MUGA Day#15: Osaka--Kahala

Kahala is #33 on the Pellegrino list of Best 50 Restaurants in Asia and has two Michelin Stars.  The chef is Yoshifumi Mori, who I asked, why Kahala, and he turned away without responding.  I later inquired and got the following story, which he would deny, I think.  Forty-one years ago, Mori spent his honeymoon in Hawaii.  No details.  Forty years ago, when he was all of 26, he opened a small steak restaurant at this very location, and called it Kahala.  Surely, he must have spent his honeymoon at the Kahala Hotel.

Anyway, I would never have found the restaurant if I did not catch a taxi.  It is in a back alley on the second floor with no obvious sign:

Here is my take.  He suffered through decades of running his business and somewhat recently decided to jack up his prices by a factor of ten and become famous.  He certainly succeeded.  Tetsuya of his restaurant in Sydney comes here.  While some call the cuisine kappo ryori, a cross between kaiseki and izakaya, I would term this international teppanyaki fusion food, although the only time that metal front is used is for the finale, a Kyushu beef.  He paints his own laquerware.  He is here showing an Okayama cheese:

The place only holds eight, so it's smaller than Jiro's.  I had an Osaka grape wine aperitif, glass of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, Niigata sake and French Cabernet-Merlot.  The first course was an asparagus-hokkigai (red clam)-cheese dish:

Then an assortment of appetizers:

That white squarish thing at the middle bottom is made from one piece of mountain yam, peeled into an interconnecting chain.  Try doing that someday.

There was no menu, and I'd be guessing, so let me get on with the rest of the meal.  A curry puff pastry:

Cheese sushi:

I like to use my fingers when I eat, so that was convenient here.  Soba with Italian dried fish eggs (?):

At this point I asked how many more dishes were coming, and informed that the number was eight, I royally insulted the staff by from this point only consuming half of everything, and still got supersaturated.  But this was probably because I had not yet recovered from the after effects of Narisawa.  Next bamboo shoots from Osaka:

The abalone mushroom soup in a large half onion was superb, maybe the best of all:

A red pepper and paprika drink was served, and I found it nicely refreshing;

I'm sorry I didn't get his name, but the Sous Chef (above) was extremely helpful and showed me how to eat the various creations.  As for example, that beef below is like the nori for sushi, you place it on the outside and the wasabi and garlic inside:

They gave me three pieces, and I unfortunately ate all three, although I was really, really, stuffed.

Rice, peas and egg yolk with tsukemono (Japanese pickles) ended the food part:

The sweet lemon from Shizuoka was a nice tarty touch:

The primary dessert was a honey caramel sorbet:

While Mori changes the set once a month, here is a blogger with some general details.  What does not change is his milk tea with honey:

You see those colored things to the bottom right?  They are candy coated fennel, which enhances the taste of the tea.  He gave me a packet of this fennel, and another of sesame seeds:

The total bill was north of $300, but much cheaper than Jiro's.  Mori deserves his Pellegrino Top 50 rating and those two Michelin stars.  The creative cuisine, fine orchestration of the service and general ambiance will forever be memorable.  After all, this meal cost me less than one night at the Osaka St. Regis.

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MUGA Day#14: Tokyo to Osaka

One overriding parameter in the planning of My Ultimate Global Adventure (MUGA) was minimization of stress.  So this morning, I awoke to a brilliant view of Mount Fuji, but with the following headlines:

TEPCO finds second pit leaking in Fukushima

South Korea says it's set for anything (my next stop after Japan is Seoul)

Concerns grow over the avian-flu strain spreading China (my stop after Korea)

At least there is nothing happening in Frankfurt, Germany, which comes after Beijing.

Japan trains are noted for their punctualness.  Except, it  turns out, for high winds.  Yesterday, my hotel determined that my best shot at viewing a cherry blossom peak was Hitachi in Ibaraki.  My other option was to take a Shinkansen to Fukuoka and hire a cab to drive me as close as possible to the nuclear cataclysm.  Well, as that could have stressful, I caught the Super Hitachi (left), which was supposed to get there in an hour an a half.  Super??  This was the slowest train I've ever taken, moving most of the time at maybe 10 MPH.  Even worse than Amtrak.  I'm sure announcements were made along the way, but I don't understand Japanese.  So two hours into my journey, and not even close to Hitachi, I finally inquired.  High winds forced the train to move only very slowly.  So at Mito, I jumped off to try to take me back to Tokyo.  Easier said than done, but five hours later I did make it back.  I saw no cherry blossoms.  The only concession was that the Shinkansens were also affected by the winds.

For the future traveler here is a beginning Japan Rail Pass Guide to the Shinkansen (bullet train)  There are 1500 miles of tracks and the fastest train goes up to 200 miles per hour.  If you think this is quick, test runs have gone up to 275 MPH, and the world record for their experimental maglev was 361 MPH.

First, you need to obtain this pass BEFORE you get to Japan.  Here are further details.  Today, for me:

1.  There are three speeds, and here are their times and frequency/hour from Tokyo to Shin-Osaka:
     Nozomi 2.5 hours (5)
     Hikari    3 hours    (2)
     Kodama  4 hours   (2)
     This is an anachronism that should be changed, but the pass does NOT allow you to use Nozomi.

2.  At the Tokyo Station, if you want a better bento to consume on the train, you must go one floor down to a more elaborate food court.  Note the prices.

3.  No big deal because you will most likely get a reserved seat, but if the train is to be crowded, people begin to stand in line at what is supposed to be the entrance.  Next to it is kind of the exit of the next car.  No one stands there.  So that is where you enter.

However, there are different details depending on where you come from and where you want to go.  Any train with a Max is a doubledecker.  In some segments, be careful where you sit because half the train goes in a different direction at some point after departure.

So here arrived my Shinkansen:

My $40 bento set:

Best I've ever had on a train.  Soon after leaving Tokyo Station, you could already see Mount Fuji.  This was the first time I've ever notice MF on a train in Tokyo.  Half an hour into the ride:

By the way, that photo at the top was not taken from my hotel room, but from just about here.  The view, however, is not always so picturesque:

I guess there were no winds, for the train arrived at Shin-Osaka in exactly 3 hours.  Many Shinkansen stations are new (meaning of "shin") and were built outside the city.  The Japan Rail Pass cannot be used for subways and metros.  What does work well is something called a Suica card, which works everywhere, including for JR trains.  The Hibiki is here because my hotel allows me two of these per day.

The Osaka St. Regis has become my favorite hotel in Japan.  The service is over the top and accommodations grand.  Except for one bump at check in.  I added a second day to my stay here, and they indicated, sorry, but on Day 1 you were provided, appropriately enough for this day, the Mount Fuji Suite, but, the room was taken in advance for Day 2, so you need to move to still a pretty good room, but must pay an additional $400 if you wish to remain a second night in the suite.  Note the additional.  Also, what kind of logic is this?  Think about it.  So I said, nah, give me the not so terrific but still good room so I don't need to move.  But then I thought, all I had was a small wheely with not much of anything, so I took this incredible suite for one night.  Here are two views of the room from each end:

And you don't even see the bathroom, which is fabulous.  I noted this:

I can't imagine a 27-floor fire escape ladder:

I live on the 27th floor in Honolulu.  Maybe I'd better look into this.

Tonight, dinner at Kahala, which is written and pronounced Kahara here.

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MUGA Day #13: Tokyo--Lunch at the Best Restaurant in Asia

I had a fabulous lunch today with President of Tokyo University of A&T, Tadashi Matsunaga, and his wife Mayumi.  We all agreed that Les Creations de Narisawa was unusual and exceptional.  After all, this is the best restaurant in all of Asia.  

I asked our waiter what kind of cuisine would be served.  To paraphrase:  fusion of Japanese and the World featuring natural products and the environment.  The chef is Yoshihiro Narisawa (here to the left in his kitchen).

To begin the day, I went to Shinjuku Station to work out my Japan Rail Pass and arrange tickets for my itinerary.  It now looks different, featuring Mount Fuji instead of the Great Wave off Kanagawa by Hokusai.  It took an hour less than what I was expecting, but I thought I'd find my way to Narisawa just to make sure I knew where it was.  It was closed, so I walked around and thought I'd start the meal with a white wine while sitting on a bench across the street from this restaurant.  Family Mart had one of those glass cups for less than $2.  I sat next to some colorful flowers.

A little after noon I walked in and they took me to our table, where I had a Kir Royale.  The Matsunagas came and they had glasses of champagne.

An odd dough was brought to our table, and allowed to ferment.  Best as I can tell it was a kind of sourdough with herbs, espeially cherry blossoms, and called "Forest 2010" Bread of the Forest:

The dough was placed in a hot natural oven on our table to bake.  We had a Duckhorn Merlot with our meal.

The first item served look like three pieces of turd, but was, it turned out, oysters:

Then came Essence of forest:

Looked like a forest floor.  That brown thing was french fried potato skin.  The liquid in the bamboo cup was cold water.  It was okay.  Six Chiayu (sweet fish) were served:

The guts were still in, meaning there was a bitter taste to the fried fish.  Soil 2001 was a gobo (burdock soup):

Basically, you pick up the cup and drink it.  I've never had gobo soup, but Narisawa made it sweetish and good.  The Matsunagas got crab legs, but I was served the best asparagus I've ever had in the life.  Straight from Saga, Kyushu, and parboiled, with a delicate dressing:

Note artistry.  Ash 2009, Scene of the seashore, somehow was linked to a liquid nitrogen foam:

That is a squid in the seashore:

There is a lot of ceremony to each dish, and the Sawaru (Spanish mackerel) with onion essence was no exception;

Luxury essence 2007 was a black abalone vegetable soup:

Next (above) was fugu (blowfish) from Yamaguchi.  The closest thing to what I had before was fried rattlesnake.  This was the safe part of the fish, the flesh.  The all time high one year had 6 deaths.  I shared with them my experience with Professor Takeo Kondo and Joseph Vadus in Kita-Kyushu, where the meal started with blowfish testicles.  Joe refused to eat his, so I had two.  This was around two decades ago, and many of by best ideas, like the Blue Revolution, were stimulated, I think, by this catalyst.   It is essential that this delicacy be consumed before the mating season, as fugu can be hundreds of times more poisonous than strychnine and cyanide.  Happy to report that I survived this dish again.  The final entre was: 

Yes, that black lump, sliced, yielded a filet, with boiled onion wedge.  The official dessert was a Kuzumochi-Sakekdasu with strawberries:

Of course, the meal was not yet over:

I'm afraid I overdid this and selected half a dozen of them.  I can accept Narisawa as the best restaurant in Asia.  The meal lasted nearly four hours.  Again, Tadashi and Mayumi:

I might finally add that their son, Teipei, is a councilman, among the youngest ones in the country, from the hometown of President Matsunaga, while their daughter, Mariko, just returned to Japan after spending her post-doc in chemistry at Harvard.

I also had another 4-hour encounter that evening in the Tokyo Westin Executive Club in a stimulated discussion on everything from energy to religion with four friends from Hawaii:

Clyde, Jean, Galen and Sharon.  They have been on a roots search.  A memorable day, indeed.