{"id":115,"date":"2009-05-03T14:57:49","date_gmt":"2009-05-03T22:57:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/2009\/05\/kaiseki\/"},"modified":"2009-05-03T14:57:49","modified_gmt":"2009-05-03T22:57:49","slug":"kaiseki","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/2009\/05\/kaiseki\/","title":{"rendered":"Kaiseki"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last night, my beloved friends Poto and Ms. J. treated me to an early birthday dinner at Kaygetsu<\/a> in Menlo Park. Kaygetsu specializes in the Japanese dining style known as kaiseki<\/i>, which features a formal succession of dishes of various types. Kaiseki<\/i> menus are very seasonal; the theme last night was definitely cherry blossoms.<\/p>\n

I’m new to this food blogger thing, so I started on my first dish before I remembered to take a photo. It came stacked neatly in a tower.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Sakizuke (starter): seared hokkaido scallop and asparagus salad, broccoli rabe, daikon radish and egg yolk vinaigrette<\/i> There was a dashi gelatin\/broth that we mixed it all in with.<\/p>\n

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Sashimi. We had octopus tentacle, shima aji, and something else delicious (the white fish in front) whose name I’ve forgotten. I love the giant shell it came on.<\/p>\n

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Takiawase (slow-cooked dish): bamboo shoot, fresh wakame seaweed, minced shrimp, cooked in clear fish broth<\/i> The bamboo shoot was a fresh one, still retaining it’s vegetal shape. <\/p>\n

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This is the big one. Hassun (assortment of flavors): egg omelet, smoked salmon and marinated celery in skewer; duck sushi with yuzu pepper and ginger; potato wrapped with nori seaweed and deep fried, topped with sea urchin and wasabi; watercress, avocado and wheat gluten mixed with tofu sauce; salted fava beans<\/i> The egg omelet was more of a sponge-cake. The smoked salmon skewer with the celery had a wonderfully clear flavor from a dashi marinade.<\/p>\n

Somehow I missed photographing the agemono<\/i> course, which was kinki fish, wrapped with a cherry leaf and fried tempura style. This saddens me, because it came with tempura cherry blossom as a garnish!!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Nabe mono (hot pot): kurobuta pork, bean sprouts, green onion, cabbage and carrots, cooked in miso sauce<\/i> The pork was a long, thin ribbon, and the broth was rich and delicious. I thought the hammered mini-woks looked like Jiffi-pop containers when I saw them on other tables, but they were really quite substantial and attractive. Ms. J. says the writing on the base seemed to tell a story.<\/p>\n

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Noodles: hot somen noodle soup with tai snapper, thin egg strips, mitsuba green, shiitake mushroom, ginger and kinome<\/i> Again, a delicious clear broth, with perfectly-cooked fish.<\/p>\n

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House-made original desserts: tofu-strawberry cheese cake, saikyo miso cookie<\/i> The cheesecake had a firm, smooth texture, and a very fresh strawberry flavor. The cookies were soft, and the miso gave an effect very similar to a peanut butter cookie.<\/p>\n

My dining companions are among those least likely to sing Happy Birthday in restaurants, but they did so in low voices, just because they love me so much.<\/p>\n

Everything was delicious, cooked and presented with exquisite care. Our server was the Best Waitress Evar, replacing our tea cups mid-meal, so we didn’t build up green tea sludge at the bottom, and even noticing when she should place cutlery for a left-hander. I loved the seasonality of the menu, and the high proportion of vegetables. I’m also a sucker for little serving dishes, and there was a bewildering assortment.<\/p>\n

And then, after abusing me about my cheap knives, Poto gave me a beautiful set of Japanese knives as a gift. (Poto never gives gifts, so this was something extraordinary.) I love the grain on the metal.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Now I’m off to use my new knives to cook some lamb shanks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\nLast night, my beloved friends Poto and Ms. J. treated me to an early birthday dinner at Kaygetsu in Menlo…\n<\/div>\n
Continue reading “Kaiseki”<\/span>…<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-restaurants","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}