Eat Like Ushi

I'm sure the website didn't exist (at least not in English) when I was there nearly 8 years ago. However the convenience of it now is that it explains the dishes I ate much better than I can.

http://www.hiraso.jp/lang/english.html

It's refreshing to know that I ordered all the dishes they now list on the website as their specials. How progressive was I...

In case this information disappears for whatever reason, here's what is says:

Kakinoha zushi
- Kakinoha zushi is descended from the traditional sushi dish “Nare zushi”. Nare zushi is the origin of the sushi in Japan, and used rice for the fermentation process. This was the wisdom from the ancients, so as to preserve the sea products in an inland place like Nara.
- Kakinoha zushi is a treasure of sea and thoughts of people, wrapped in a persimmon leaf which has many benefits and was invented as a medication by ancient Japanese.
- Our ancestors never forget to thank the lives we are taking so we can live. Kakinohazushi contains treasure from the sea (a mackerel), the mountain (a persimmon leaf) and the land (rice). It plays the trinity harmony and remains the wisdom of ancient people. Please enjoy tasting the sense of history and remembrance of the venerable Nara.

Cha gayu
- Cha gayu is rice porridge made with rice, roasted green tea and salt.
- This is also a local cuisine which you may enjoy either hot or cold. A very simple meal but not poor, inelegant but a rich dish. I recommend you to take a time to taste it. It is a gentle meal for your health. You will feel the richness of this meal and would love to have it in everyday life. Each little piece of rice in a bowl contains rich flavours of roasted green tea and expanded with tea moist in beautiful golden brown colour.

Ayu zushi
- Another local cuisine you may like to try is Ayu zushi, this is a traditional style of sushi from ancient times in Yoshino Nara. This style of sushi is one of our specialities and we have been serving this dish to the Royal Family for years.
- Ayu zushi is a very unique style of sushi and is served with a whole cooked river fish on top of the sushi.
- We have two types of Ayu zushi, one is marinated ayu fish with sweet vinegar, which you may enjoy a freshness of the fish and refreshing vinegrated flavor, the other is baked ayu fish which is seasoned with our original soy sauce based sweet sauce.

My memories were the fish:rice ratio was quite low in the zushi. There was a strong fermented/vinegar flavour overall.

Soft shell turtle set course JPY12,705

Note these photos are NOT for the faint hearted...

Research about Japan online is quite difficult. There just isn't that many reviews of places, I assume because a lot of places wouldn't be easily ventured by non-Japanese speakers and similarly my Japanese skills aren't good enough to read through any non-English reviews (if they exist at all). One of the comforting generalisations is that I think most Japanese food experiences are of good quality and so the chances of randomly coming across an alluring tourist trap is quite low. I suppose the real reason to try and look into where you want to go and what they offer is simply because most of these Japan-specific experiences are quite expensive and noone likes costly surprises.

In any case in deciding upon an onsen to soak a few days of stress away, Fujiyoshi (with its two reviews) seemed like a good bet. Tucked away in the onsen district of Ito, few tourists would ever venture to this area. In fact the hostess of the onsen confirmed practically all their guests are Japanese.

Part of the appeal is the large public onsen overlooking the coastline (although it was too cold in January to safely use this) but also the 3 private onsen for guests to enjoy shaded from howling winds and rain. Purely from an onsen point of view, I can certainly promote this place as worth a detour and a couple of days of unwinding. But this blog is primarily about food experiences - and Fujiyoshi is sensational on that front.

The photos are combined from 2 breakfasts and 2 dinners - both days of meals certainly had similarities with subtle differences to keep things interesting. In any case the food was of such high quality, repeat dishes were welcome.

Breakfast was far from the traditional cold fish and rice that I've had at a previous ryokan. Fujiyoshi served a sushi plate of various nigiri (including ootoro & scallop), coal-grilled fish, scallops & mollusc, lobster miso soup (using the lobster leftover from the previous night's dinner) and rice. The highlight was clearly the miso-cooked ootoro - fatty tuna belly coated with miso, the fish flesh cooked through but so fatty that it dissolved into a sweet miso/tuna mouthful. Far better than Nobu's famous miso cod.

Dinner was an exercise in greed, but a more acceptable sin than wasting anything. A large sashimi platter was headlined by a local variety of snapper (the name escapes me) which is much softer with less crunchy bite than the usual tai I'm used to. A variety of hot and cold sides using prawns, crab, noodles, tempura, chawanmushi, vegetables and pickles made the meal complete. We also opted for the special supplement that enabled us on the first dinner to add lobster and abalone sashimi (live fresh from their own tanks), as well as grilled lobster and abalone. The second dinner we opted to stay with grilled versions only, and as a result were served a huge lobster. Not at all an expensive addition given the cost of lobster and abalone (especially sashimi) everywhere else in the world and also that I hadn't seen it offered in Japan before.

Next time I would order the same package again - I think that you need one full uninterrupted day to enjoy the onsen, relax in the common areas, walk around the complex and even possibly around the town. That could either be arriving first thing in the morning and spending a whole day there, otherwise having two nights to not have the feeling of rushing your experience. The dinner supplement for lobster and abalone is a necessary expense that you will be thankful for, and although the meals are large note that Fujiyoshi does not serve lunch (we were given a few snacks and tea to keep us going).

There are many reputed Kobe beef venues in Tokyo, although if you read extensively very few are actually Kobe, but rather similar types of cow bred elsewhere. In order to be designated Kobe beef, the specific black Tajima-ushi cow breed that is born, raised and slaughtered in Kobe. It seems that only a few Tokyo restaurants serve authentic Kobe beef, which may be imported beef directly from slaughter or a variation on a theme of importing the entire cow for slaughter elsewhere (not technically Kobe, but close enough...)

After much research, I settled on 511 for their reputation of serving award winning Kobe beef (Grade A5 Beef Marbling Score 11 - hence the restaurant name) and also being one of the few that serves it as a kaiseki menu as well as the usual beef steak only option.

All guests other than us were Japanese, and my language skills (and their English skills) were not great in conveying which cuts of beef and added ingredients were being served. It didn't detract from an superlative meal.

The starter of seared Kobe beef with cod roe was a little teaser of the quality of beef and a salty roe kick to enhance the flavours. The 5 appetisers were from various parts of the cow, all nice but none particularly memorable. The chawanmushi was wonderful with uni (I adore good uni) above and tender beef underneath. The miso beef was reminiscent of Nobu's cod except with a heavier core. The monkfish was a refreshing break in between two beef courses, wedged on the other side by two beef sushi - one served with grated ginger and the other topped with salt.

We were then treated to an additional extra of Kobe beef jerky - salt cured and wetting appetites for the main attraction.

The A5 B11 Kobe sirloin was amazing. The proportion of fat is evident from the photos. Each slice was a melting flavour of beef and fat. It was unparalleled to any Wagyu beef I've previously tried all outside Japan - there is no competition. Sadly for me I paid a bit extra for the eye fillet, which had a much less percentage of fat (I read later this is expected given the different muscles areas) and was cooked more medium than my preferred rare.

Some rice and dessert dishes rounded up the meal but I remained transfixed on the beef that had just passed and contemplated whether to order any sirloin steak just to relive the experience. I refrained. I will go again.

Next time I would order the kaiseki menu again. The experience and variety is a much better overall dinner than I imagine a rich fatty steak alone. Choose sirloin, remember not to count calories and give thanks to the cows.

(Other places serve other cuts including rib-eye and chateaubriand - I'd be curious to know how their marbling compares with sirloin. If you only have one experience though, I'd definitely recommend sirloin for price and to know what you're getting.)