Our family really enjoyed our meal at Takagaki no Sushi. It was a special experience and the mix of both cooked food and sushi was a true pleasure.
We were pleasantly surprised by the number of perfectly cooked "snacks" in addition to the wonderful sushi. It was also extremely interesting watching Chef Takagaki at work and the exquisite timing he had in cutting different pieces of fish and letting the rest and come up to room temperature, while serving steamed food at the perfect time.
He started the evening by grating fresh wasabi and explaining we could use salt or soy sauce to season the snacks. We were then served:
Shiromi - white fish (hirame? - halibut)sashimi
Boiled (?) octopus
Steamed Shirako (cod parts)
Oysters - absolutely fabulous
Steamed animo (monkfish liver) - my surprise favorite
Steamed sea bream
(We proceeded to make a faux pas of pouring some soy sauce at this point, right before there would be no need as all the subsequent pieces of nigiri were seasoned by the chef.)
At this point, we were served pickled ginger to use for the rest of the meal and were served:
Akamai (lean tuna)
Chu-toro (medium fatty tuna)
Otoro (fatty tuna) - so good!
Akamai (ark shell - red clam) - beautifully served
Shiromi - white fish (tai? - sea bream)
Shiromi - white fish (buri? - yellowtail)
Steamed Ebi (shrimp) - beautiful and perfectly cooked
Fish (?) broth with slivered green onions
Ikura (salmon roe)
Anago (sea eel)
Tamago (grilled egg)
Kanpyo maki (egg)
We loved our meal and are thankful to the chef for providing the opportunity for us to see him at work and to create a wonderful memory that will last the rest of our lives.
My only regret was not pre-ordering the option for additional sushi as the food was so delicious. Although our stomaches were satisfied, we would have loved to stay with the two, more experienced local customers who had pre-ordered additional pieces of sushi.
It is also worth noting that we had extreme difficulty getting reservations at a high end sushi restaurant in Tokyo. It appears that the combination of the use of Michelin and tabelog, the pandemic, and the reopening of Japan to tourists, has made many high end sushi restaurants more insular with many closed to reservations from newcomers, let alone tourists traveling from abroad. I researched the reservation process for all 38 Michelin starred and bib sushi restaurants and was rejected by almost all of them. We greatly appreciate that Chef Takagaki still allowed reservations with foreign guests through jpneazy and welcomed a family of four from abroad to dine at his 6 seat restaurant.
Our family regrettably knew very little Japanese, but had tried to research how to correctly eat at a sushi restaurant. My daughter read Jiro's sushi's advice on eating sushi with hands or using chopsticks to support the sushi from the bottom. Also thank you to the Sushi Geek website for their reviews and advice on the customs of eating sushi.
In regards to the chef's demeanor... we always felt treated with respect by him even as foreign tourists with young teenagers. He was very nice about my wife's request for less rice. We talked very little with him due to the language barrier. But it was fun watching him occasionally banter with the two local guests who spoke Japanese - we wish we could have understood what they said. When Chef Takagaki was not talking to them, he was very focused on providing a stunning meal. His focus might cause some guests to think he was aloof, but to us it was a sign of his care for his craft and his customers. When we left he said goodbye to us warmly.
Another indelible memory we will cherish is of the very kind waitress who kept waving to us from outside the restaurant in the warm darkness until we had made it all the way to the end of the street. Her goodbye, reminiscent of scenes from Asian dramas, capped a memorable evening of wonderful food and mastery that my family will be talking about for years to come.
Thank you, Chef Takagaki.
Tokyo Metro Hanzomon Line
Tokyo Metro Hibiya Line
Toei Subway Asakusa Line
Tokyo Metro Tozai Line
