jpatokal

Last week's Tokyo episode of Anthony Bourdain's "Parts Unknown" makes Sushi Yasuda (Minami-Aoyama, near Gaienmae stn) sound pretty epic, and rather incredibly, the omakase for dinner is only Y3200/3800 for 10/12 pieces. Anybody been? Worth the hype, and how tough is it to get in? Apparently reservations required and only 8 seats.

Pickles

Hype? What hype? His only customers are unadventurous New Yorkers that have issues telling the good stuff from the merely mediocre.

KPT

+infinity
QFT

There is a certain brand of pseudo foodie growing in ranks across the country, fueled by a constant stream of garbage from cable television. I'm sad to see some of our local ethnic flavors go flat due to these people.

AlwaysAisle

Owner of Sushi Yasuda, Naomichi Yasuda, was trained as sushi chef in New York City. Japanese going to New York City to train as sushi chef…? That is like French person in France wanting to become French chef, decide to go to Thailand for French cuisine training instead of studying in France. Or Mexican person in Mexico wanting to become Mexican chef, decide to go to Russia for Mexican cuisine training instead of studying in Mexico.

Any media programs like this, establishments featured on a program are pretty much always negotiated through agents. It is not like they decide to feature a restaurant purely based on the quality of cuisine. Often quality of food become not part of the negotiation process. Likely Sushi Yasuda already had agents working for them, the owner was seeking that kind of publicity.

It is possible that Sushi Yasuda is more for taste buds of New Yorkers, not for taste buds of Edokko (江戸っ子). Maybe better to stick with manga which features sexually ambiguous pretty young boys and girls and head out to Kabukicho (歌舞伎町) for more of weird sexually implied show at side street clubs as Anthony Bourdain shown on the program.

jpatokal

So... have any of you actually been there, or are you just basking in a warm glow of assumed superiority? The reason I find his concept intriguing is precisely because he's struck his own path instead of just faithfully replicating standard Edomae, and if he was in this (purely) for the money, he'd still be charging $180/head in NYC. In other words, forget authenticity, does it taste good?

Also, this isn't your standard Japanese "waa, oishii!" infomercial, since Bourdain makes a point of not being anybody's b!tch, and from what I know of the restaurants, street stalls and holes-in-the-wall featured in his other shows, this does seem to be the case. He quit the Travel Channel rather publicly after they tried to sneak in product placement.

Q Shoe Guy

Was this the show I partially watched on CNN? They lost me when they veered into the discussion of tentacle porn while munching on tomato nabe…..I have been to the sushi-ya you mention as it is near my apartment. It was fine…..but I am not a sushi-maven (coffee is a different story).

AlwaysAisle

If you really beleive that...

The owner moved back to Japan from New York City in 2011. Restaurant at Minami-aoyama is two years old or less. It is not old establishment but not totally new. The restaurant review sites in Japanese (reviewed by Japanese) have very few reviews about this restaurant. But one common comments are that there were foreign people (non-Japanese) at the restaurant. Looks like people who knew the owner from back in New York City come to this restaurant.

One of the review site averaged three out of five. Seems like the food is not bad, but the owner looks like making exact copy of New York City restaurant. For example, ウニ (Uni, sea urchin) served at this restaurant has two type: one from East Coast U.S. (Maine coast) another from West Coast U.S. (California coast). No local Japanese uni is served. The owner seems to be using exactly same ingredients as New York City restaurant. Maybe the owner does not know anything else, since he was trained in New York City?

I think people who reviewed the restaurant is saying that the food is not bad at all, but no local Japanese ingredients? In Tokyo and no uni from Japan, but from the U.S.? If the owner gets ingredients from outside of Japan, then likely those are frozen, not fresh from local market. It is like in Texas at steak restaurant, but having beef from Australia because American owner was trained as a chef in Australia?

The review seems to agree with one point, the restaurant is good. But it is like having nice New York City restaurant sushi at Tokyo. If that is what you are looking for, then I think this restaurant is for you.

Pickles

I went to the one in New York a number of times. Was it good? Yes, it was fine, on the right side of decent. Was it the kind of experience that I would seek out in Tokyo? No. Was it equivalent to some of the best I had in Japan? Not even close, it was one step above Sushi Zanmai. That's probably why his omakase is JPY 3800 for dinner, which is what you'd pay at Sushi Zanmai for 10-12 pieces of Sushi Zanmai quality. Perfectly fine, but not a dining destination.

Now, I haven't been to the one in Tokyo, but given the priors, I have no interest, and I wouldn't waste a dinner in Tokyo just to check it out.

As for Bourdain being anybody's poodle, I also believe Yasuda probably didn't pay him or his production company anything for the "product placement". But Bourdain and Yasuda know each other from way back, and this looks to me as a convenient way for Bourdain to help out a friend and make Bourdain's life easier for his show. Has a good angle, very Japanese: Famous US-trained sushi chef and favorite of the intended viewership of his show moves to Japan to try his hand there, spends his spare time in martial arts. Austere, Japanese, wabisabi, mind-blowing! Very mysterious and Oriental, no?

gnaget

As much as I hate to agree with "Pickles the king of Quartz clocks"....... and I have eaten there. Put it this way, the sushi at Zanmai is much, much, much better. I even much prefer the sushi I purchase in the basement of Tokyu-honten or Food Show despite the refrigerated rice.

The sushi is very much like a mediocre sushi restaurant in the States. One thing that strikes you is the small size of the nigiri with tiny, thin pieces of fish. There is a reason that the set only costs ~3000 yen. However, a positive is that there is a least no California rolls or other American style maki sushi abominations.

Another positive is that the guy is a friendly character and speaks reasonable English (poor if he in fact lived in NYC for several decades).

Getting a reservation? My impression was more that the place might close because there are no bookings. I got the impression that he was doing it as a hobby in retirement.

We were the only gaijin there and the non-counter tables were not used. In fact they used them for bag storage. The restaurant had a nice ambiance but I would rather take the mediocre ambiance of Zanmai with a few tattooed Shibuya louts than the more upscale atmosphere and mediocre sushi.

I am rather shocked that this guy gets accolades in NYC.

But I guess the yardstick/ competition is so weak in the US. And I suppose it's a clever ploy to convince the dumb NYers that having a tiny sliver fish is the height of sushi refinement:

"The chefs do not play around with seasoning, adding jalapeńo here and mayonnaise there. Monstrous portions of fish do not overlap the rice like flopping fillets. The classic proportions endure."

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/16/di...view.html?_r=0

I haven't been there for 4-5 years but there is a decent sushi restaurant in Denver that had a special menu with Japan imported fish. Simple stuff like aji, but you never see it in the US. What does the clientele order? You see odd looking rolls with layers of avocado and mayonnaise cross the counter; nary a plate of nigiri.

Steve M

There does seem be a lot of that in this forum, from time to time.

... and maybe others wouldn't. Maybe someone on what might be a once-in-a-lifetime visit to Tokyo would like to sit at a sushi counter run by a lone proprietor/chef that has practiced the art of making sushi for decades, and loves to share the experience and can converse in English, over an izakaya-style place run by a corporate chain? ... and doesn't want to pay $350 to what's-his-face?

That seems fairly straightforward. Add to that that both Bourdain and Yasuda lived in NYC at the same time for a couple of decades, and both are in the restaurant business, and Yasuda's restaurant in NYC was apparently somewhat well known. It's totally natural that Bourdain would go to and feature his place when he took his show to Tokyo. No grand conspiracies about heavily-scripted TV or product placement are needed.

gnaget

Zanmai is corporate but does a fantastic job of delivering good sushi at reasonable prices. Their tuna is especially good. It is farmed tuna from Japan.

Also, there is a specials menu at Zanmai only in Japanese, so tourists cannot read it. But you can ask what it is, as long as you know the fish names in Japanese. Usually it's on the table but sometimes on the board. That's where the good seasonal stuff is found. I usually order the tuna set and exclusively from this menu.

Like last time I had the hon-maguro set plus from the specials menu: kinmedai, kue, broiled sanma (I asked to have it broiled) and seki-aji. The latter is a special aji from Oita fished in the channel between Kyushu and Shikoku.

Yasuda does not get within a mile of offering this kind of fish. I am also pretty sure that Zanmai (if you order correctly) is better than his illustrious $130 a head restaurant in NYC.

p.s. Sadly, I recently noticed on the wall in Zanmai that there is a photo of California roll with a caption in English. It is not even listed on the menu.

Pickles

You can do much better than Yasuda for that once-in-a-lifetime experience with a sushi boss conversant in English. And you don't have to pay $350 to what's-his-face for some decent fish laced with xenophobic attitude, that's on the other extreme of the ridiculous.

Maybe it's totally natural, but intensely self-serving, unimaginative, and taking the easiest way out. To his credit, Bourdain did once feature what's-his-face. He filmed the whole thing, which consisted of Bourdain coming in to what's-his-face's restaurant, sitting down, and having 15 pieces of sushi in 15 minutes, give-or-take 30 seconds. So running Tokyo again would mean finding somebody that wasn't what's-his-face, and Yasuda was probably the simplest, easiest answer.

jousis

I usually don't like Bourdain's shows and sometimes his choices are not what the locals would choose (I can vouch for that for the countries I've been/live).

In this case, he clearly states that this guy is his mentor, that he knows him from NYC, etc. It's like he admits that he is doing a favor for a friend.
And I really like this attitude.He leaves nothing to be "debated". He just praises a friend.

Now, if you are TV-zombie you will ignore all that (commercial warning from the host himself) and go there expecting a super sushi chef. It's not Bourdain's fault though...

By the way, if you intend to go to Japan and you are a foodie, do not open tripadvisor or similar English sites.
Search from tabelog.com
It can be difficult with a translator but you can find gems if you give it some time.

Oh! I forgot.
At least, in this episode, this guy says that "it's mostly the rice that makes a good sushi" . Finally, I heard it once on mass media
(in here I've read it numerous times but you are the best- you don't count as mass media)

jpatokal

So to set the baseline here: I lived in Japan for a number of years, speak and read the language, and have eaten plenty of sushi in my time, some of it sublime, some of it awful. As it happens, I also rather like Sushi Zanmai for a quick dose of maguro -- will keep an eye out for that specials board next time! And since I go back yearly, I'm simply looking for an interesting new experience, not the absolute pinnacle of edomae for a once-in-a-lifetime trip.

Per the show, Yasuda's actually known for buying fresh fish (daily from Tsukiji) and flash-freezing it in his medical-grade deep freezer at some ludicrous temperature like -80C on purpose to break down the flesh and make it tastier. And having eaten tuna that was alive and flapping hours earlier, I agree with his assertion that extremely fresh fish has little taste.

Is that so ludicrous? Some of the best steak I've had was imported frozen from Uruguay.

I've never been to a nice NYC sushi restaurant, unless you count Melbourne's branch of Nobu, which was one of the worst meals of my life. But Nobu's all chilli mayo this and yuzu glaze that, while Yasuda's experimentation seems a lot more restrained.

armagebedar

I think most people are not saying that Sushi Yasuda is bad, just that while it may be a standout sushi restaurant in New York, in Tokyo it's just one of hundreds--if not thousands--with a similar value proposition. Hence the "so what?" reaction.

I've never been, nor do I plan to go -- I've never been interested in celebrity sushi restaurants. The food can speak for itself.