Man do I have a backlog of stuff to post. Sorry, life has been crazy! But for my first post in a while, it will of course be a new delicious place I found to eat. Because as much as I love learning wonderful things about culture, viewing beautiful parks and gardens, and even discovering new things about myself in ways only living alone in a foreign country can teach . . . let's be honest, the reason I'm here in this country is the food
So let's chat about gyukatsu, shall we? Not uncommon, but certainly atypical, gyukatsu is the cousin of tonkatsu (about which I have discoursed in the past). "Ton" means pork, "gyu" means beef. So instead of a nice pork loin wrapped in batter and fried, you do the same with steak
Now, steak is delicious. Deep-frying things makes them delicious. So I'm working on a theory here that if you take something delicious and subject it to a process that makes things delicious . . . it will be super delicious. Gyukatsu is definitely a positive data point in this theory
There's a shop near my work that does a very nice gyukatsu. Head on down for lunch and get the lunch set, I'm sure you won't be disappointed. But I think I'm going to keep that shop anonymous, I'll explain in a sec
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| I will never get tired of lunch sets |
But wait. Now that's nice and all, but if I made a post for every meal that was "nice and all", I'd spend my whole life glued in front of the laptop. But there is a shop in Akihabara that pushes all of my extra credit buttons
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| Tiny interior . . . |
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| . . . with a long line out front |
Ichi Ni San Gyukatsu (it's a pun--"ichi ni san" is Japanese for "one two three", but uses a different set of kanji in this name) in Akihabara does not mess around. Like many of the places that get mentioned on here, their menu is simple and delicious. I wandered past it at lunch one day and saw a line even longer than the one in the photo. So I came back right at opening time and managed to sneak in
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| Lnch set. 1200 yen'll get you beef, veggies, soup, rice, and three kinds of sauce |
Awesome, gorgeous, and super fun. But what sets them apart is the quality of the meat. Let's compare to the first place, which as we said will remain nameless because it's just not fair to have to measure up to Ichi Ni San. Well, there is no comparison
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| Exhibit A |
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| Exhibit B |
You want to take amazingly high quality beef and then wrap it in light delicious crispy batter? Head on down to Akihabara. Wait in line, it'll be worth it
Noah out
I couldn't help but notice the "man-sized" bowl of rice that accompanies the meal. Makes our large rice bowls look like regular size. Are those noodle bowls of rice. I hope Japan isn't doing the portion size creep we do is the USA! Anyway, nice to see you posting again. Thank you. Your fan club is really glad to get the latest installment!
ReplyDeleteRice is usually the one thing people love to double up on here. I don't know if it's a portion creep though, I think that's just how lunch works. Get full at lunch when it's cheap!
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