Kaseki Stumble - I'd Like to Tumble More Often

It was a Friday night and Russell and I wanted to try something new.  But it's hard.  We try,  (think the Godfather) but the hood just keeps-pulling-us-back.  There are just so many good restaurants in our neighborhood.  We started walking, thinking we'll just head up to Azabu Juban and try something there.

But before we could get out of our zip code, we stumbled upon this place.  It looked really nice from the outside.  Nicely lit - usually a good sign.  There were wine glasses and pretty sake glasses on the tables.  The people inside seemed to be having a really good time.  They weren't smoking.  We decided to go in and see if they could accommodate us.  Always a risk when you're an expat.  I can't tell you how many times they say they're "fully committed" upon the sight of us, even though half the restaurant is abandoned.

Apparently, after careful consideration, they had room so we said we'd like a table.  They asked us to wait outside a minute.  I'm thinking, they're probably preparing a table away from the window. They wouldn't want to scare away the locals.  Then the manager came out with a serious look on his face and mumbled something conspiratorially to Russell.  What did he say, I queried when the guy went back inside.  "He said they only serve set courses and they start at 10,000 yen, which means about $120 USD.  "So, I guess they think we can't afford it?"  "Apparently.  But I told them it was fine, " Russell said.

They sat us at the counter all smiles and bows.  One of the men behind the counter looked worried.  I realized it was because he was supposed to serve us and he didn't speak English very well.  This was the kind of place where they explain each course, and you want them too.  We ordered a bottle of Sancerre.  It was tasty and reasonably priced.  So far so good.

We had stumbled upon a Kaseki restaurant.  Basically a Kaseki meal is a gourmet multi-course dinner.  It is actually considered an art form as the entire experience is carefully orchestrated to balance taste, texture, appearance and the colors of food.  Even the serving dishes and presentation are carefully considered and represent the best the season has to offer.

I had learned about this through my reading and cultural classes.  All right!  Bring it!

The Japanese kanji characters used to say Kaseki literally translates to "stone in the bosom."  Huh?
They think this came from Sen no Rikyu who originated kaseki as part of the tea ceremony.  His idea was to equalize all guests by serving a frugal meal like the monks did back then.  Back then the Zen monks would put a warm stone in the fold of their robes, near their bellies, to ward off hunger.  That's usually where I put the wine.

The name of the restaurant was Wake Toku and it was sublime!  I want to come back once a quarter to see how they change the menu.

This was the place setting to get us in the mood.

The wheat represents the harvest and the leaf represents the change in seasons.

I'm sure everything else has a meaning too but this is far as I got.

Amuse bouche

I am very amused.

Creamy, heavenly sea urchin served with a mild sweet custard

Four seasonal vegetables each prepared magnificently.

Look at that tomato.  No this film is not color enhanced.

It tastes as good as it looks.

This is sashimi with different toppings and a dollop of wasabe.

I want this bowl.  Badly.

The wasabe was hand grated on this shark skin

Seasonal mushroom soup.

I'd seen these mushrooms in the store for 3500y or $42

for a small, and I mean small, package.

Abalone with seaweed

Served in the shell

Fish with perfectly crusted top and Wagyu beef 

A closer look, 

note the pine needle for effect.

I don't remember what this was but I loved the crock it came in.

Clearly it was handmade.

And Russell's was different.

Throughout the dinner the one waiter who could speak English would give us a colorful explanation of each course.  When he couldn't think of the English translation he'd whip out his trusty translator.

Their version of traditional miso soup

including house made tofu

Rice pot with spoon

This rice was amazing and not just because it had caviar on top 

Those are pickled vegetables on the side

Pickled vegetables are served with almost all Japanese meals

The variety of veggies they use always inspires me

Dessert was the season of Fall - jellified

The brown portion is a sweat, meaty chestnut

Note the maple leaf

After this meal I felt as content as a monk, with a whole satchel of heated stones in my belly.

It was a religious experience.

Kichijoji - Japanese Housewives Neighborhood of Choice?

The tour was touted as "Kichijoji the Japanese Housewives' Neighborhood of Choice."   It sounded intriguing or at least like an interesting reality series.  I had to check it out.  What do Japanese housewives want? Fresh produce?  Cool shops?  Young, virile gardeners?

When we arrived in Kichijoji the streets were empty.  Well except for Starbucks of course.  It was around 10am and my first impression wasn't enriching.  I asked our guide, so what do you mean Kichijoji is the neighborhood of choice for Japanese housewives?  She just smiled and said you'll see.

But I didn't see.  Sure the houses I saw from the train as we made our approach to Kichijoji station were larger than those in central Tokyo.  It is a suburb after all.  And yeah, there seemed to be a lot of green around, which is nice.  But I wasn't really seeing the big draw.

Turns out Japanese housewives want...wait for it...a big park?  We spent the majority of our time walking around Inokashira Park.

The park was nice.  Actually very nice.  I must come back during Cherry Blossom Season I thought.  It had a pretty shrine, an athletic field and a famous Anime museum called the Ghibili Museum, which we didn't go into.   Apparently Ghibili is thee studio for Anime and has a contract for distribution through Disney. If I knew anything about Anime I would know this.  If we had kids this would definitely be a place to come back to.

We ate lunch at a Thai restaurant in the park.  The weather was so nice and the food was great.  The set menu was a good deal.

After lunch we walked back through the park towards the station.  The streets, which in the morning had been so empty, were now crowded with sidewalk merchandise and hoardes of housewives shopping.  Ok, now I get it.  There were lots of interesting little shops, with friendly vendors, inviting us in.  She lead us to a large no-vehicles-allowed shopping street.  Our guide explained that most of the vendors have been there for years and the citizens of the town get to know each of them personally.

She, apparently knew one vendor in particular whom owns a tea shop call Ocharaka.  He was French.  He had samples of his tea waiting for us when we arrived.  The thing about his tea shop, unlike other Japanese tea shops, is that he adds other flavors to his tea.  I'm thinking, what's the big deal? They do that all the time in America.  But apparently that is a big deal.  Japanese tea makers do not add ANYTHING to their tea.  Period.

But this guy, did I mention he was French, named Stephan no less, explained how he is a sommelier and wanted to apply his sommelier finesse to tea.  Ok, I'll bite.  Um, I mean drink.  His staff passed around more samples as we all settled in, drawn by the romantic tilt of his oh-so-French accent.  "You were saying...oh yes, tea.....go on." Sigh.

Apparently his tea is so well regarded it's endorsed by the Japanese government in an effort to increase tea exports.  When he brought around his newly minted special Christmas blend we were all smitten and couldn't get our pocketbooks out fast enough.

http://www.ocharaka.co.jp/e_concept.html

The tour concluded there but our imaginations didn't.  We all vowed to come back and Christmas shop.

Japanese housewife?

Starbucks - one of many.

Large expansive park.

I don't see any housewives.

But this reminds me of a record cover.

Pretty lake and bridge

Allegedly this path leads all the way back into Central Tokyo

Could be a good bike path or running route

Russell would love this.

You can rent these.

Pool, pond, pond would be good for you.

That wisteria must be gorgeous in the Spring.

Hmmm. Nice place for a picnic.

Praying mantis blending in unlike us 16 expat women.

Run for your lives!

I love turtles.

Pretty little bridge.

Natural well, which is the source of the stream.

View of the shrine across the lake.

Cistern at the shrine.

View of the park from the cistern.

Nice.

Shrine

Does this look like it would be an anime museum to you?

I was expecting something more high tech.

It looks like hobbits could live here.

Tori gates along the lake.

Hungry fish.

This lake water looks like art.

Everything sounds good with a French accent.

Go on, you were saying?....

His shop.

Jayne, aka Vanna White, passing around the tea with a flourish

Oh Joel What Have You Done?

Ever since the first time we came to Tokyo I have wanted to dine at Joel Robuchon in Ebisu Garden Place.  Not only is it one of the best restaurants in Tokyo with three Michelin stars, it's the kind of place where you can get away with wearing an evening gown, diamonds and real fur.  Call me pretentious but ever since I was poor white trash I have fantasized about wearing these things to a fancy restaurant.  I mean go big or go home, right?

Unfortunately, I didn't bring any formalwear to Tokyo.  But that didn't stop me from wearing a black cocktail dress and fancy jewelry to the restaurant for our 18th anniversary.  Our anniversary almost didn't happen.  Russell came home from work that Friday in severe pain.  He was hospitalized that night for a kidney stone.   They told him they wanted to keep him there till Monday.  "But we have reservations at Joel Robuchon's on Sunday. He can't be in the hospital till Monday!"  Thankfully Russell was released on Saturday morning and felt well enough to make our reservation on Sunday evening.  Like me, he was really looking forward to it too.

Who wouldn't want to go here?

It looks like a French chateaux.

The door to heaven?

Hey, nice shoes.

Yeah, I'm gonna need a staircase like this someday.

The dining room was over the top elegant. At least the walls were.  They were covered with ornate boiseries and crystals. Yes, I said crystals.  They must be Swarovski because the walls were protected by heavy plastic panels so you couldn't touch, or rather steal, them.  The table tops were quite another story.  They were surprisingly mundane and cheap looking.  Sure there were cut crystal glasses, decent silverware and an impressively large charger plate on the rather blase black table cloth.  But to my utter horror they used fake, F-A-K-E, candles and not even the expensive kind that flicker like the real thing.   Seriously?  In a beautiful place like this I expected shimmering candelabras emanating a romantic appetite inspiring glow.   It took me a glass of champagne to get over my shock.

I'm thinking of redoing our bedroom this way without the plastic wrap.

The surprisingly mediocre table setting.

I just couldn't stand to take a picture of the Dollar Store fake candle.

The handsome devil.

I overcame my disappointment when the mountain-o-butter came, under glass no less.  Wow.  Just give me a big spoon.  This stuff was so good, so creamy, it was like, um, butter.  Yum.

No thanks on the bread, just give me a bigger spoon.

The menu came and we negotiated over the three different pre fixe choices.  Hmmm should we go big or really really big?  Of course we picked the biggest one.  It was our Anniversary and we wanted to try as much as possible. Our first mistake.

Technically this would be two pages but they 

used bigger paper to accommodate all the courses

We expected the food and wine to be exalted.  We knew it would not be cheap.  We've been to French Laundry.  We get it.  But we didn't expect to be insulted.  I've seen a lot of tragically over-priced wine lists in my day but this one was seriously insulting.  I mean I could see it maybe being somewhat acceptable, even appreciated, during the 80s when conspicuous consumption was in.  But this is the, WTF do we call this decade, the 00s.  And in the 00s value is coveted.  

Of course the wine list should be amazing.  But monied people are generally smart, that's how they got money.  This list was abasing, a personal affront to any intelligent individual who knows anything about wine.  We refuse to pay five times (and I'm not exaggerating) the retail price for a bottle of anything! That's just stupid.  So Russell decided we would buy by the glass.  Mistake number two.

Russell's horror at discovering we have to 

mortgage our house to afford a bottle of wine here.

BTW, the wine list was on an iPad. 

Maybe that's why the wine was so expensive

But then the amuse bouche came and we forgot the wine list for a moment.  OMG!  The amuse bouche was caviar served in a caviar tin, with a layer of cream fraiche underneath.  Now we're talking!  This is what we expect from a restaurant of this caliber.  We couldn't stop smiling between bites.

Hello Kitty!  I mean Caviar.  

Can I keep the tin?

I thought, how are they going to top that?!  The next, first course, was sea urchin prepared three ways.  In America sea urchin is a disgusting slimy, down right inedible, let's face it, yucky, thing.  But in Japan and especially at Robuchon's it is ambrosia.   

Food of the gods, that is Japanese, prepared three ways.

1) with a coffee scented mash potato - heaven

           2) in a "maki" with couscous and cucumber - heaven

     3) with shrimp custard and fennel cream - heaven

After that, several courses came in a parade of exquisite textures and tastes, served imaginatively and ironically timed out so that we had to purchase a new glass of wine with each 1.5 course.  Hmmm. Are they doing that on purpose?

Chilled pumpkin soup

The crustacean platter 

Red Lobster eat your heart out!

That gold globe has crustacean in a spicy herb broth

Can I keep the bowl?

Gorgonzola custard served with mint marinated peeled grapes

and the bowl is pretty too.

Russell may need to start peeling grapes now

Wagyu Beef grilled and served with wasabe 

flavored spinach and seasonal veggies

Organic spelt wheat with Summer truffle finish

I am finished!

But somewhere between the crustacean platter and the Wagyu beef we started to fill very, very wrong.  We took turns excusing ourselves from the table.  Each absence growing longer and more panicked.  It was clear neither one of us were faring well at all.  Was it something we ate?  We had to leave.  

We asked for the check before any of the three, yes three, dessert courses showed up.  Not only were we forfeiting the multiple dessert courses, but the tea service and the petit fours.  But not just any tea and petit fours.  A guy rolls around a tea trolley with live tea plants which he actually snips at your table and brews the aromatic beverage right in front of you.  And the petit fours, the petit fours! Another guy comes around with a different trolley boasting over 100 kinds of petit fours for you to pick from.  We'd been admiring them all night.  Well until we started to feel so retched.  

It took twenty minutes to get the check.  We were dying.   Funny how glass after glass of wine showed up before our lips took the last drag from the previous glass.  But we couldn't get the check to save our lives and at about that time, that's kind of what it felt like.  We were so ill.

You would of thought a classy establishment like this would have taken something off the tab since we missed a significant part of the menu.  But to our astonishment not one gesture was made to acknowledge the fact we were leaving without dessert or that we were sick.  They had to know, we were in the bathroom, more than we were at the table. Sure they gave us a goody bag which consisted of some cookies and a small loaf of bread.  But that did nothing to make us feel good about spending more than we have ever spent on a meal in our lives.  I am too embarrassed to admit how much.

The congratulatory anniversary token they delivered with our check.

Is this what took twenty minutes?

Congratulations suckers!  You just spent more on 

this meal than a down payment on a Mercedes.

Just get us out of here!

We faked those smiles well.