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Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Fukada - Irvine, CA

this is the best value for japanese food in orange county.

hands down.

can you tell me where you can get a noodle bowl (udon, soba or somen) PLUS rice bowl (katsu, chicken + egg, eel, spicy tuna, tempura, eggy tempura, plus i know a bunch more stuff i'm forgetting) for approximately ten bucks that's actually really good food? i mean really good. no. stop trying to think of a place and just keep reading.

oh! i would highly highly HIGHLY recommend the salmon belly. OH! and the brown rice. i hate brown rice, but for some reason, this is one of the only two places in the universe where i've enjoyed their brown rice


don't try and tell me yoshinoya is as good or good at all unless this is your face.


please answer these below questions
  • do you like japanese food?
  • do you feel like certain restaurants are hiking up prices on food and would like to find something a bit more reasonable?
  • do you often times like going to a quick, casual restaurant?
  • do you like food made from scratch?
  • do you like japanese noodles beyond ramen?
if you answered yes to any of these questions, fukada is the place you need to go.

one last OH!!! and get the ICED green tea. here's the process of making the tea to me below


TLDR version: best bang for your buck non-ramen japanese noodles in orange county

Fukada on Urbanspoon

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Tsuruhashi - Fountain Valley, CA

kobe beef. if you consider yourself a steak savant you are likely familiar with the term. kobe beef is a term that gets thrown around a lot these days, it comes from kobe japan where they feed their cows beer and massage them all day: relaxed cows produce better beef, high in fat content, and simply melt in your mouth goodness.

kobe dunk / kobe beef

tsuruhashi is a japanese yakiniku restaurant, or japanese bbq restaurant - with a grill in the middle of thetable, you receive the raw meat and cook it yourself. not to be confused with korean bbq places (which i love) the thing that separates tsuruhashi is quality. its basically one of the best meat places i go to in oc. some of the meat itself comes slightly marinated, they also give you two different sauces to dip it in


beef yukke
marinated shredded raw beef served with shredded onions, kaiware sprouts, quail egg and crisp apples. the perfect cold appetizer that will contrast well with the hot beef to come.

pork sausage/belly/cheek
what we usually start with when we go, cheaper than the beef and served with lettuce wraps and sesame oil

prime outside skirt
this is probably the best bang for your buck item on the menu. juicy and tender cuts of beef and highly reasonable at $8/plate.

cap rib eye with onions
grilled onions over beef? yes please.

kobe beef boneless short ribs
the finisher. it changes your life. theres nothing i dont love about kobe beef short ribs - its like candy beef and serves as dessert. remember that scene in ratatouille where the critic tries the dish and has a memory to his childhood - making it an almost out of the body tasting experience that brings you to tears. that is what this does.


ice cream with coconut milk
the real dessert - who wouldve thought ice cream, coconut milk, mandarin oranges, tapioca and whip cream would be so delicious? tsuruhashi did.

all in all this is a spot i go to at least every other week. its dinner only, and its open late (1am) and has amazing food - it is on the expensive side, but if you're the type to appreciate the quality and basically something that cant be bought for $5 at a meat market this is the place to indulge. if this place had a downside it would be the smell you leave with in your hair and clothes.

WP24 - downtown LA, ritz carlton 24th floor

WP24

what does $100 chinese food taste like? it taste like $10 chinese food x 10, i would know, i'm number's guy. and yes, i'm aware you can get cheap chinese food virtually everywhere, but if you're willing to go for the adventure, the view, and the experience of how good chinese food can be then i recommend it. and if you have somebody willing to treat you there for your birthday, i recommend you suggest it.

price: 3 courses/$80 or 4 courses/$110
courses include app, entree (or two), dessert

prawn toast
this is on the lounge menu, but was given to us as an amuse-bouche and it was quite possibly one of the best single bite apps ive ever eaten, i would know, im also shrimp guy. a tiny little bite from bread and shrimp heaven, two of my favorite things in this world served with a sweet and spicy garlic chili sauce. 10/10

peking duck rolls
basically takes a peking duck breast, wrapped up in an eggroll and fried to perfection while maintaining the flavor and juiciness of the duck. served with a hoisin sauce. duck, fried, crispy, hoisin. nuff said. 9.5/10

black cod broiled with chinese ginseng honey
if youve ever had black cod (butterfish) you basically know youre in for a treat. melt in your mouth fish that you could basically eat without teeth. marinated with a sweet sauce? yes please. i dare say better than roy's misoyaki butterfish. 9/10

unfortunately i dont remember the menu description of the scallops - however i do remember that they were the biggest scallops ive ever eaten. they were deep fried and almost the size of tennis balls. normally if you told me they were deep fried i would first smile because anything short of bleu cheese and mayo deep fried is amazing. then i would start to think that it would hide the flavor of the scallop, and basically turn into a fish stick. wrong. another home run. crispy outside but kept the integrity of the scallop itself. 9/10 (the sides on the dish were eh)

marjolasian
its really hard to describe this dessert. it had layers of dark chocolate, with white expresso mousse in between, served with a coffee ice cream. it was almost like a candy bar from the future. it also had some nuts to give it an extra crunch and was a nice finish to the meal. 9.5/10

we were able to have a few other items that were definitely solid but these were the highlights. the ambiance alone is breathtaking and if you have some extra time before laker games and wanna feel like a baller go to the ritz and take the elevator up to the 24th floor - the lounge menu features both of the two appetizers i talked about. basically my expectations of this place were: familiar chinese style flavors with expensive ingredients and executed perfectly. foodwise it delivered. the service had a little airball when they forgot a fried rice side we ordered and then got it wrong, but the management was courteous, and comped off the rice, and all our drinks and we got two extra desserts and even invited us to notify her before we dine again with them so they could style and dial us. not sure what dial us means, but im down to find out.

the report card

food: 9.5/10
presentation: 9.5/10
service: 8.5/10
ambiance: 10/10
overall: 9.4/10

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Musha - Torrance, CA

musha is everything that is awesome about japanese food right now. musha takes japanese food, which we all know is the best food on the planet and then somehow puts their own twist on it and makes it exponentially better. it's like....you know how when you watch basketball you see blake griffin and you know he makes the nba so much better. so yeah. that's what musha does for japanese food for me. i don't really know any other place that does stuff like this and there's no other person in the nba what blake griffin does.

let me just point out a couple of the noteworthinesses (noteworthiness'? noteworthinessi? noteworthinessesies?) on musha's menu...

cheese risotto - risotto is good. but when it becomes mixed with cheese and bacon thrown in there....how can that not be good?!? but i'm not even done! it comes in a huge block of cheese!!! COME ON!!!! it's like saying.....here's an ice cream sundae. let's put some oreo crumble, peanut butter and strawberries on top. but oh wait, let's deep fry the whole thing in pancake batter and throw some sprinkled sugar on top. yeah....it's kinda crazy how it escalates to pure delicious.


MFC - it stands for musha's fried chicken which isn't the most mind blowing piece of fried chicken i've ever had, but it is very very good. it's almost as good as extra crispy recipe at KFC. almost. sadface.

seared mackerel - i love mackerel. i know i will get clowned on because mackerel is one of the cheapest fish and used for bait to catch other fish...but it's awesome. you're not going to hate on chicken mcnuggets just because they're cheap, right?! same with mackerel. what makes an additional awesomeness to this plate is that there's a little table show. no, not strippers....but that would be awesome. i won't spoil what it is, but you should order it because not only is mackerel awesome, but musha does it awesome here

ebi mayo mayo - i love mayo. i know some people might think it's gross, but mayo is awesome. i love ham and mayo sandwiches, deviled eggs, any jack in the box breakfast sandwich, may on ghetto dogs outside of staples plus countless others. so when you put fried shrimp on a plate with not just one helping of mayo, but two?!?!?!? sold.

maguro yukke - i don't know why, but these japanese people have mastered making raw proteins delicious. so they basically take raw tuna (which you may think is just tuna sashimi....BUT SHUT UP FOR NOW!) and throw a raw egg in it, mix some diced apples and man oh man....you just gotta try it for yourself.

i'm probably gonna go there this week. again. and i would watch blake....if the clippers were good enough to make it in the nba playoffs. so i will leave you with this, which saves you all the pain of actual clippers games and leaves you with the best parts.





TLDR version: kinda on the pricey side....but well worth it! try the risotto!

Musha on Urbanspoon

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