WEAST

We were late, and it was empty. For the first time, I didn’t know what to do with myself at a restaurant. Empty means no waiter/waitress/manager/anyone-who-was-working-and-of-use-to-me in sight - I was stuck in limbo between the street that I had walked in from, and the invisible divide that stopped me from dropping myself on any cushy sofa seat in the tiny sitting area just in front. Should I be infuriated? (with them or me?) But it was too clean, too open, too bright, too serene. So wait awkwardly for a minute or so we did, marveling at the petite petals and artsy mirrors to our left, and the abandoned bar to our right. It felt slow, but not irritatingly so, and while this piece will definitely be the former, it will endevour to attempt the latter. 

Then, a woman emerged from the back, efficient, but not brisk, warm and friendly as she invited us to take a seat “here, or here, or anywhere else [we] like”, but with enough reserve to mimic our awkwardness. While we’re chatting to harmonize with the light, yet animated, room with two (or was it three?) other tables, the woman skimmed back and forth with something in her hand and a purpose in her composure each time. I was so focused on settling in I’ve only realized in hindsight: the patrons were happy, with the food, the place, the company, the day, everything. 

So let us begin: the free tea. Well, tea really should be complimentary, but you could easily pay a good $3 upwards for tea ten times worse in a plastic cup just down a few blocks: bubble tea. So, tea: a dance of translucent up to pale orange simmered in a dusky brown, and layered in cubes of ice. It should be genmaicha, with its cool watery relief, followed by a full bodied earthiness and a final whiff of grain - perfect after speed walking here.

The soup soon arrived on a tray - first to the black counter/display in the middle of the room - then on her hands to our table. The woman’s graceful invitation to open the lid led to an expert introduction of the ingredients that deserved a diligent transcription. Sadly, having no notebook, we proceeded to experience her abstracts with the chopsticks, eyes, and mouth. The noodles, every single strand, were delightfully thin as you felt them slip through your lips. They weren’t mushy, but soft, with a pleasant springy texture without being chewy.  Green’s me, Suihi, by the way. There’s a sesame tofu block mixed in with cream cheese supporting them: not firm, but strong, not too creamy but rich, not split but rather separated. There’s a tinge of ginger: the culprit is a microbially thin sliver. There were several lingering in the dark of the bowl. There’s a ghostly trace of salt in the red flakes. And lastly, the mysterious little plants you wish you could eat because picking them up with chopsticks is a talent: junsai. The young buds of junsai, also known in English as the water sheild plant (Brasenia schreberi) or mountain fern, naturally contain agar, which gives each piece a jelly-like coating. They danced in the otherwise clear liquid, slightly sweet, very gelatin, and amazingly textured when you finally give up all decency and pick up the god-damn bowl and drink the remaining subtly full-bodied broth along with the poor little things you’re addicted to. When you close your mouth, there’s something there, when you chew it melts away, spilling multiple bursts of both a jelly, grass, nostalgia for something you’ve never had. 

The next four pieces came in a square plate, each allotted their deserved section. The salmon was grilled to perfection, with just enough of a salmon taste and just enough moisture left. Indeed, the cooking showed it was possible to master the subduing of salmon without killing the fish’s allure after stripping off the ocean fragrance, although sashimi is another story. There was no sauce, and there was no need for one. Despite my bias against cooked salmon, this could gain no complaint.

The tomato behind, grilled in dengaku style with a spot of miso, was a nice burst of flavour and juice that was given dimension once the miso mixed in. Cherry tomatoes often are too tough-then-soft, too acidic, too sweet, too dominant, but this one humbly cooperated with its miso counterpart, dancing a balance of paste and juice, sweet and salty-tinged, clear and cool with aged and substantial. The banal block of tofu hidden underneath mocks the eye: a dried sponge that exudes the illustrious complexity of dashi, soy sauce, mirin, and sake as you press it between your teeth. Bite harder or slide them, and it will come apart, hardly smooth - layered and sandy, reminding you the tongue can feel even as it is tasting the juices.

The grouper defied sashimi limitations. The smooth, dry, and massaged piece was an amazing bubbly-jelly texture with a trace of the sea-sweetness, finished with a powder in rice cracker flour that adds a flavoured and salt dimension. If you’re lucky enough to have some daikon stuck in the back teeth - yes, really! - as you chewed this piece of fish, the cool, crunchy, moist burst from the daikon will accentuate the room-temperature meat. It can’t be compared to a fresh piece of wild salmon sashimi: that is about highlighting the how you cut a beautiful fish dish, with all its wet, slippery, sweet, raw fishiness; this is how you can make a beautiful dish with raw fish.

The tempura was an unexpected love. Modest in its baby scallion shavings, light creamy brush, and wraith-like in its tempura-flour coating, every bite was a lively spring of mass, texture, and taste. The shrimp, again, provided an overarching fragrance and firm, yet smooth texture, encased in the complimentary miso-creamy-like folds of flavour, finished with a snapping breeze of yuzu as the food slides to the back. 

Ordinary tempura you’d find in your average Japanese restaurant is clad with mounds of crumbling batter, over-greasy and heavy in flavour. The tempura we had today, however, was miles away from that. The batter was thin and fried so it was just crispy, not crumbly. I actually thought the dressing was reminiscent of Japanese mayonnaise rather than miso, but of course with that subtle hint of yuzu. Our waitress told us that it was yuzu koshou, a Japanese condiment made from yuzu zest, chili, and salt.

And the beef tongue I have not forgotten. It was supposed to be duck, but I was not robbed of anything less than wonderful anyhow. Or was it duck? I thought it was too tender to be beef tongue. It was marinated in a thicker sauce, which was heavier than the others and would have likely wiped out any scents from the tastings following. It tasted like it was based on soy sauce and sweetened lightly with mirin. It wasn’t chewy, it wasn’t hard, it wasn’t soft, it wasn’t rough, nor too smooth, but it was flat, and was complimented with scallion strips below, and most satisfying. The quail egg was a little thing that couldn’t escape being eaten in one bite, eliciting the rubbery egg white and the thick, runny, rich yolk - a great wash off of the sauce from the meat before the final course.

This course included a paddle, and a little bit of work: opening the lid, suspending judgement of what seemed to be the least spectacular of the dishes, and scraping it from the pot to the bowl without being made a fool. After such labours, one reaped the reward of continually sniffing the lingering spectre of tea, which came from the hijiki (a brown sea vegetable), while chewing perfect harmony: individual yet accommodating rice grains, interwoven and smooth dry seaweed, the elastic kelp slits, and the almost pancake-but-a-tinge-crunchier carrots. 

And best of all, you finish all this without the slightest hint of hunger, nor the slightest trepidation at the task of stomaching a dessert: a sweet tofu mousse topped with roasted soybean flour (kinako). The dessert is considerate of a patron’s labour too: staying to the light side with an assertive soy taste bolstered by the airy cream, and invigorated by the roasted soybean nutty sweetness. It’s not too sweet, but it brings a perfectly choreographed finale that necessitated actual sugar rather than the scented preludes hovering in the dishes before.

We sat for quite a while afterwards, talking, and as obliviously happy as the people who were here when we entered. We lingered, we thought the weather rather fine considering Toronto’s potential for the smog-heat-sun-exhaust combination. Sitting here only a few hours later, I hover between recalling the topics, and forgetting the conversation; regardless, I distinctly remember, and still feel, the light happiness at having seen, smelt, ate, experienced amazing attitudes towards food.

We finally decided - but didn’t feel - we should go, and asked for the bill. Perhaps we were generous, but so was the place: in its consideration of atmosphere, aesthetics, food quality and quantity, all for an amicability for its visitors. It’s a place where money, even if was a trick of the moment, didn’t have to mean much, and won’t mean much so long as you can recall the experience. We spoke with the woman, who kindly repeated the ingredients we had loved and forgotten, explained whatever methods we inquired of, and smiled more than we could ask for. As we left, another table came in, and I’d like to think we passed on the same contentment to them, which I’m sure the restaurant will effortlessly heighten to sheer joy. 

The woman never told us her name, but it’s on the receipt, and if you’re willing to spend even a fraction of the time she and her husband (the chef behind it all) have spent to create the menu and realize the meal, to look the place up, you’ll know. It’s a home, a life, which they opened to us, for us to invite ourselves into and enjoy. The woman’s name is Yumi, and if she’s not there when you step in, wait, because it’s worth being welcomed and feeling welcome right from the doorway in to the doorway out.