Origami: A Good Place to Try Beef 'Sashimi'

One of the latest trends in Japan is niku zushi. It's basically sushi that is topped with raw meat (usually beef or horse) instead of fish. For many, the sound of eating raw meat may make you apprehensive, but at Origami, a 10 minute walk from Nagoya Station, you can try a version that's not quite raw and will give you an idea of what meat sashimi is like.

The items on the menu here say sashimi fuu. This fuu means "in the syle of". So it may not be exactly sashimi but it is a similar take on it.

Beef, sashimi-style

It looks raw doesn't it? It's actually been passed through a very low temp to get this effect. The restaurant recommends using their slightly sweet soy sauce which goes very well with the red meat. It's just like in Kyushu where they dip their horse sashimi (basashi) in a sweeter than normal soy sauce. Eating this meat 'sashimi', you can enjoy the flavour of the fat and meat as opposed to the juices when you eat warmed, grilled meat. 

Beef liver, sashimi-style

Here, we have liver that is served to look and taste like sashimi. Beef liver is now prohibited by law to be served raw in restaurants, so this is a really good dish mimicking the sashimi version. Sprinkle salt on the slices that have been drizzled with sesame oil for a crunchy texture and to bring out the umami. It was a common way to eat beef liver, and the combination goes so well together.

Uni niku yukke-style

Topping beef with sea urchin is another trend that started a few years ago but is still apparent. Yukke is originally a Korean dish made by mixing strips of raw beef with a gochujang-based sauce. I guess it can be considered a kind of steak tartare. At this restaurant, the seasoning is more of a Japanese style sauce that is sweeter and soy sauce-based, and this meat also although looks raw, is yukke-fuu. From the photo you can tell that it uses a lot of the fatty part of the meat so you get a lot of umami from that. I like uni, however I found that even though the ratio of uni to beef was small, the flavour of the uni overpowered that of the meat. Perhaps is this dish 'sans uni' would be the way to enjoy the beef. 

The restaurant itself was nice to have a quiet, private dinner as all the tables are in separated rooms. You don't even have to call a waitress since ordering can be done on a touch pad. It seems they try to be a little more on the high-end, so you can imagine that it can get pricey. That being said, they do have a good deal on an all-you-can-eat niku zushi course meal. Overall a good place to start if you're new to beef sashimi or beef sushi, but if you want the real thing, you may have to look elsewhere.

Area: a 5-minute walk from Nagoya Station exit 1 名古屋駅出口１, or a 7-minute walk from Kamejima Station 亀島駅

Restaurant: Origami オリガミ

Map: www.hotpepper.jp/strJ000650458/

Hours: Mon-Thurs 5-12pm (LO 11pm), Fri and Sat 5pm-1am (LO 12am), Sun and Holidays 5-11pm (LO 10pm)

Wired Cafe: A Different Take On a Popular Tuna Dish

Negi toro is a popular tuna on rice dish in Japan. It consists of the prized fatty part of tuna chopped up into a paste, or essentially ground. The fat gives it a nice flavour as you would get from eating a slice of toro sashimi and because it is ground, a soft melt-in-the-mouth texture. Eating negi toro you get the flavour of expensive cuts of sashimi, but for a fraction of the price.

Normally it is found in Japanese food restaurants that sell sushi or those that specialize in kaisen don (sashimi rice bowls). This is why I was curious about the cafe’s take on it. At Wired Cafe, on the 12th floor of the JR Gate Tower at Nagoya station, there is a dish on the menu called the Negi Toro Bowl (980 yen plus tax).

Negi Toro Bowl

I was actually pretty impressed by this version of the negi toro don because it’s a complete balanced meal all in one. The negi toro was flavorful and went really well with the nori tsukudani sauce (a sweet and savory soy sauce based seaweed paste) and the mayonnaise, a combo not usually found on traditional negi toro don. The carbs seemed a bit healthier than plain white rice because it was mixed with some millet grains. You can't go wrong with onsen tamago (like a poached egg but the whites are softer); when the yolk is broken it runs over the tuna and rice creating the perfect combination. The protein in this meal of course comes from the egg and tuna. The salad provides a variety of vitamins and nutrients. You also get healthy fats from the avocado which was a lovely ripe colour and actually goes really nicely with Japanese food that uses soy sauce. Toppings of takuwan (pickled daikon) and tobiko (fish eggs) add a great flavour changer and savoury accent.
The restaurant itself is quite busy and often has a line up but once your seated it's a good place to relax alone or chat with friends. Half the cafe is in an open space surrounded only by a low portable fence so it may feel a little less cozy there. American pop music was playing softly in the background. It's a lively atmosphere, but not so noisy that you can’t hear the person next to you.

Area: JR Gate Tower, 12F (Nagoya Station), 名古屋駅JRゲートタワー12F
Restaurant: Wired Cafe　ワイアードカフェ
Map and Website: https://www.cafecompany.com/brands/wiredcafe/nagoya/
Hours: 11am-11pm (LO 10pm)

Yokoi: For the ORIGINAL Nagoya Ankake Spaghetti Taste

If you've ever visited Nagoya, you'll probably have heard of ankake pasta or spaghetti. This dish has become well-liked by the people of this city. It has made it's way into guide books as one of the dishes to eat while in Nagoya. This spaghetti is unlike any other noodle dish you'll find in Japan.

So what is ankake spaghetti? It can be described as thick spaghetti that has been boiled, then sauteed in lard or oil in a pan, and topped with a peppery tomato-based meat sauce thickened with starch. At an ankake restaurant the variety in the menu comes from your choice of topping. The veggies often include green pepper, onion, tomatoes and mushrooms or corn. Then there are the fried toppings such as pork cutlet and breaded shrimp, fish or oysters. Other popular toppings may include eggs, wieners, ham, bacon, clams and ground meat patties.

What differs largely between shops is the sauce. Some are spicy, some are more peppery, some use more tomatoes, others taste more like demi-glace sauce. Since lard is widely known to be unhealthy, there are some restaurants that advertise that their healthy ankake pastas are topped with plenty of veggies and that do not use lard.

At Yokoi, you can try the original Nagoya ankake. They claim to be the creators of this popular dish. I have tried many ankake restaurants and recently I was able to try Yokoi's version.

Pork Piccata Ankake

This is the pork piccata ankake. Unfortunately the dish did not come with a vegetable topping, but at least there was a small salad (coleslaw) served on the side. In Japan, piccata are slices of meat coated in egg and pan-fried. While the dish in the photo looks quite plain, the sauce is rather concentrated with quite a black pepper punch. It is gloopy (the norm for ankake sauces) due to the starch slurry used to thicken it, but this helps to coat the thick noodles. The pasta is boiled al dente and becomes slightly dryer when put in the pan, but this also makes the sauce become the star ingredient. Their sauce reminded me a little bit of Swiss Chalet dipping sauce (you'll know what I'm talking about if you're Canadian!). I liked that it wasn't overpowered by pepper, and you can tell by the depth of flavour that it uses broth that has been simmered for days (it is demi-glace based). The meat was soft and not overcooked, thanks to the coating of egg sealing in the juices. 

Overall, a good ankake, but my advice is to eat it before the noodles cool and you can feel the lard solidify of the noodles, or just make sure to coat the noodles in the sauce well.  The family restaurant atmosphere makes it a bright and suitable place to have a hearty lunch. 

Area: Just north of Nagoya Station, KITTE Nagoya B1F  名古屋駅、KITTE名古屋B1F

Restaurant: Yokoi KITTE Nagoya-ten ヨコイKITTE名古屋店

Map and Website: https://yokoi-anspa.jp/shop/ヨコイkitte名古屋店

Hours: 11am-11pm (LO 10pm)

Norabo: Regular Udon With a Unique Topping

Udon is one dish that is pretty consistent throughout Japan. The slight differences come with the origin of flour used for the noodles, the method of kneading the dough, and the type of dried kelp and/or fish used to make the broth.

It's fun visiting various udon specialty shops to taste the subtle differences between them. At Norabo, they go for more bold flavours in their toppings. I tried the Norabo special (840 yen) which was topped with niboshi tempura (dried sardine), wakame, Japanese leek, grated ginger, bonito flakes and a raw egg.

Storefront

This restaurant's dashi, or broth, is more on the mild side, and I think it's because the toppings are meant to add flavour to them. Niboshi and bonito flakes are two ingredients that are commonly simmered and strained when making dashi, so as toppings to this dish they made a bold impact. I personally found the tempura a little too salty and overpowering, perhaps a smaller portion would have been more fitting.

The Norabo Special

The sanuki noodles (udon originally from the Kanagawa region), were on the softer side of the udon noodle scale. They were not as soft as ise udon, but they didn't seem to have much bite to them either.

The menu

The shop is quite cozy with dim lighting and a nice view from the 12th floor of the JR Tower. It didn't seem particularly popular on a day when the other restaurants in the area had lineups outside, but it's perfect for a break from the crowds.

Quiet setting

Meat udon

On a separate occasion I tried the meat udon. The pork belly is so heavily seasoned with a soy sauce and sugar based flavor that you might not even need to pour the soup over it. 

Area: JR Gate Tower 12F (Nagoya Station) ゲートタワー12F（名古屋駅）

Restaurant: Norabo 野らぼー

Website and Map: http://www.norabow.jp/shopinfo/JRGATE.html

Hours: 11am-11pm (LO 10:30pm)

Tirol Chocolate Flavour #5: Cheese Cake, but Black?

 5. Takesumi Cheesecake (2019)

Takesumi is the Japanese for charcoal, which explains why this chocolate is so black.

Flavour: Chocolate and sweet cream cheese

If you've ever had food blackened with charcoal, you'll know that the charcoal doesn't actually add much flavour. It strangley has a hint of tropical fruit flavour such as passion fruit, although there really isn't any fruit in it (could this be the charcoal powder?). It has a milky aftertaste and is much like Japanese dessert cheese which is made with cream cheese.

Tirol Chocolate Flavour #4: For the Coffee Lovers

4. Seven Cafe 

As the name indicates, this one is exclusive to Seven Eleven convenience stores.

Flavour: Coffee

The crunch from the pieces of coffee beans really make it like drinking an iced coffee, resembling the crunch of ice (only not as cold). The bitterness from the beans balance out the sweetness of the chocolate, and the overall coffee aroma is very nice.

The checkered design