Wabi-sabi, please don't ask for wasabi.
In japanese art there exists a concept called Wabi-sabi (侘び寂び), which is of finding beauty within imperfection. In Japanese ceramics work there is Kintsugi (金継ぎ), the practice of repairing a cracked or broken plate or a chipped pot using gold lacquer enamel, both to reinforce the original and to emphasize that the repair work enhances the original look. Much like how re-working and restoring a piece of antique furniture restores its look and yet celebrates its history, or how Ikebana (the Japanese art of flower arrangements) features both a fresh element and a withered element, wabi-sabi is critical to understanding Japanese aesthetics. One of my favorite places in Japan is Nihonbashi-Ningyocho 1 Chome 8-5 at the downtown part of Tokyo, where a highly weathered, old school building is used to host a French restaurant right across the street from some brutalist Tokyo office buildings, and it's the contrast, celebration of the old and the new, and attention to detail that clinched it for me. Of course, these kind of thing is everywhere in Japan.
Well, this bowl I am eating off from here is definitely wabi-sabi, along with the decor of the restaurant/gallery/worskhop, which is chic new furniture punctuated by restored antiques. Oh, and on this artsy bowl is 45 dollars worth of duck soba. I am trying to figure out a) what makes it worth 45 bucks b) Why did I reserve this place in May to belatedly celebrate my wife's birthday (it was in mid-March) and c) I am coming off a cold and I temporarily lost my sense of smell. Do I feel like I'll give these guys a fair and nuanced review?
In short? Not really - I don't have to tell you this place is overpriced as the people at the Michelin Guide will tell you that..this is a bit rich as they recommend places that charges 35 bucks for a plate of flambeed radishes with raspberry sauce. This restaurant is merely mentioned by the guide - not awarded a star nor was it bib gourmand recommended, so if you are looking for culinary plaudits (not quite my cup of tea either), not quite it. The duck shio soba was "okay" considering how difficult it was to use 100% soba flour (which doesn't develop gluten) to make dough stick together and form, well, noodles, and it's not that easy to make duck broth flavorful but without feeling greasy and/or gamey, but I should feel more than merely "okay" when it came to a 45 dollar bowl of noodles. I would say it tastes "complete". Doesn't need any additions, definitely don't ask for wasabi. Wifey got the tempura mochi veggie soba and felt "okay" about it, and that's 42 bucks. Now add the 2 apps (root veggie and cucumber salad, 30 combined) and that's an entire benjie. Now add the Kyoto tea cocktail and the dessert (parfait with whipped cream and some dry and dense soba cake), a 20% tip and whatever is owed the guvmint, and it's two benjies for an experience that can only be described as "wabi-sabi in Greenpoint".
If your friend in the Tokyo Academy for Fine Arts invite you out for a meal at his studio in ShimoKita, and amongst the artwork is a bowl of soba noodles like this, you'll be happy, but you'll probably prefer he meet you one metro stop up at Yoyogi-Uehara for Turkish coffee and baklava instead, since it's cheaper, you feel less embarrassed about your professed ignorance of Japanese art, and you don't feel like you are about to drop one of his creations by accident. By the same token, eating at Uzuki is an experience with Kotani Sensei and his artful expressions of soba cuisine, ceramics and ikebana. It's expensive and a bit above my paygrade or my comfort zone (I am more of a Shogayaki Teishoku at a corner joint kinda guy), but if I ever want to crowbar some Japanese arts and culture into the noggin somewhere in NYC, Uzuki is Kotani-sensei's atelier that has a side-gig serving up soba. Good experience but not likely to repeat too often for me. read more