Archive for July, 2007

Au goût du jour Nouvelle Ère (ヌーヴェルエール)

Published
by
seat
on July 13, 07
in 01:French and 06:有楽町・丸の内
. 4 Comments Tags: .

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Very nice view of the old red brick facade of Tokyo station.
The bread is very good.
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軽く温めたサーモンの軽い燻製、ゴマ風味、山葵の冷たいクリームソース。
Amuse: Pork pate puff.
Appetizer: Warm smoked salmon with sesame seed, wasabi cream sauce. Delicious! Couldn’t taste the wasabi though.
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ゆっくり火を通した長州赤鶏の胸肉、タブナードソース。
Main: Chicken breast in Tapenade sauce. Very tasteless and dry meat…I couldn’t finish it.
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Dessert: Strawberry roll cake. Specialty of the patisserie. Super good.

Lunch course is 3500yen. This restaurant is under the same management as Au gout du jour and Merveille(see tag). Service is warm and friendly. The food is not super impressive but the value is not bad. After coffee, herb tea was also served. The restaurant is quite small and is inside Shinmaru building, right next to igrek.
Menu 1, 2.
Nouvelle Ère

bel mare (ベルマーレ)

Published
by
seat
on July 12, 07
in 01:渋谷・恵比寿・代官山
. 2 Comments

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Salad, bread or rice, main dish, half-portion pasta and drink, 1250yen. Bread is garlic bread, which is warm and pretty massive. Main dish is salmon saute in green(pesto) sauce. Quite tasty! Two options for the pasta and I had the scallop “Genovese”(pesto sauce). It is definitely not half-portion! Rather normal pasta but not bad. For drinks, other than coffee and tea, there is also blood orange juice. I was so stuffed that I didn’t need dinner at all….
Today’s lunch menu(J) here.
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Went back again for the same course. Puttanesca with squid, tomato, caper and olive.
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Main is pork saute with lemon sauce. The lemon sauce is a little too sour and the pork a bit dry, but it is okay. Garlic toast today is focaccia bread. Also includes a salad.
Another lunch menu(J) here.
bel mare
Add: 24-2, Sakuragaokacho, Shibuya-ku
Tel: 03-3476-3681

La Belle Epoque (ラ・ベル・エポック)

Published
by
seat
on July 11, 07
in 01:French
. 4 Comments Tags: , .

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6500yen lunch course. Menu here.
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Amuse-bouche: Melon and duck meat. Many layers of potato, beetroot, carrot etc. Cranberry bread, and cumin bread with pumpkin seeds.
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Maguro tuna tartare on jelly made from bell pepper and tomato. Avocado cream in between.
Chiled broad bean soup with Parme ham flavoured mascarpone cream.
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Pan-fried whiting, tomato and aubergine gateau, Nice-style sauce with olive, caper, anchovy and herb.
Grilled baby lamb chop with Dijon mustard and herb, and spring vegetables.
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0705030031Berry jelly with lavender soup. Main dessert is mousse made from cream and egg and wine, with grapefruit jelly and pineapple sauce. Petit fours from a wagon.

A French restaurant inside Hotel Okura. Food is overall quite good. Very light-tasting. Portion a bit small….the fish is tiny! My friend remarked that you can probably eat this kind of French even when you get old…in fact other customers were mainly elderly. ^^;;; I heard that this French restaurant is famous for heavy sauces and traditional French-style and big portion…that’s why I wanted to try this place in the first place. I wonder if the chef is different. The service is brilliant though. Very attentive and warm. There was a 40-something couple celebrating birthday behind us and also an Omiai going on in the private room….
La Belle Epoque
Add: 12F, Hotel Okura Bekkan, Toranomon 2-10-4, Minato-ku
Tel: 03-3505-6073

Randy (ランディ)

Published
by
seat
on July 11, 07
in 08:神田・神保町・秋葉原
. 4 Comments

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アスパラサラダ、￥１９０。ハンバーグ（２００ｇ）、バターソース、￥８７０。
Asparagus salad is drowned in too much dressing. For the 200g hamburger steak with butter sauce, the waitress warned me that “medium will be quite rare in the middle” but it turned out to be over-cooked. But the texture is great with the beef not grounded too much or with too much breadcrumb or other stuff added to it.
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デミシャスハンバーグ、￥８７０。 温泉玉子、￥７０。
Second time I had the hamburger with demi-grace sauce. A bit too minced and mushy, and the sauce is very salty. The salad on the side is again drowned in too much salty dressing…better ask for “less dressing” next time. Also ordered a hotspring egg for 70yen.
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ハンバーグ（２００ｇ）、ガリマヨソース、￥８７０。
Hamburger with mayonnaise sauce. The third time is cooked just right. Solid beefy texture and pink in the middle. A bit too much mayonnaise sauce though…the chef seems to love his sauces and dressings. Rice and soup are refillable.
Choices of sauce for the hamburger(J) here.
Randy

der Akkord (アコルト)

Published
by
seat
on July 10, 07
in 07:Bakeries
. 5 Comments Tags: .

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アップルジャムパイ。よもぎぱん。
Apple jam pie and yomogi anpan. Just these two cost 997yen! But understandable since this bakery is 100% strict organic/macrobiotic: doesn’t use sugar, animal products or chemicals. All the ingredients are either homemade or carefully selected. Taste-wise…the yomogi bread tastes like grass and the red bean inside has a strange sour and salty taste…^^;; But the apple pie is crispy and the apple filling is sweet(natural kind). Very “whole food” tasting but quite like it.
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パンプキンパイ。ココナッツケーキ。
Went back another day to get the pumpkin pie and coconut cake. The coconut cake has too much raisins in it…I gave up halfway. The pumpkin pie is good but I prefer the apple pie.
der Akkord
Add: 5-45-5 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku
Tel: 03-6419-2928

Arossa Ginza (アロッサ銀座店)

Published
by
seat
on July 9, 07
in 05:銀座・新橋・日本橋 and Good Cheap Eats
. 1 Comment Tags: .

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アロッサ式もりもりサラダ。 玉ねぎとコーンのフリッタータ。
Salad. Onion and corn frittata.
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地鶏と野菜の煮込み。 フランボワーズのグラニテ。
Chicken and vegetables stew. Raspberry granite.

The salad is for two people but it is massive. The rest are included in the lunch course for one person and the lunch is only 1050yen!! Not just being cheap, everything is delicious, including the bread(refillable). The restaurant is on the 8th floor of a shopping building in the middle of Ginza. So many reviews(1,2,3,4) had been written about this amazingly good-valued lunch. The menu is fixed but it changes everyday and also available on weekends. Also there is a 2620yen lunch which is basically the same thing except the main dish is New Zealand roasted beef(btw this place is supposed to serve Australian/NZ cuisine).
Today’s lunch menu(J) here.
Arossa Ginza
Add: 8F Ginza Velvia-kan, 2-4-6 Ginza
Tel: 03-5524-1146

KAIKAYA (開花屋＠神泉)

Published
by
seat
on July 7, 07
in 01:渋谷・恵比寿・代官山, 03:Japanese and Favourite Food Entries
. Closed Tags: , , .

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桜海老と水菜のサラダ。くるまえびの甘エビ味噌炒め。
Sakura prawn and mizuna salad. Kuruma-prawn in prawn sauce.
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鮮魚のカルパッチョ。雑魚(ざこ)のグリル。
Fresh fish carpaccio with garlic, olive oil, balsamico and sweet basil. Grilled fish with garlic, olive oil and lemon.
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マグロのかまのスペアリブ。
“House Special” tuna spareribs.

I have heard about this place for years and have always wanted to try it but somehow never got around to it. Finally! All the food are very good! Quite heavy use of olive oil and lightly salty to eat alone, but with a bowl of rice, you simply can’t stop eating. The restaurant is very tiny and crowded. The waiters are friendly and patient even though they are so busy. Sort of an izakaya but we didn’t order any alcohol and just had tea and it was okay. We sat at the big table sharing with other people and the guy sitting next to us wouldn’t stop smoking so that was a bit tough. But if you sit at the counter, maybe you can avoid the smoke to some degree. The homepage has Japanese and also English with the whole menu translated to English. Indeed there were two tables of foreigners(other than us) the day we went. Three of us shared all the food, plus a bowl of rice, less than 2000yen each. Very cheap! The nearest station is Shinsen, but it is just 15 mins walk from Shibuya. Some reviews in English here.
KAIKAYA