Restaurant # 8: Kitcho Arashiyama

While researching our trip back in March, I came across mention of Kitcho Arashiyama on several english language websites. The descriptions were vague and only described it as high end Kyo-Kaiseki. (Kyoto style banquet feast) By chance i suppose, we decided to reserve there, hoping for the best, with little concrete info on what to expect.

Here is it's website: http://www.kitcho.com/kyoto/english/about/index.html

We took a taxi from our ryokan in gion, and after going north west through the suburbs of Kyoto, we finally got to the Arashiyama district. It was a beautiful area, heavily wooded and characterised by a large river flowing from the mountains.

There was a row of townhouses by the banks of the river. The taxi approached one of them, that looked like a hotel quite frankly, with a large steel gate, and drove inside.

As the car parked on the walkway outside a very traditional Japanese style townhouse, three male attendants ran to the car and proceeded to open the doors for us. At this point, it was clear to us as to the level of service that we were to expect.

After being greeted by our hostess we were led to our room, on the second floor of the townhouse. It was situated in the corner of the building, both sides of which had windows, which when opened revealed on one side, the river and on the other, some lush greenery. The room was airconditioned, as July is a very hot month in Kyoto. It was very large and exquisitely furnished, with an antique chest not shown in the above image.

As is customary the meal begins with some green tea.

We were served by tow hostesses, one of which was fluent in english. The hostesses were extremely friendly, humble, helpful and courteous. While one of them was pouring my fiancee Maya Sake, some condensation from the outside of the bottle (a single drop) had dropped onto her handbag. I can not describe how much the poor lady appologised for that and how she hastily sprung up and got a towel to wipe the bag, even though we were trying to calm her down, insisting that she not worry about it at all.

This only went to confirm in our minds that Japanese service was in a different league altogether.

I really regret not writing down what the individual plates was. I will have to rely on my memory in trying to recall what these many elaborate plates were.

The first course was lightly seared sweet shrimp, steamed abalone, pond seaweed (described earlier under my Okahan entry), okra and some Japanese squash in a ponzu-soy sauce.

This dish was spectacular, it was a combination very fresh, delicate ingredients and had a summery mood.

Next course was another summer favorite, Hamo (Pink conger) in a clear soup.

Hamo is extremely fluffy, owing to its method of preparation where the flesh is sliced cross-sectionally so that it fluffs and twirls around the skin when cooked.

As you can see, our Sake also arrived around this time. :)

This dish was Awabi (Abalone) sashimi with some cubes of steamed Awabi liver (the dark brown cubes).

The method of preparation was paper thin cross sectional slices.

Not shown above was the sauce. The sauce was made from abalone liver and was dark green, with a muddy texture.

I had tried this dish before at Kanetanaka (The first restaurant to appear in this blog) and did not particularly enjoy it back then, so i approached this plate with a certain caution.

I only lightly dipped the first slice of Awabi in the sauce, fearing its strong fishy taste, however, much to my delight, the sauce tasted nothing at all like I expected. Its flavor was strongly nutty, as if it contained almonds. In fact, the taste closely resembled that of fine Fois Gras. Even the steamed Awabi liver was ridiculously nutty in flavor. It seems strange that both the liver of the Abalone, a sea slug, and Goose Liver would taste so similar. After I drenched the remaining slices in the sauce, I even took a few sips out of the sauce because it tasted so good.

This was the second sashimi course. On the right , you have some red snapper sashimi, served with soy sauce and pickled ginger. On the left was clam sashimi, "bakagai" if i am not mistaken, served with a light Dashi-Soy dip and roasted sesame seeds.

The shellfish was very sweet. There was also Jellied seaweed on the plate, presumably to be eaten alone.

This course was Uni (Sea Urchin) in tofu with Wasabi mousse and chopped seaweed, in a light dashi-soy sauce.

Uni was both a summer favorite as well as my own personal favorite. Needless to say I enjoyed this plate very much as well.

At this point I was becoming overwhelmed by how amazing all these dishes were.

After my fiancee Maya inquired to the hostess about the plates, she revealed that they were 3-4 hundred years old, and came from the owner's own personal collection. I couldn't help but to think that each of these antique plates was probably worth hundreds, if not thousands of dollars.

Next was this elaborately decorated, truly beautiful, edible, work of art...

Opening the red flower reveals very little fish, presumably sardines, deef fried with a strong, sweet black miso flavor. Going right, we have steamed green beans, a steamed shrimp, a slice of sweet potato, and on the bottom was a sweet tasting brown paste which i could not identify!

The picture of the plate at large, shown above shows two smaller bowls not pictured in detail. One of which contained a form of pickled seaweed whereas the other had some broiled Hamo (pike conger) and spinach in a sweet tasting sauce.

Next was some Ayu (sweetfish) from the arashiyama river Broiled on a stick, in most traditional Japanese fashion.

The Ayu was medium in size, and still contained its inerts. Apparently, that is the proper way which the Ayu is supposed to be eaten. Being a somewhat adventurous eater, and perhaps emboldened by Walid eating the Ayu whole before me, I proceeded to bite its head off, along with the intestines, and they did not taste pleasant. In fact they were quite bitter. Unknown to me at the time was that the primary source of food for sweetfish was little river insects, so one can only imagine the sort of little buggers which I ingested with the Ayu! Fortunately, the remaining flesh of the Ayu was sweet tasting (as the name sweetfish suggests) and quite enjoyable. The Ayu was served with a vinegary dip, presumably made with rice-wine vinegar.

The ladies decided to have the fish with head, bones and inerts removed, whith the help of the hostesses ofcourse.

This course consisted of simmered vegetables, all local products of Kyoto. These included clockwise from top, two slices of eggplant, okra, green pepper, pumpkin, and lotus root.

The Kyoto eggplant was as sweet as we had come to expect.

The final course was some "Japanese risotto" with some slices of really creamy, broiled Unagi (fresh water eel). This was an excellent variant to the plain steamed rice usually served to signify the end of a meal.

The bones of the Ayu, expelled before they were eaten by the ladies, were presented to us as "crackers" to be eaten with our Sake, a form of fish chips! They were very soft and actually quite pleasant to eat.

This plate of Japanese fruits was pure heavenly bliss. None of the varieties was imported, all were local produce. Even the Mangos were from Kyushu.

The varieties were Melon, Watermelon, PEELED grapes, PEELED peaches and mangoes.

They were utterly spoiling us with this level of indulgence.

The fruits were really unexplicably good. The peeled grapes were absolutely huge, the peaches were so moist, watery, sweet and almost perfume like with regards to strength of flavor, the musk melon was just as good as expected, it really blows my mind how these fruits could be so much better than what we were accustomed to, mind you most of the fruits we get in Dubai are either imported from the United States or from various european countries.

The fruits were only the first of our two course dessert. For the second we had a choice of either Matcha with Jellied Azuki bean paste...

(The Matcha was very rich and was obviously of exceptional quality.)

Or crushed ice with Matcha syrup over mochi riceballs and azuki bean paste. Very refreshing!

Here we were with, to the left of the picture our gracious hostess, and to the right of the picture, Kitcho's Madame...

Kitcho was an amazing experience, hands down the best food, the best service, and the best setting that i have ever experienced. Truly exceptional.

The pricetag was very steep though, at 240,000 JPY (2,604 USD) for four people, nothing short of the very best ever would have sufficed!

Restaurant # 7: Kosendo, Tour Guide's Choice

This was our second day in Kyoto, and we decided to go with a tour guide, mainly for info on the locations rather than having her choose the locations herself, as we already had an itenary planned for the day. After visiting GinkaKuji, along with another temple, the Nishiki food market and Nijo castle, it was time for lunch.

The food market was an interesting experience, the most common foods, typical Kyoto specialties included pickles, tofu and agricultural produce.

Interestingly, when we were in the vicinity of Nishiki Market, a camera crew from one of the local TV channels approached us for an interview, due to our exotic appearance (in Japan at least). However, when they realized that we were not europeans, their interest in us waned somewhat. (The TV crew asked where we were from, and after I answered lebanon, they presented me with a map of europe to point out where it was.)

It was very common for random locals to come up to us and try to guess our nationality, people in Kyoto are very curious about foreigners, albeit in a very friendly manner ofcourse.

Nothing works your appetite quite as much as exploring serveral temples/castles in the span of 5-6 hours.

For this day we decided on having lunch at a place popular with the locals, rather than a high end restaurant and we went with the tour guide's choice. This was her favorite restaurant in Kyoto so we thought we would give it a shot.

The restuarant itself was a cozy, traditional, little place that seemed popular with locals (we had to wait a few minutes for a table).

The menu seemed colurful enough. Shame no english menu was available. There were two choices for main course, either deep fried chicken "Kyoto style" or Oden (Several ingredients stewed in a Dashi-Soy broth).

If someone can kindly translate the name of the restaurant from the menu (assuming that it is mentioned on there somewhere) I would be much obliged.

The meal looked extremely neat, with all the plates arranged neatly on the tray. Clockwise from top left: Enoki mushroom miso soup, Pumpkin cake dessert, Crab radish cucumber mayo salad, Deep fried chicken cutlets stuffed with a pickle relish, Nama-fu served with a sweet miso dipping sauce (wheat gluten, a high protein meat substitute popular in buddhist cuisine, and especially popular in Kyoto) and finally plain rice and pickles.

The Nama-fu was the star of the show, it was delicious! It was very chewy. The story goes that buddhist monks had got fedup with their vegetarian diets owing to the "weak" textures of vegetarian foods as opposed to meats, and they came up with this dish to mimic the chewy texture of meats.The Japanese (east asians in general actually) love their food to have chewy/unusual texture, often giving texture precedence to taste (examples are konnyaku jelly and sea cucumber among a long, long list) . Texture plays a minimal role in middle eastern cuisines, or even european cuisines, at least in the sence that no foods are valued based on texture alone.

The others ordered the above, but i opted for the more Japanese option of Oden. Although fried foods are extremely popular in Japan, and have been for a long time, they were brought to Japan by the Portuguese, and since Oden is as Japanese as it gets, my choice was obvious.

The meal was identical to the one above with the exception of the oden.

Although Oden was traditionally a winter plate, it was one of the things i had to try while in Japan. Oden is a very typical Japanese plate and is not well known outside of Japan, its ingredients appealed specifically to the Japanese palate. The contents were: Clockwise from top left, a boiled egg, konnyaku jelly (jelly made from the konjak plant) which had very little taste and was gelatinous in texture, deep fried tofu, a turnip, and a cylindrical shaped form of kamaboko. (fishcake)

The meal cost 2200 JPY (24 USD) per person. Not bad for such a filling meal. We also got a genuine taste of everyday foods that the locals eat.

Restaurant # 6: Tamahan Ryokan

After searching extensively on the internet for a Ryokan (Traditional Japanese Inn) in Kyoto, we came accross Tamahan.

http://www.tamahan.jp/

It was situated in Gion, just a few minutes walk from the Kiyomizudera and Kodaiji Temples.

If you haven't been to Gion, the old district of Kyoto, you will have some difficulty in understanding just how beautiful the place is, its like traveling 150 years back in time to a bygone era that only exists in Gion, and perhaps a few other places in Japan.

If you take a peek into any of the townhouses in the Gion area you will see just how splendid they are. With perfectly trimmed Japanese style gardens and genuine traditional style wooden structures. The streets and walkways are really neat and clean. The only sign here that you are indeed in the 21st century is the occasional vending machine.

If you are lucky, actually, more often than not... You will come across a Geisha, or a Maiko rather (apprentice geisha). Although the majority of them will be just tourists dressed up as Geisha, should you come accross a real Maiko you will be able to tell the difference quite easily.

As you can see, Gion offers a sublime blend between the traditional and hints of modernity, where the tranquility is often tainted by the occasional "Cans Shop"! :)

Arriving at Tamahan revealed to us just how beautiful the Ryokan was, we were glad we had four days to spend there. We were scheduled to have dinner at the Ryokan, so we went out for a bout of Gion exploration before heading back here for dinner.

A view of the Ryokan's main entrance.

I personally opted for parting with modern conveniences throughout the duration of our stay in Gion, in order to be better immersed in the Ryokan experience, Walid on the other hand, had no such intention. You can see Tamahan's spectacular inner garden through our room window.

We had two rooms, situated one above the other.

What better way to have dinner in the Ryokan than dressed in traditional attire...

On to the food. Excuse my descriptions, as we neither got a menu, nor had an english speaking waitress so ill try my best to describe what the food items actually were.

First course was Tofu in a simple Dashi based broth and some White fish Sashimi.

Very elaborately presented as you can see.

This course will be harder for me to describe, excuse my memory lapse.

At the top of the plate was a spinach, enoki mushroom and tofu salad in the smaller white plate, clockwise next is a rolled piece of stuffed eel, next is a slice of jellied octupus, Edamame, a slice of sweet potato, a shrimp on a sweet yellow paste that had the texture of hard boiled egg yolk, and finally a slice of some sort of dried fish.

A simple Chawan Mushi (Egg custard flavored with dashi, soy sauce and mirin). No toppings or fillings had been added, probably to emphasize the delicate taste af the Chawan Mushi, showing off the chef's skills.

Here was the deep fried course, served with a lemon wedge and Matcha salt.

It was skillfully prepared and retained very little oil.

There was a green pepper, a red pepper, a slice of sweet potato, and two varieties of fish, one of which was coated with little multicolour crumbs.

This was a whole fish head cooked with bamboo in a sweet sauce.

It was the best course of the meal. Although it was my first time having a "fish head" and the idea did not seem appealing to me at first, it did have quite some meat on it, although i did avoid the eyeballs, which my brother Walid tried. Apparently the eyeballs are extremely fishy tasting, glad I avoided them!

A broiled King prawn basted with a sweet sauce, again, this was very good.

This was eggplant coated with black and white miso. Kyoto eggplants are exceptionaly sweet and moist. The quality of fruits and vegetables in Japan is astounding, I would go as far as to say they are the best in the world.

Please excuse the low quality of this photo, unfortunately, i cannot recall what this plate was!

After this they server us some plain steamed rice, which we were too full to eat.

The dessert was simply some cherries in a glass of ice water. Just as expected from Japanese fruits, these were very sweet and juicy.

Breakfast was no less fancy, a typical breakfast included several plates and the choice was either Japanese or western. Naturally, I sided with Japanese: (although the Japanese breakfast did differ from day to day)

The plate on the right was a Chawan Mushi (Egg Custard) with mushrooms and prawns, very tasty. On the left hand side was yogurt with blueberries and avocado. Curious as to why they would serve this as part of a Japanese breakfast as neither yogurt nor avocados for that matter are traditional Japanese foods, rather they are more recent imports.

On the top left was a plate of pickles. Not pictured here was a bowl of plain steamed rice.

Deep fried Tofu in a dashi-soy sauce broth topped with chopped seaweed.

Delicoious Miso soup with Enoki mushrooms and Rolled Omelette.

Tamahan's breakfasts were quite memorable, much needed calories to sustain our 12 hours of walking daily routine.

Here I am with the two tamahan attendants to my left and right, and the Obasan on the right hand side of the picture was the owner of Tamahan. I can not say enough good things about the service there or the owner herself for that matter, they were most courteous, friendly and accomodating.

The prices were not cheap, and can be seen in detail on their website, but for a high end Ryokan I think that this was the best that Kyoto had to offer. Located right in the heart of Gion, excellent food, and excellent service.

Restaurant # 5: Izu

After spending two days exploring Osaka and Nara, we headed to Kyoto for the next four days of our trip. The first lunch that we had was at Izu, one of the oldest makers of Kyo-Zushi (Kyoto style sushi) around.

Their web address is: http://r.gnavi.co.jp/izu/

Since Kyoto is landlocked, this traditional style of sushi does not involve fresh fish, but rather involves a variety of toppings ranging from pickled Saba (Mackrel) to Tamago (Egg omlette).

We went to Izu for a quick lunch and sampled what few varieties that were on offer.

Unfortunately the only image that I could find on my camera was a partial outside view of Izu.

Hopefully I will find some images of the interior on my sister's camera and upload them later.

The inside was what i can best describe as rustic, with wooden benches desigend for a quick meal, and most customers that we saw opted for takeout. It was extrmely neat and genuine looking, and i have no doubt that it has looked exactly the same way for over a century.

The meal itself was very simple, consisted of a cup of green tea and the above plate.

The sushi varieties were: on the bottom of the plate left hand side, Saba Zushi (Pickled Mackrel), next came the big roll that had in it pickled radish, tamago (egg omlette) and very sweet pickled mushrooms.

The Saba Zushi was far too fishy tasting for my taste, i did not enjoy the Saba at all, although my brother Walid did take to its liking. The other large roll was very sweet in flavor (owing to the sweetened mushroom and tamago) and was indeed very large. This large sushi was actually very good, but tasted more like a dessert than a sushi roll. I would best describe it as a rice cake.

On the top of the plate there were five varieties of box pressed, cube shaped sushi which consisted of the following:

Ebi (shrimp), Tamago (Egg Omlette), Hamo (Pike conger basted with a sweet sauce), Torigai (A variety of cockle), and finally Tai with Kinome (Sea bream with shansho leaf).

These small sushi were mostly rice with a very thin layer of topping for flavor mostly. They were all mild tasting, rice being the first and foremost ingredient, and it contributed most to the taste of the sushi. I did especially like the Hamo, although I thought it distinctively tasted like roast beef!

Walid, absolutely loved the big rolls, so we opted for another order. The initial order by itself was filling but we are big eaters.

As you can see, we could barely fit the roll in our mouths. :)

I guess as a traveller exploring Japan and sampling the local cuisine, trying out traditional places like this is a must. However, if you are only looking to eat the best tasting dishes available rather than sampling the local specialties, you could find many tastier alternatives in Kyoto.

I can not say how this restaurant compares to others serving the same fare since this is the only Kyoto style sushi place that I have ever visited, however i remember it being quite expensive at 13,000 JPY (141 USD) for the four of us, considering that our meal consisted of little more than flavored rice.

Restaurant # 4: Fuku Fuku Fugu in Osaka

After spending two days in Tokyo, we headed to Osaka.

Osaka has a reputation for being a foodlover's paradise. After a long day of exploration, and sampling several Osaka streetfoods which I hope to discuss later, the time was right for a large multi-course Fugu meal!

Now the best season for Fugu was during winter, however, since i cant visit Japan as often as i would like, sampling Fugu was an absolute must for me on this trip.

The concierge at the Hilton Osaka recommended this restaurant to us.

I would highly appreciate it if someone can read the Kana name of the restaurant from the pictures below.

The restaurant served Tora-Fugu (Tiger Fugu), which was a highly sought after variety.

The website is: http://fuku2.jp/

Upon arrival we were greeted by an extremely friendly waitress, and led to our private room. Although small in size, the room was quite cozy, with a window view of the street below.

Although the waitress did not speak a single word of english, she was extremely adept at "animated" gestures. We had no problem whatsoever communicating with her, in fact it was quite an experience for us. Our limited knowledge of Japanese can only take us so far...

Upon inquiring about the Fugu, the waitress decided to introduce us to our unsuspecting victim.

Couldnt help but feel sorry for the poor guy, he almost looked like a puppy in that little bucket of his.

What better way to start a Fugu meal than some Sake infused with Charbroiled Fugu Fin..

The Sake had taken a slight Charred-Fugu flavor, the fin itself was slightly bitter due to the charring.

The first course was the Fugu skin, which was perhaps unsurprisingly, extremely gelatenous in texture. It had surprisingly little taste, and so took on the taste of the ponzu dressing. The texture was amusing, and the sauce itself was rather refreshing.

Next Came the Fugu sashimi. It was characteristically tough in texture, and distinctively sweet in flavor, just as I had expected.

It was served with chives and grated radish with chilli.

The sashimi was followed by deep fried chunks of Fugu, served with Matcha salt and a lemon wedge. The texture here was somewhat comparable to chicken, while retaining the sweetness of the Fugu. Although usually apprehensive of fried foods, i did particularly enjoy this course, as it seemed well prepared and not excessively oily.

This course was a plump piece of Fugu sashimi on baby chinese cabbage, served with onions, chives, grated radish eaten with a ponzu dip. Very Fresh.

My fiancee, Maya, was very apprehensive of the "poisonous" status of the Fugu, and perhaps her apprehension was coupled with some pity for our victim after being introduced to it, so she decided to go with a lobster course instead.

The above consisted of a few items that were to be char-grilled on a portable coal grill.

These included naturally, some Fugu for us, deep fried Tofu garnished with what the waitress described as shrimp brains, pink bars that were made of rice and perhaps some dried shrimp, some shitake mushrooms, and finally a whole lobster, heart still beating and all.

The grilled Fugu was quite good, it toughens up quite a bit, and although quite chliche, I found its texture closely resembled that of chicken breast.

Deep fried Tofu is one of the delights that i discovered on my trip to Japan. The texture and flavor of deep fried Tofu are very interesting... Shame it is nowhere to be found here in Dubai.

The most interesting part of the above course was the grilled rice cake. After it was heated on the grill its texture became extremely sticky. It was delicious!

Thinking of all the rice based treats that we had in Japan, I can't help but have my mouth water!

The lobster's beating heart stalled Maya's appetite for a few minutes. Guess Japan is not a place for squeamish eaters! Although fresh lobster, live from the tank, is widely available here, the eater is only exposed to his victim after cooking.

The hulking mound of Fugu meat seen above was to be used for the Fugu Hotpot. The serving size was massive, at this point i couldnt help but thinking that several fish had probably fallen victim to our appetites!

The Fugu meat itself was extremely lean, with very low levels of fat, and the meal itself was very healthy.

For the hotpot, using the gas burner that our room was already equipped with, the waitress first boiled some kelp to flavor the broth, then removed the seaweed so that we may start boiling the fish, along with the other vegetables that were on offer.

Accompanying the veggies was.... Even more Fugu! Guess the serving entailed more Fugu than could fit on that measely plate that i pictured earlier. The veggies were Enoki mushrooms, Chinese cabbage, and the greens pictured in the middle of the plate, the name of which seems to have escaped my memory.

After consuming scores of Fugu chunks, the waitress added rice, eggs, and spring onion to the broth creatining a rice hotpot and effectively bringing our Fugu feast to a close.

Im definately doing this again the next time I visit Japan. And this restaurant comes highly recommended , if you are in Osaka and looking to have some Fugu, check it out.

We payed, i think it was around 5000 JPY (54 USD) per person for the Fugu Course, and around 3500 JPY (38 USD) for the Lobster. I think it was reasonably priced for the quantity of food we got.

After we were done, we met the chef to whom we had entrusted our lives. He seemed dangerously laid back, and even joked that we would probably not wake up the next morning! I remember thinking before the meal that eating Fugu was a dangerous endeavour reserved for special occasional banquets, however, after this meal it became clear to me that it was just as routine and normal as any other type of fish and that the chances of getting poisoned at a restaurant are close to nill. The little info that I had known about Fugu came to me through western sources such as documentaries that sought to make it seem more exotic and dangerous than it actually was. I was later surprised to see how widespread the eating of Fugu was, as we routinely saw Fugu served at non specialist stores and even some Yakiniku restaurants.