Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Tim and Karen's report Unashige -eel@Shimuzu-cho-

I am an Australian who has been lucky enough to live in Mishima and Numazu for nearly 4 years.
I was given the chance to sample some of the areas first restaurants and would like to share my experiences with you. I went to only Japanese style restaurants in the hope to introduce this unique, traditional and delicious style of restaurant to people from all over the world.
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Growing up in Australia where the act of eating eel is an extremely unfamiliar practice, I have unconsciously avoided it during my nearly 4 years of living in Japan. However, I constantly hear about the delights of eel from friends and students, and in particular one restaurant in our area is often mentioned – Unashige!

So, at around 5.30pm on a Wednesday evening we found ourselves arriving for a meal of eel. Surprisingly, at this early time the restaurant was already very busy, however we had no problem getting a table, and as in all good Japanese restaurants were given a choice of smoking or non-smoking, as well as tables or tatami-mat seating.

The interior décor was bright, spacious and clean, and we were seated at a table next to a window that looked out onto a nice pebbled Japanese style garden. The walls were decorated with an array of interesting eel traps and for some reason an ancient Japanese musket. There are also fish tanks filled with eels in the entranceway to the restaurant.

There was an impressive number of staff on duty, even at our early time, so they obviously expected to be busy. The staff of mostly mature women were friendly and professional, and it was nice to be looked after by experienced people instead of the young part-time students at many other restaurants.

We ordered a dish each, choosing ‘ishiyaki bibinba’ and ‘unajyu’. The food arrived promptly, and while the unajyu was a simple affair of rice topped with tempting looking eel, the ishiyaki bibinba came in a bowl carved from stone with various ingredients on a tray. The waitress very kindly explained how to eat my ishiyaki bibinba – it involved first stirring the ingredients in the bowl and adding soy sauce, wasabi, and other sauces as I liked.
The rice at the bottom of the bowl had baked to a nice, crispy texture which went really well with the eel and spring onion. The sauce I chose gave a subtle flavour, and the eel was most impressive with its delicate flavour (not as smoky as another eel restaurant I know). When I added wasabi it really brought the dish to life and made it even better. There was a great mixture of texture and flavour, and my companion couldn’t stop taking spoonfuls of it even though it was my dish!


The unajyu was not as impressive as the ishiyaki, but it had a mild and pleasant flavour that was not too oily, and the rice was plump, soft and delicious. The accompanying soup was very smoky but nice enough. Both dishes were quite large serves, so it seemed very good value for money.

To sum up, the service was excellent with the staff being efficient, friendly and attentive, and the eel dishes were most enjoyable. I particularly recommend the ishiyaki bibinba – I know I will be going back soon to enjoy it again.

Unashige
Address:239-3, Fushimi, Shimizu-cho, Shizuoka
Tel:+81-55-975-6879
http://www.unasige.com/
Budget:3,000 yen
Open:Weekday:11:00am~2:30pm,4:00pm~9:00pm,Weekend:11:00am~8:30pm
Closed:Mon.


Tim and Karen's review



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