added a pinch of salt and enough cake flour to coat the vegetables and let it sit for a few minutes. The moisture came out of the vegetables and moistened the flour which makes it easier to fry the veggies crispy. This “undercoat” of flour means the batter will coat the vegetables better. I added a bit more flour and cold seltzer water and mixed to make a rather thin runny batter.

On a large spoon or wooden (flat) spatula (or  Japanese "Hera" へら), I placed the mixture and chestnuts (previously boiled and both outer skin and inner skin removed) as shown below.



I slipped the mixture into hot oil (175-180C or 350F). I used peanut oil. I fried them for 4-5 minutes until brown and crispy (my oil was a bit too hot).



The vegetables turned out to be a bit too brown but the crust was very light and crispy and deep frying makes the onions, ginko nuts and chestnuts very sweet. They have a nice texture as well. We had this with my usual green tea salt. Any left overs can be heated up nicely in a toaster oven. To reheat them in a toaster over, however, you need a metal grate over a cookie sheet since excess oil will drip down. This is another winning combination. You can’t go wrong with deep fried onions, a combination of sweet carrot and nuts.

Fried Burdock stick 牛蒡の唐揚げ

This is a rather common Izakaya dish, although, for some reason, I have not made it at home until now. There are several different ways to make deep fried gobo. There are gobo chips like potato chip, kakiage tempura, or match sticks like shoe string fries. It can be just deep fried as is, or some kind of batter (tempura batter or buck wheat batter) or flour coating could be used. Another variation infuses some flavors before deep frying.

I decided to make shoe string like fries. I also marinated it with sake and soy sauce before frying. I used potato starch to coat the surface to help make it crisper.

For two small servings like those shown above (one serving shown), I used 2 root end halves of gobo. I scraped the skin and cut into match sticks and soaked in acidulated water for 10-15 minutes with several change of water. I then drained and marinated it in a mixture of sake and soy sauce (1:1) in the fridge over night (few hours at room temperature will be fine or you can skip the marinading step all together). I drained the gobo and patted it dry with a paper towel. I then dredged the sticks with potato starch (katakuri-ko 片栗粉).

Instead of deep frying, I shallow fried them using light olive oil (below image) on medium flame. I could have used peanut oil and/or deep fried them. After several minutes, the gobo sticks turned brown and crispy. I drained the excess oil and while they were hot, I seasoned them with salt. Serve while hot.

My wife was totally sold on this dish. Gobo has a very unique flavor and prepared this was they were so crunchy. It is a bit like sweet potato shoe string fries but gobo is all fibers and crunch. This is probably much healthier than fried potato. This goes well with any drink but we were having cold sake.

Izakaya Yuzuki in San Francisco 居酒屋癒月

We visited the San Francisco Bay area recently to attend a wine tasting and dinner held in honor of my former mentor. My friend, who organized the event, did a great job of putting together a wonderful great quality wine tasting of old vintages of California and Bordeaux wines emulating the judgment of the Paris in 1976. Afterwards, we decided to stay in San Francisco and visit a few Izakaya style restaurants. One evening, I chose Yuzuki 癒月 from the information I gather on the Internet and it happened to be a great choice.

The restaurant is in the Mission district. The building is old and could have previously been a neighborhood eatery. “Yuzuki” is a created word meaning “healing moon”. The picture below shows a framed calligraphy of the restaurant's name. In the old style, the letters are read right to left.

All the wait staff appeared to be Japanese and the two chefs busily preparing food could be seen through the pass-through opening in the back. The Sake sommelier  was also at hand to explain the sakes they were serving. The atmosphere was informal and very pleasant. For a more realistic Izakaya atmosphere, however, I would have preferred more counter seating. They have a bar counter (leftover from the previous restaurant?) but it is not quite the same as an Izakaya counter.

The table at which we sat was dark; darker than other tables which made picture taking a bit difficult. We started with a flight of four different sakes. The sake sommelier (a young man) served the flight and explained the types of sake, breweries, brew masters, flavor profiles etc. It was accompanied with a piece of paper with the name and short description of the sake. This is a much better way to experience a sake flight than the one we had at Sakamai 酒舞 in New Yolk because all the relevant information was available right in front of us.The Dewazuru junmai 出羽鶴　純米酒 was served at room temperature and the rest were chilled. From right to left, Takatenjin, Diaginjo 高天神大吟醸, Shizuoka; Fukucho “Suigetsu”, Junmai Ginjo 富久長　水月　純米吟醸酒, Hiroshima, Dewazuru Kimoto junmai 出羽鶴きもと純米, Akita; Yukino bosha, Nigori, Junmai ginjo, 雪の茅舎にごり純米吟醸酒　Akita.

We really enjoyed this flight. After the tasting, we chose a bottle of Fukuchou Suigetsu from Hiroshima as our drinking sake for the evening. The brew master for this sake is a female which is very unusual. We liked this one because of its nice clean taste yet it had some depth with a distinctive fennel after taste which was pleasantly surprising.

I forgot to take a picture of the first dish which was three Kyoto and home style vegetable dishes called “obansai” おばんさい presented very nicely in three small bowls set in a wooden compartmentalized box. There were three  specials on the menu that evening; 1) Hokkaido white squid sashimi, 2) raw oysters on a half-shell, and 3) anago 穴子 or sea eel tempura. We asked for the squid sashimi and anago tempura. In addition we ordered squid shiokara イカの塩辛 or “squid and guts”.

The picture above shows the squid sashimi. A portion of it was prepared in “naruto-maki” 鳴門巻き style with the nori seaweed. The legs were lightly boiled which was a bit chewy. This was very nice.

For the shiokara, we were well into it when I realized I had not taken a picture. We stopped eating long enough for me to quickly snap the pic. This was the best dish of the evening especially for my wife who is a shiokara connoisseur. This was home made by the chef rather than store bought and tasted of every bit of his skill.

The anago tempura was huge. The entire anago was served with other items such as egg plant, mizuna, and sweet potato. The entire length of the bone was also deep fried and served (a portion of it is visible in the picture above as “U” shaped item in the back). We also had shrimp kakiage かき揚げ and a very good chwanmushi 茶碗蒸し with uni (it was very good but the uni looked and tasted like it was from Maine).

As a shime 〆 or ending dish, we had grilled uni rice balls うにの焼きおにぎり. Four small wedges of rice topped with soy sauce-butter seasoning, uni, green (water cress), thin strips of nori. These were perfect for the two of us. This combination of uni and water cress sautéed in butter and soy sauce appears to have started out by the teppan-yaki 鉄板焼き place called "Nakachan" 中ちゃん in Hiroshima 広島 and was popularized by the new-trend sake bar "Buchi" in Shibuya. This was very good with a crunchy crust and nice uni taste.　

Although Yuzuki has the atmosphere of a small restaurant rather than an Izakaya, the food and sake were all excellent. If we were living in San Francisco, we would frequent this place often.

Information of Yuzuki:
Izakaya Yuzuki 居酒屋癒月
500 Guerrero Avenue, San Francisco
(415) 556-9898
http://yuzukisf.com/

Restaurant Kappa in San Francisco 小料理屋河童

I learned about this restaurant sometime ago on a previous trip to San Francisco. On that visit we stayed at the Hotel Kabuki in San Francisco Japan town and tried to go to this restaurant but we could not get a reservation. Instead, we went to Ino sushi 井乃鮨. Later we learned our substitute choice was a “Sushi bullies” place (aka sushi Nazi) which we did not know at that time but had a good dinner nonetheless. This time I planned ahead and made a reservation via email way ahead of time. This place must rely on a regular clientel or "Jouren" 常連客 or word-of-mouth for most of their business. It is an “if you don’t know exactly where you are going you will never get there” type of place. Even with the specific instruction that it is located on the second floor of the building at the corner of Post and Buchanan* (picture below left) you will not find it. This is because prior to opening at 6pm, the front of the restaurant (picture below right) is totally hidden behind locked, nondescript, unmarked double doors with absolutely no signage. On our previous visit, even though we did not have a reservation and would be eating elsewhere, I just wanted to see where it was located. We wandered around for quite some time but never found it. This time, luckily we arrived a 6:00 PM and there was a small hand written cardboard sign with “Kappa” on it. Behind the double door we found a small vestibule and a nice black Japanese style sliding door with a lantern with “koryouri Kappa” 小料理 かっぱ on it (picture below right).

*The first floor of this building has a family style Japanese restaurant called "Sanppo" 三宝. When we lived in the Bay area many years ago, we used to stop by for a late supper after driving back from all-day skiing at Lake Tahoe.

We opened the sliding door, and were welcomed by a smiling kimono-clad proprietor (wife) into a small but nice space. The restaurant's decor was dominated by a white wood counter which probably seats 10 people (picture below left) and a small separate room which seats 3 more at a table. The husband was the chef behind the counter and no other helpers were in sight. In the small triangular space behind our seats was a flower arrangement displayed (picture below right) which was a very nice touch. It was very quiet (there was only one other couple in the separate room).

They had quite an extensive sake list. For the first round, I had Kikusui 菊水 and my wife kamotusru arabashiri 加茂鶴あらばしり. After some conversation with the couple, we found out that both were from Hokkaido like myself; the “Mrs.” was from Asahikawa 旭川and the “Mr.” from Akabira 赤平. Since we established the Hokkaido connection, I next chose Otokoyama 男山 which is brewed in Asahikawa (unfortunately this was not a particularly great sake).  We also had Dassai 獺祭 and Born 梵 to accompany other dishes.

We had asked to have an omakase tasting course お任せ. So, we did not have to order. Everything just came, one after the other in a well timed fashion.

The first dish was clear soup with seared scallop and kaiware カイワレ大根 and yuzu ゆず. To me, this is a bit unusual for an opening since we usually start with sashimi at an izakaya but this is not an izakaya it was more like a small ryoutei.料亭 or traditional Japanese course only restaurant. The soup had a lot of umami (or “dashi ga kiiteiru” 出汁がきている).

The next was crab in vinegar dressing or Kani no sunomono カニの酢の物. Good sized Dungeness crab and snow crab meat was dressed in sweet vinegar with sesame and cucumber.

The third dish was “tuna no nuta” マグロのぬた, yubiki tuna 湯引き鮪 with blanched scallion and wakame seaweed were dressed in miso vinegar dressing..

And then came the assortment of 15 (no mistake, fifteen) small dishes called “Hassun” 八寸. Traditionally, many small items are placed in an 8-sun square plate (“sun” 寸 is an old Japanese measurement unit which is about 3cm, so 8-sun is 24cm or about 10inch square). As far as I can remember, the left row from the bottom are hamachi teriyaki はまちの照り焼き, roasted duck breast 鴨胸肉のロースト, karashi-mentaiko wrapped in squid 辛子明太子のイカ巻き, dashi-maki omelet 出汁巻き. The right row from the top are corn kakiage トウモロコシのかき揚げ, fried scallop ホタテのフライ, tuna kakuni マグロの角煮, simmered gan-modoki がんもどきの煮つけ, and simmered kabocha かぼちゃの煮つけ. In the center 6 items from the left bottom are smoked salmon with mountain yam 燻製サーモンの山芋載せ (in the small dish), asparagus in sesame dressing アスパラの胡麻和え, senmai zuke of radish 千枚漬け, simmered small scallop ひも付きホタテの煮もの, boiled “Kuruma” prawn 茹でクルマエビ and eggplant with dengaku sauce 茄子の田楽. All these were presented on top of a fresh wasabi plant leaf. This was indeed our nirvana; small morsels of different tastes between sips of sake.

At the wife's advice, we nibbled on the stalk of fresh wasabi plant which had a nice fresh taste but was not as hot as wasabi itself. We had consumed quite a bit of sake to finish these dishes.

Now came the otsukuri お造り or sashimi 刺身. From the left to right; a nice piece of hamachi はまち, maguro 鮪, kanpachi カンパチ, and California Uni (we were told was from off the coast of Santa Barbara, and is said to be the very best and indeed it was). Everything was great but the uni was particularly great and we asked for an additional serving to go with more sake.

The shime  〆 course was three good pieces of nigiri にぎり; eel, smoked salmon and tuna. The rice was not as well seasoned as it could have been and the rice balls appeared to be made in a mold rather than done by hand.

At this point, we had drunk enough and were quite satiated.  But here came the dessert. From left to right in the picture below; mizu-yokan水羊羹, ripe pineapple, strawberry, mango and kinako-coated warabi mochi わらび餅.

This was not the end of the desert and we also had strawberry/raspberry sorbet.

This was quite an extraordinary experience. We felt like we were back in Japan. The place was quiet and we enjoyed interesting conversations with the chef and his wife. We thoroughly enjoyed the evening.

Information on Kappa.

Restaurant Kappa 小料理かっぱ

1700 Post St., Suite K

San Francisco, CA 94115

(On the 2nd floor of the building located at the corner of Buchanan St. and Post St.)

(415) 673-6004 - Call for reservations after 4:30pm

http://www.kapparestaurant.com/english.htm

Shuhai, Akita city, 酒盃 秋田市

We arrived at Akita city 秋田市 in the late afternoon via Akita Shinkansen 秋田新幹線------the slowest shinkansen ever! We tooled along at 30 MPH because recent heavy rains caused major flooding, mudslides and undermined the rails. When the train slowed to a crawl through one damaged section we saw where a raging river had over run and destroyed the dykes on its banks, threatened farm houses and deposited debris all over the fields. At the slow speed we could take in all the details including the disturbing sight of an over turned car rusting where the flood water had dumped it in the river bed. In addition, even without the weather related destruction, many segments of the Aikta shinkansen are single-track and we had to stop and wait for the opposing Akita shinkansen train to pass. Luckily the seats were comfortable and the service was impeccable as it can be only in Japan. (As soon as we sat down we were offered paper slippers and our choice of cold beverages). It did seem strange, however, to observe the destruction wrought by nature while riding in such comfort.

Upon exiting the station we could tell from the signs that the area around the station was populated with chain Izakayas. This must be the trend everywhere in Japan. But we had a reservation at the premier Izakaya called “Shuhai” 酒盃, which was written up by Kazuhiko Ota 太田和彦 and also recommended by the master of “Suiko” 酔香.

Since Shuhai was a bit far from our hotel, we took a taxi cab. When I told the driver our destination he immediately approved of our choice and went into a long dissertation on how things used to be "in the old days…." when drinking places in the neighborhood of Shuhai were crowded with people every night’. Then the cab driver started “interviewing” me. Asking such questions as: "Is she your wife?  Where do you live? How long have you lived there" (This seemed to be a regular occurrence on this trip. For some reason the cabbies saw our short time together as their opportunity to extract as much personal information as possible—all done very politely of course. Numerous cab rides ended up feeling like an “exclusive for CNN” at best or a security investigation at worst). Finally we arrived at Shuhai (Thank Goodness!).

This is the picture I took before going in. It is uncanny that this was early fall, yet, it looked like this was winter and snow should be piled up in front.


Inside was a bit dark with all dark wood decor. It was amazing to see that my name was posted on the "Getabako" 下駄箱 or shoe box (I made a reservation while we were in Kyoto. I suppose people who reserve get designated shoe boxes with their names on them). We deposited our shoes in the designated box and were ushered in. There were several semi private rooms as well as a second floor. We had reserved seats at the counter which seats 10 people. We really liked the looks of this place and the fact smoking was not permitted at the counter. Behind the counter was a yaki-dai 焼台 where yakitori 焼鳥 was prepared. The back wall was lined with refrigerated cases with glass doors housing many large bottles of sake. To the right, out of view, was the main kitchen. The master greeted us (we were the first to be seated at the counter).  I asked about Suiko and Mr. Sugawara. The master told me that they worked together and every time he goes to Tokyo he stops by at Suiko.

Here was the otoshi. Does this look familiar; six items like at Suiko.

We asked for a recommendation of dry and non-dry sake. Again, all the sake we tasted were wonderful. Describing the subtle differences among these special  sake is beyond our ability.

(From left to right)
1. 天の戸　芳醇《超辛口》純米【生】原酒　天辛，浅舞酒造　秋田県横手市  Ten-no-to,  Ultra dry, Un-pasteurized Junmai Genshu, Asamai Shuzou, Yokote
2. 角右衛門　純米大吟醸　秋田こまち仕込，木村酒造　秋田県湯沢市 “Kakuemon”, Junmai Daiginjo, Akita-komachi rice, Kimura Shuzou. Yuzawa

We ordered Sashimi-assortment 刺身の盛り合わせ. It was good combination including a type of blow fish or “Fugu” ふぐ.


1. 雪の茅舎・秘伝山廃純米吟醸　齋彌酒造店　秋田県由利本荘市 Yukono-bosha, Special “Yamahai” Junmai Ginjo, Saiya Shuzou, Yuri-Honjou city
2. 鳥海山 純米吟醸酒　びん火入れ　天寿酒造　秋田県由利本荘市, “Choukaisan”, Junmai Ginjo, Bottle pasteurized, Tenjishuzou, Yuri-Honjou city

Next we ordered “Kakiage” かき揚げ of shrimp えび and lily root 百合根. I like edible lily root or “Yurine” (Please be aware most lily roots are poisonous and not to be eaten—“so don’t try this at home”). This was a bit unusual. Instead of an usual flat disk like shape, this one was a nice round sphere like a small baseball. The lily root had a nice starchy and sweet taste. The surface was nicely crunchy. Need more sake.



1. 雪の茅舎　純米吟醸生原酒　山田穂　齋彌酒造店　秋田県由利本荘市 Yukinobosha, Junmai Ginjo, Un-pasteurized “Genshu”, Yamada-ho rice, Yuro-Honjou city
2. まんさくの花 純米大吟醸 生詰原酒 雄町酒　日の丸酒造　秋田県横手 “Mansaku” flower, Junmai Daiginjou, “Namazume” (not sure if this is non-pasterized or pasteurized in the bottle) “Genshu”, Omachi rice, Hinomaru Shuzou, Yokote

We then tried Yakitori. I am not sure what we had but, for sure, skin, neck meat (seseri せせり) and tsukunes つくね and probably more. As usual, our collective memories were getting feeble.


1. 雪の茅舎　製造番号　百六十六酒　大吟醸生酒　齋彌酒造店　秋田県由利本荘市 Yukonobosha, Serial number 166, Daiginjou, Un-pasteurized, Saiya Shuzou, Yuri-Honjou city

I do not recall we ever tasted sake which bears a hand-written numbers. It looks like Yamada-Nishiki rice was ground to 35%. This may be an example of “giving gold coins to the cats” “or "Neko ni koban 猫に小判"  (Japanese proverb) although we enjoyed tasting it.

2. 天の戸　夏田冬蔵　純米大吟醸　浅舞酒造　秋田県横手市 “Amanoto”, Natsuda Fuyuzou, Junmai Daiginjo, Asamai Shuzou, Yokote



1. 太平山　純米吟醸　無濾過　生　『津月』（つづき）小玉醸造　秋田 Taiheizan Junmai Ginjo, Unfiltered, Un-pasteurized “Tsuzuki”, Kodama Brewery,
2. やまとしずく　純米吟醸　生原酒　秋田清酒　秋田県大仙市 Yamatoshizuku, Junmai Ginjo Unpasteurized Genshu, Akita Seishu brewery, Daisen city

Although all the sake we tasted was great, we chose “Yamato-shizuku” as our drinking sake for this evening. We ordered a few more dishes. We had what was listed as “Squid Okizuke” イカの沖漬け but it turned out to be quite unusual. This was the whole body of squid with innards preserved (but cartilage removed) which was marinated and then frozen. The master himself sliced it for us and served with alternating layers of cucumber still semi-frozen. I have never seen this presentation for “Okizuke”. We must have had more food. I should have taken more pictures of the food we had.

In any case, this was a quite an evening. We were lucky to have so many rare and excellent “Akita” Jizake 秋田の地酒 and excellent food in the great “farm” house atmosphere.

One of the wait-staff hailed a taxi and saw us off. The streets of Akita on our return trip to the hotel were desolate and dark, not like Sapporo or Tokyo. As soon as the meter started so did the “interview”. It was cut short however, by our arrival at the hotel. The entrance was flooded with some very very happy people, laughing, waving and shouting to each other. Most were shouldering large cardboard cases labeled beer or sake. Apparently a banquet or wedding reception was just breaking up and everybody seemed extremely happy with the door prizes—the cases they were hefting. Or maybe they were just happy because they had been sampling the contents of the boxes all evening…we fit right in.