The restaurant itself may be gone but unforgettable is the owner. Through eerily acute observations he saw through each movement of every guest from the instant of our first twitch when the mind crossed the threshold from uncertainty to action. By the time I realised, he was already there.
At the same time, he moved with constant grace throughout and spoke without hesitation. There was no choice but to surrender to his benevolent dictatorship. I later learned that in addition to being the owner and sommelier, he apparently also hunted the variety of game meats on the menu himself, from birds to bears. Prey as we were, we never stood a chance.
I went back one winter out of nostalgia. On that final visit, I picked a bottle of wine, at which he commented, "Méo Camuzet, a fine choice. I like his wines so much I named my pet Meo." When serving, he poured a slight amount into the glass, tilted it horizontally and rotated it in a single motion until the inside was evenly coated before handing it to me for tasting. Albeit an act overdone in Europe, he somehow managed to salvage the remaining grace in it.
It seems like everything is always within arm's reach but at arm's length as the city grows increasingly foreign and nostalgic at the same rate. Nevertheless, it was obvious that this foreign society had no plan of forsaking me, as I was once brought to a restaurant otherwise inaccessible where we drank old champagne to braised octopus, ebiimo and wasabi leaf, and Armand Rousseau to suppon tsukune.
I could see what they desired out of me whenever they looked at me with the same eyes as ones in anticipation of the surprise inside a toybox. I could also see the right words to utter to humour them for they were as simple as pin, ryan, geta, dali. After the meal when others had left in taxis, a new acquaintance invited me onto the ride blazing through the late night road to her Shinjuku gyoza hideout.
Well loved is this dichotomy: to dive straight from the lavish high life to the depths of shomin with nothing in between, as though in some kind of appeal of humility, a defense mechanism in the face of the exposed cheap materialism that makes them oh so vulnerable to mass criticism.
One an open secret and the other hidden in plain sight, neither out of financial basis nor epicurean, this polarization, reaction formation of the palate, is but a social, or even more so, internal psychological escape hatch which gives them a deceptive sense of self against the system they are bound to, but in turn that individuality itself just turns into yet another anti-pattern pattern to which everyone is mandated.
Whenever I crawl out of the concrete bowel of Ginza I find myself lost.
They say the tricky rabbit digs three holes for itself.
Well, there are enough here to make one's eyes spin.
None of the willows as promised however; those have gone mythical by now.
The tempuraya was situated on the second floor of a cramped building, with the noise of the fan at the entrance and television at the back where the two year old sat, creating a showa vibe. The chef and his wife greeted in wafuku, their service intimate and ad hoc.
While the coating was flurry, the overall taste had a strong presence, which allowed for salt, tentsuyu, lemon, or self-mixed ponzu. A thick slice of tuna was wrapped in ooba and fried briefly enough so the inside remained raw. Kue was aged before frying.
Anago, neither overly thick nor overly fried, was served as a minidon in a beautiful bowl with transparent star-shaped glass holes, finished with tare warmed in bain-marie to prevent bitterness. Tara's shirako was boiled and then fried, so its coating was crispy while the inside remained creamy, perfect for sake.
The chef giggled whenever praised. The wife enthusiastically introduced Nagano sakes from home, and from time to time the child would run behind us to seek attention. The art of a kappa on the pillar was described as Evangelion.
Another floor of another building housed what could be its foil. At the quiet centre of a minimalistically spacious white wood counter, sudden fragrances came and went. I would catch a whiff from the left when a kabosu was squeezed, only taken over by the smell of sesame from the heated oil, and then the trio of rice, oil and tare from the tendon on the right.
The tempura pieces were best eaten as presented. Perhaps a scrape of kabosu on the shirauo and kisu when feeling provocative, but even a pinch of salt or a drop of tsuyu would be enough to bury the natural flavours of the ingredients. It was not that the flavours were weak, but they were fragile, and in that fragility rested all value there was to speak of.
Serving French at a counter was an irregularity that had not really occurred to me until the madame mentioned it.
Behind the counter there were only trustworthy ovens, pans and cocottes, and none of the modern toys.
Past seventy, the chef moved at a pace slow to the eye yet wastelessly sharp; it was a performance.
The product was the pinnacle of the imaginable taste, based on utmost extraction of flavour and good balance.
The main dish was braised wagyu oxtail. According to the chef, a whole bottle of wine was used for my single serving. It was marinated for a day in wine, cognac and mirepoix, and then cooked for a day before finally the night of indulgence. There was not a sprinkle of garnish on top nor assorted sides on the same plate as those would only weaken the fragrance and dilute the sauce. 2009 Jean Grivot Clos de Vougeot at their recommendation stood up to it like an elegant beast.
His air of intimidation had rounded out even further since my previous visit. He smiled and made jokes in a soft-spoken voice. Between courses he would understandably retreat to the back kitchen to rest. Post-dessert, he joined us to rant over leftover wine.
The hailed term of wakonyosai is rotten at the core despite its infestive proliferation. It stems from a self-contradicting sentiment of inferiority complex and chauvinism. These people succumb to habits and preferences of their tongues while desiring to uphold a mere appearance of the admired west which crumbles the second it hits the palate. But when we peer into the soul there is void.
Before heading out to catch the last train, I told the chef I searched in vain for an old magazine featuring his recipes. "There are dishes you can make only when you are young, but others you cannot until you've grown old," he said. As I pondered the meaning of these words, he grabbed his copy of the book to show me an impossibly young photo of himself moments before the elevator door shut and began its descent.