[skiiipi]

I recently got back from a culinary journey to Japan
Dined at a total of 9 Michelin star resturants in 7 days

Thought I'd share some photos here, for some I've already written a review on Trip Advisor so I just quoted the reviews. For others I may just post pic for now and come back to add comments later.

First one is Sukiyabashi Jiro in Roppongi (this was actually my last restaurant before leaving Japan, but it was the most recent from my phone to upload)

Unfortunately I was unable to get a reservation to his father's restaurant.
But after reading numerous reviews about his father's restaurant being a very "hostile" environment for foreigner, I was actually more inclined to try his sons location.

Takashi Ono was very friendly as was his apprentice. His apprentice spoke very good English. The seating arrangement was clearly arranged in a way where the non Japanese guest sat closer to his apprentice vs. The Japanese guest.

Like other high end sushi restaurants, Takashi paid attention to whether or not the customers were left or right handed and altered the size of sushi based on the gender of the customer. (Also ebi for girls had no tail whole for men the chef kept the tail attached)

The sushi rice was more vinagery than the other two michelin sushi restaurants I tried in Japan, but the fish quality was very good. The 4 pieces of sushi that stood out as better than other sushi bars (including a 3 star sushi resturant) was the house smoked Bonito, the chu-toro (which was not seared and can easily be classified as otoro) and the otoro which was the fattiest piece of otoro that I've ever had, and last and not least..the tamago was indeed the best I've had.

I made the mistake of bringing up Nakazawa whom used to be an apprentice at his father's job. He now owns a resturant in NY. Apparently there was some bad blood between Nakazawa and Jiro and Shiro. And Jiro and his family wishes to have no connection with him any more. Takashi-san stopped serving sushi upon hearing his name...walked in front of me (clearly mad and bothered) to tell me the back story between Nakazawa and Jiro....I thought I was going to get kicked out.

It's worth noting after a 15 pieces, Takashi brings out some premium fish that is not included in the lunch set menu, I tried all of the extra pieces and the cost of lunch was a little over $300 usd. Of the extra pieces...the highlight was the otoro.