Solitary Gourmet - Fisherman Cuisine At Tokyo, Meguro And Lamb Cuisine At Tokyo, Setagaya

Join us on a culinary adventure as we check out two eateries in Tokyo. We first have lunch at a restaurant located in Ookayama, Meguro City. It serves fisherman-style cuisine and its dishes include grilled fresh saury with kabayaki sauce, special tuna rice bowl, seafood rice bowl and stewed red bream. 

We however decide to order the recommended Kue set meal. It includes sashimi and stewed fish, but one can also choose to have seafood curry instead of the stewed fish as part of the set. It comes with all-you-can-eat rice and miso soup. As for the sashimi, the set includes four varieties of fish and the chef will choose which fish to serve each day. Our Kue set meal’s sashimi comprises flatfish, tuna, amberjack and salmon. They go well with soy sauce and white rice. The stewed fish uses tuna collar, while the daikon radish is seasoned separately and flavoured with clear broth. The stewed fish has a gentle flavour and is soft and tender. Leftover bony parts from the amberjack are added to the fish bone soup. The side dishes with the Kue set are deep-fried tofu, omelette, Japanese mustard spinach and salad.

Besides the Kue set meal, we also decide to try the cold namero chazuke. For this item, minced skipjack tuna is eaten with rice and cold miso soup. There is ice in the soup. We first eat the namero by itself, then with rice, following which we pour a generous amount of the cold miso soup to finish it off. This version of namero is very different from horse mackerel namero and it is best eaten cold.

The second eatery we visit in Tokyo is located along the Chitose-Funabashi shopping street in Setagaya City. Jingisubar Maasan has a cosy interior and serves a wide variety of barbecued lamb dishes. We start by ordering Set A, which features chuck roast, rump, vegetables and rice; and seseri, which refers to neck meat. The grill is set for us and we are ready to go. We are advised to lightly grill the rump and add cumin salt. We eat it with a garlic and chilli pepper sauce. Our meal of lamb chuck roast with the sauce, rice and onions from Awaji Island is delicious.  The seseri or lamb neck meat we ordered goes well with the rice too. All these cuts are already flavoured so there is no need to add any condiments. 

We are surprisingly not full yet so we decide to order Set B, which features lamb chop and loin marinated in a special sauce. It also comes with rice and herbal lamb soup. The comforting soup with a gentle flavour has lamb meat too. We are taught to grill the lamb chop for two minutes on each side, flipping it over five to six times, and then squeezing lemon over it before eating the lamb chop. 

Tips:

1)    Try cold namero chazuke instead of the usual horse mackerel chazuke for a different experience
2)    Check out Jingisubar Maasan for its wide variety of delicious barbecued lamb dishes