Tag - kaiseki

 
Menu
Search
 
April 20, 2024
 

Today's print edition

Home Delivery
Subscribe for more access

KAISEKI

Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Sep 9, 2016
Moriwaki: Blissful sashimi in a compact family-run eatery
One of my favorite occasions to eat out in Japan is after returning from a long trip abroad. I have learned to empathize with those Japanese tourists who can't wait to get home and eat Japanese rice after a whirlwind tour of Europe.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Jul 22, 2016
Fukushima Mori: Slow 'kaiseki' beside a minimal rock garden
I'm seated at one end of a wooden counter, hewn from the dark wood of a bubinga tree and streaked with hues of purple and red. The white pebbles in a nearby rock garden fan out around a patch of moss shaded by a single Japanese maple tree. And on my other side? Three empty seats. Beyond that, all Fukushima Mori's tables are occupied. And by the end of my long two-hour lunch, I can see why — Fukushima Mori's cooking is adventurous, and nearly always rewarding. As to the reason why I was put at the far end of the counter, beyond the reach of all other diners, I can only speculate. Unfortunately, this kind of enforced solitude often happens when dining alone in Japan. But the innovative cooking made up for the isolation.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jul 8, 2016
Sara: Where daintiness gets a good grilling
Midway through lunch at Sara, a family-run restaurant in northern Kyoto, I started to suspect that the chefs subscribed to a philosophy of daintiness. The food was as pretty as it was good to eat, but the portions were decidedly petit.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
May 13, 2016
Sakamoto offers an 'only in Kyoto' experience
There's every chance that while dining at Sakamoto you'll end up in a tourist's photo. It's not because of who you are, but where you are. Diners sit overlooking the shallow Shirakawa River, which is lined with restaurants, bars and cafes on one side, and a cobbled street with cherry trees and willows on the other, the tips of their branches fanning the water as it dances through the Gion district.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Apr 22, 2016
Ukon: Traditional kaiseki cuisine served in a bento box
The answer: bento box. The question: What Japanese food — or type of meal — would I miss most if I left Japan? And now for some qualifications, before an explanation in the form of a restaurant review.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Apr 8, 2016
Godan Miyazawa: Traditional multicourse cuisine unsettled by a wild bear
Regrets? I have a ton. Here's one: I didn't get to eat bear meat at Godan Miyazawa. Perhaps one of the drawbacks of the omakase (chef's selection) here is that there's no actual menu to provide information about what's being served. Trusting your chef is a small price to pay for an elaborate multicourse meal that marries skill with tradition. Besides, there is a certain pleasure in anticipating what you're about to eat when the chef throws tradition out the door and lets a bear in — if you're lucky.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Feb 26, 2016
Oimatsu Kitagawa: A moment of calm in a swirling galaxy of Michelin stars
Toru Kitagawa, the chef and owner of Oimatsu Kitagawa, has a casual air about him that borders on insouciance — an air that belies the imagination, creativity and earnestness of his cooking. Perhaps this equanimity is an Osaka trait, but it could just have easily been cultivated at Gion Sasaki, the award-winning Japanese restaurant in Kyoto where Kitagawa worked for several years. That restaurant's team of mostly young chefs have the kind of self-assurance that only the young can pull off. Inside, Gion Sasaki is casual and refreshing — a reprieve from the studious silence and contemplation typical of haute cuisine restaurants here.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Jan 29, 2016
Rikyu: Playing games with traditional 'kaiseki' cuisine
Tsukasa Yamaguchi likes to play. But not much of what he does behind the counter of Rikyo, which he opened nearly two years ago, suggests this. Like many of his contemporaries working in haute cuisine restaurants, Yamaguchi has the manner and intensity of a surgeon. If you look closely, you'll see his lighter side shine through in only a few dishes during his elaborate nine-course lunch.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jan 15, 2016
Rikichi: Bowling and the art of traditional Japanese kaiseki
In 2000, Harvard political scientist Robert D. Putnam wrote "Bowling Alone," a book about the decline of community and rise of individualism in the U.S. I thought about the title of that book over lunch at Rikichi — indeed there was plenty of room for thinking. Not only was I the only diner, but chef and owner Shuichi Hiraoka was working by himself. It's how he prefers things in his little kappo (counter-style restaurant), tucked away in the back alleys of Gion.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Nov 13, 2015
Hashinaga: Delicious and relaxed kaiseki cooked by a formidable chef
I am almost certain that I wouldn't survive a day working under chef Noriyuki Hashinaga. I am, however, certain that I could eat his food every day.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Nov 6, 2015
Kohaku: Horsehair crab, turtle and caviar at this tradition-bending kaiseki restaurant
Tradition looks quite different in Tokyo than, say, Kyoto. Concealed and evolving under constant layers of reinvention, it must be sought out. Where to start? Just head to Kohaku in Kagurazaka, Tokyo's atmospheric nightlife district.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Oct 23, 2015
Kaishoku Shimizu: Slow kaiseki dining, watched over by Van Gogh
Across from Osaka's Van Gogh museum is Kaishoku Shimizu, a Japanese multicourse restaurant with a facade that looks small enough to squeeze onto a canvas. Between the counter and the two tables it can accommodate 15 diners, which may be a decent amount for restaurants of this kind but good luck trying to squeeze Japan's rugby heroes into this intimate space. The chefs — there are no waiters — are constantly having to shift one way or another as they attend to various tasks. Presiding over the cooks is the eponymous Toshihiro Shimizu, an affable and masterful head chef.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KANPAI CULTURE
Oct 9, 2015
The future for aged Japanese whisky and traditional kaiseki
'This will surprise you," says chef Kenichi Hashimoto as he hands me a glass of what appears to be beer. This serious-faced chef — who leads the kitchen at Kyoto's Ryozanpaku, a two-Michelin-starred kaiseki (Japanese haute cuisine) restaurant — waits for me to take a sip. He then explains that this fizzy drink is, in fact, a "super-highball" made with Suntory Hitomi (a rare single cask whisky from 1991) and soda, poured in alternating layers and capped with a thick head of creamy foam.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Sep 11, 2015
Kyokabutoya: Informal Japanese cuisine in an old wooden townhouse
Yasumasu Ikeda, chef and owner of Kyokabutoya, moved to the Kansai region from Hokkaido more than 15 years ago. After almost a decade of cutting his teeth in the kitchens of Osaka and Kyoto, he opened a Japanese restaurant around 2010. Kyokabutoya is housed in a machiya (traditional wooden townhouse), which is located a stone's throw from a buzzing centuries-old food market in the center of Kyoto.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Aug 7, 2015
Gion Sasaki: Where eel is served in tiny shrines and speaking on phones is banned
On the wall at Gion Sasaki there are two signs depicting mobile phones with lines through them. Bringing your phone with you is allowed, but speaking on it is a no-no. When I visited for lunch, an Asian tourist dining on his own nearby barely put his phone down during the entire nine-course kaiseki meal. He was, I fear, so distracted by apps, messages, news updates and pictures he may have missed one of Kyoto's best meals. I dedicate this review to him, for he was there in body, but that is all.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jul 10, 2015
Ogawa: Dining at a six-seat restaurant in Kyoto's traditional nightlife district
The Kyoto neighborhood of Gion is small but complicated. Wedged between the hills of Higashiyama and the Kamo River, it contains some of Japan's most picturesque and well-trodden streets, but there's also a warren of back-alleys and lanes with bright lights and seedy goings-on.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Jun 26, 2015
Rakushin: Austere multicourse dining in a traditional Osaka town house
What does austerity look and feel like? Well, it depends on whom you ask. I imagine for Greeks it’s a sort of endless despair engendering cynicism, but here in Japan, austerity — or, rather, restraint — can engender a sense of luxury, subtlety and even sensuality. Austerity has a long and rich history here, and many Japanese have an innate feeling for expressing it. Shintaro Katayama, the chef at Rakushin, who runs the restaurant with his sommelier wife, are masters of restraint and surprise.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Oct 14, 2014
Ginza Maru: Kaiseki courses that won't break the bank
Sitting down to a kaiseki dinner is rarely a casual decision, least of all in Ginza. Like going to kabuki or shopping for pearls at Mikimoto, you need to budget time and cash for a multi-course meal of traditional cuisine in the glittering heart of Tokyo.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Sep 9, 2014
Wakuden: An early lunch of budget kaiseki cuisine
Wakuden in Kyoto Station opens for lunch at 11 a.m. Who eats lunch that early? To answer I arrived minutes after 11, thinking I would be dining tout seul. Far from it: The queue was out the door. The reason: Wakuden serves pricey kaiseki (haute cuisine) — sets starts at ¥6,000 — but every day there are a set number of roughly 15 lunches (called Kuchinashi) priced at ¥2,700. Hence the early birds, many of whom were in their twilight years.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Apr 5, 2013
Akasaka Kikunoi: Tastes of old Kyoto in Tokyo's bustling heart
A pair of ornamental cherry trees stand like attendants by a sturdy wooden gateway. A narrow flagstone path lined with bamboo and maples curves out of sight in the mid-distance.
No link to Nankai Trough quake seen after temblor in Shikoku
Satoshi Harada from the Meteorological Agency explains about the magnitude 6.6 earthquake during a news conference early Thursday.
Tehran signals no retaliation against Israel after drones attack Iran
A reported strike against Iran by Israel on Friday came against the backdrop of Iran's support for the Palestinian Hamas militant group, whose assault into Israel on Oct. 7 triggered Israel's invasion of Gaza.
In a first, Japan doctors sue Google over negative reviews on firm's map app
One of the lawyers representing a group of doctors suing Google told a news conference that the main purpose of the lawsuit is not to seek compensation but instead to raise awareness over various problems with the Google Maps system.
Former No. 1 Kento Momota retires from international badminton at 29
Badminton star Kento Momota leaves a news conference after announcing his retirement from Japan's national team, in Tokyo on Thursday.
Thousands evacuated as Indonesia volcano erupts
Indonesia's Mount Ruang spews hot lava and smoke as seen from Sitaro, North Sulawesi, on Wednesday.
'House of the Owl' brings Hollywood values to Japanese TV
In the new Disney+ series “House of the Owl,” Min Tanaka (left) plays a powerful political fixer, or “kuromaku,” who has a troubled relationship with his adult children, particularly his idealistic son, played by Mackenyu.
Benefits and risks: AUKUS looks to take gamble on Japan
U.S. President Joe Biden, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and British leader Rishi Sunak deliver remarks on the AUKUS partnership, after a trilateral meeting, at Naval Base Point Loma in San Diego in March last year.
Kyoto’s demon night parade lives to haunt another day
In a Kyoto long past, the "hyakki yagyō" (100 demon night parade) haunted a sleepy corner of Kyoto. Now, one enterprising monster enthusiast has won a small batttle to keep the march alive.
U.S. deploys midrange missile system in Indo-Pacific for first time
A U.S. Army Mid-Range Capability (MRC) Launcher arrives as part of the capability’s first deployment into theater on Northern Luzon, Philippines, April 8.
Unpacking the chaotic by-election in a scandal-hit Tokyo district
People listen to a campaign speech in Tokyo's Koto Ward on Tuesday.

Podcast

From easily navigable train stations to the helpfulness of its municipal staff, Tokyo has earned high praise for its commitment to accessibility for disabled travelers.
[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Longform

Historically, kabuki was considered the entertainment of the merchant and peasant classes, a far cry from how it is regarded today.
For Japan's oldest kabuki theater, the show must go on
By Lance Henderstein

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Prize winner Maki Imoto catches light with glass
Prize winner Maki Imoto catches light with glass

SPECIAL SUPPLEMENTS note

Read more

SUPPLEMENTS BINDER