Ishikawa

I guess this place is no1 or 2 of my Unagi experience.
Be careful, this place takes a lot of time. Even you made a reservation and pick the order beforehand, they will start picking up an Unagi and killing it when you arrive at the place. So please make sure you have enough time about 45 mins to start eating from your arrival. I’ve visited here about 5 times but everytime I came here hungry and felt so craving for 45 mins. But it tastes sooooo great. The source, freshness, crispness, everything is good. It’s an art. I defo recommend this place for you.

Hideki Ishikawa owns both this and another 3-​star restaurant right down the street (Kohaku) and he takes mastery of Japanese cuisine to a new level while still providing a friendly, down-​to-​earth atmosphere that guests of Japanese and Western origin alike can appreciate.
Ishikawa is featured in Lutz Hachmeister’s documentary Three Star (worth a watch–
), where he describes in detail the work that goes into is Michelin rating. The service is exceptionally friendly and open– kind of a rarity in Japan, unfortunately– and the interior is a gorgeous, relaxing, beautiful place.
The ingredients are incredibly fresh, creatively prepared, and are once-​in-​a-​lifetime good. For a full-​on dorky description, go here:
This is a about as good as it gets in Japan, or anywhere in the world, period.

This is a once in a lifetime kind of meal. You will receive very traditional japanese food — so don’t expect any kind of modern cuisine kind of twist which is so popular with the michelin set nowadays. The flavors are subtle and understated. Half of the beauty of the plates are in the pottery itself.
This place is like no other michelin star restaraunt. You feel like you’re walking into a family owned place which is warm, relaxed and welcoming. No worries about having 10 waiters hovering around you waiting to see you use the wrong spoon or drop your napkin. In fact, our party had a private room and could completely relax. The pacing was perfect. No long waits — as soon as we considered getting the bill, it appeared.
We had a late seating (10:00pm) and the place closes at 11. Notwithstanding the fact we were the last table there and I’m sure they all wanted to go home, Chef Ishikawa walked us out to our taxi and the whole staff waived goodnight to us as we sped away from the little alley into the neon streets of Shinjuku. The whole thing felt pretty magical.

Absolutely amazing! I can see why this place gets 3-​Michelin stars.
We had the 19,000 yen kaiseki course, and it was phenomenal. They use very fresh, seasonal ingredients in their dishes, and everything is perfectly executed. The ikura was very fresh and the hint of yuzu added a a hint of complexity to the dish. The charcoal grilled unagi was perfectly crispy on the outside, fatty and flavorful on the inside. The wagyu tongue dish just melted in my mouth. The sudachi sorbet with seasonal fruits was probably one of the best desserts I’ve ever had. I also really enjoyed the kamameshi (hot pot steamed rice), when Chef Ishikawa himself came out to mix the crab liver directly into the rice himself, and then chatted with us for a bit. He’s a very nice guy, and seems to really appreciate all of this guests that come from around the world to check out his restaurant!
Service was phenomenal, and I love how they even prepared an English menu for us. The staff is very helpful, and will answer your questions in English, so I don’t think there’s any problem here for travelers.
This place is a bit hard to find, so when you’re traveling, make sure you have a smartphone with internet to map directions to the place, and I also recommend looking at pictures of the building entrance so you can identify it when you see it (since it’s very nondescript).

Three Michelin stars. No. 42 in the Best 50 restaurants in the World. Let’s just say the expectations are high.
This was my first three Michelin restaurant so I’m not experienced enough to different restaurants of each star rating. However I can say that this was a great meal with very subtle layers of flavor.
** Appetizer– Fresh Salmon Roe with diced lotus rood, taro, shiitake mushrooms with a hint of yuzu citrus
** Deep fried– «kakiage” — soft shelled turtle, lotus root, and oba herbs, ginko nuts
– the Ginko was picked fresh so had a interesting crunchy initial bite followed by chewiness
** Soup– Matsutake mushroom, tofu dumpling, and turnip
– So glad we came during matsutake season. Hard to go wrong with this ingredient.
** Sashimi– Sea bream garnished with fresh seaweed and Japanese herbs. Steamed abalone with abalone stock jelly
** Charcoal grilled– Fresh water eel and sweet onion with grated white radish.
–Easily one of my favorite dishes. The eel was perfectly grilled and had a great charcoal taste
** Delicacy — wagyu tongue, eggplant, and tofu
– My other favorite dish. Melts in your mouth!
** Hot pot– horsehead snapper, wax gourd, okura, maitake mushrooms and wood ear mushroom
** Steamed Rice– Steamed rice with horsehair crab, miso soup, and pickled vegetables.
–Apparently the secret ingredient to great rice is crab brains. We had extra so they made it into Onigilly so we could take it home!
** Dessert– Japanese pear, grapes, muscat, peach, sudachi citrus sherbet in white wine jelly
–Great refreshing dessert. I love Japanese citrus
Chef Ishikawa came in and mixed the rice for us and chatted with us. It’s not every day you get to talk to a 3 michelin chef! Great experience!

Fantastic Kaiseki food! Great place to book as a tourist:
1) Easy to book (you can speak in English if you call in the evenings). Just book a month in advance.
2) The waitresses were able to explain the dishes to us in English
3) Fairly easy to find
The food was amazing. A lot of the dishes feature ingredients from specialized regions in Japan. Asides from food, the service was also incredible. Chef Ishikawa personally came to our room to talk to us (in English) and talked about some of the ingredients he chose for his dishes.
It was an absolutely amazing, and quite affordable 3 Michelin Star restaurant.

Kagurazaka Ishikawa. solidly executed.
–Appetizer: Hard clam, monkfish liver and rape flower bud covered with egg yolk sauce with Japanese mustard
–Deep Fried: Conger eel and mashed garden peas with butterbur bud petals
–Soup: Freshly harvested bamboo shoot dumpling and wakame seaweed
–Sashimi: Sea bream garnished with fresh seaweed and Japanese herbs
Snow crab topped with crab innards with broth jelly
–Charcoal-​grilled: Kinki fish and freshly harvested onions
–Specialty: spear squid with roe garnished with 7 kinds of spring vegetables
–Hot Pot: Japanese Duck, duck dumpling, tofu, tofu skin, chinese cabbage and broth agar
–Steamed Rice: Fresh sea urchin, short neck clam and wasabi buds
Miso soup and pickled vegetables
–Dessert: strawberry and setoka tangerine and sherry flavored mousse topped with genko citrus sherbet
delicious meal where you can tell Japanese cuisine stays light, highlights ingredients, and is always fresh. nothing too complicated or overpowering. really enjoyed the appetizer, fried batter was so light, bamboo shoots here are so good, crab, grilled fish, hot pot, dessert.
michelin 2 star, and 4.39 tabelog