Al Dente Pasta Restaurant - Shinjuku Stn, Tokyo

As a woman, I find it offensive for restaurants to serve high-calorie food that is tasteless.  What are the benefits of ingesting a heavy cream sauce that has no flavour - an extra 20 minutes to your workout routine or slightly tighter clothing?   For all the enjoyment your tastebuds are experiencing, you might as well be eating plain tofu or rice.  And I hate it when vegetables have been cooked to the point that it's practically pureed or have lost any hope of retaining any flavour; equally bad is trying to find a vegetable to spear your fork with but discovering that the one piece of broccoli on top was a loner.  But whenever I bite into the pasta at Al Dente, the sorrow from terrible, past pasta dishes disappears and the world is a less fearful place. The cream sauces are hearty and the vegetables are flavourful and have more than a cameo appearance.

Al Dente's menu is written in Japanese and Italian.   On the front right side are the starter courses: bruschette (bruschetta), antipasti (appetizer) and insalata (salad); while the left side has the spaghetti alla giapponese (Japanese-style spaghetti which usually has a soysauce base) and determinazione lista (house specials).   On the other side are more spaghetti sauces: salsa pomodoro (tomato sauce), en bianco (white sauces), and alla panna (cream sauces).   All pasta dishes come with 110g of spaghetti.  If you wish for less, you can order the 70g "piccolo" portion and save ¥50.  For heartier eaters, there are "grande" (180g for ¥100 extra) and "doppia" (250g for ¥200 extra) sizes.  This is all written down on the top right corner of the menu.  When ordering, the restaurant forbids you from ordering only one doppia-size dish and sharing it between two adults.

My favourite dish is the Spaghetti Funghi E Panna Acida (¥1050).  It has cooked Japanese mushrooms that are fresh, not canned and the sauce uses sour cream which gives the pasta a wonderful bite.  Japanese mushrooms are amazing and if you've never tried them, this restaurant is a good place to do so.  The Spaghetti alla Carbonara (¥1000) has thick pieces of bacon that have a lot of taste and great texture.  The Lorenza (¥1250) is wonderfully rich but ordering an extra-large size is a bit too much.  From the tomato sauce section in the specials, I recommend the Spaghetti Bolognese E Melanzane which has ground beef and tasty pieces of eggplant.  Help yourself to the grated paremesan, which in the small metal containers every few seats.

Extra-large size Spaghetti Funghi E Panna Acida

Normal-size Spaghetti alla Carbonara

Spaghetti Bolognese E Melanzane

 Unfortunately, the restaurant does allow smoking. The counter seats on the left side are the non-smoking seats while the counter seats and tables on the right side have ashtrays for smokers.  The ventilation system is good enough that you'll never smell the smoke when sitting in the non-smoking section.  Al Dente is located between the ground floor and the basement level- there is a restaurant area mid-level, meanwhile the basement floor leads to a walkway that will take you to the station.  The restaurant is packed during lunch hours, but since the  restaurant is open all day, going late afternoon to avoid the queue is an option.  Al Dente is great place to get tasty pasta at a reasonable price. 


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Numazukou Kaiten Sushi - Shinjuku Stn, Tokyo

Whenever I go to a sushi restaurant, I never order a set.  Sets always come with a variety of sushi and among them are usually octopus, squid and fish roe; missing is usually chutoro or anything including "toro" (toro literally translates into "fat" - not hard, chewy lard but a blend of meat and fat that can be extremely tasty).  Since I'm not fond of the former and the latter is my favourite, I always order sushi a la carte.  This tends to quickly become pricey, especially since the sushi pieces that I like are usually the more expensive ones.  Because of this, I limit my trips to a proper sushi restaurant for special occasions and all other times go to the much more reasonably priced kaiten sushi restaurants.

Kaiten sushi places are very much about self-service.  Customers sit on stools by a counter and help themselves to plates of sushi moving on a conveyor belt.  Rather than a waitress serving you hot tea, cups are lined up on the counter, along with tea bags or powder; you must fill the cups yourself with hot water from the taps built into the counter every few seats.  Everything is within easy reach from your seat and at your complete disposal: chopsticks, saucers, wet napkins, soy sauce and ginger.  Even though you can help yourself to the sushi rolling around, you can also order things

The price menu

directly from the chef or waitress and the shop will usually provide a picture menu for this.  Above the counter, you will usually see the price list, and each plate colour indicates a different price.  The more expensive plates will not usually be on the conveyor belt unless the place is busy, so ordering directly from the chef or waitress is the only option during lull times.  As you finish each plate, keep them stacked in front of you.  When you've had your fill of raw fish, flag down a waitress who will come to your seat and give you a tally of your plates on a piece of paper which you then take to the cash register by the entrance and pay there.  As a side story, I once went to a kaiten sushi restaurant where the person sitting next to us snuck one of his plates onto our stack.  Luckily, it had been a ¥500 plate for beer - the plate literally had a "beer" label across it; the waitress gives it to you when you order alcohol since it's not easy to stack mugs or bottles.  Since we had no beer mugs at our seats while the young punk next to us was still nursing his but had no beer plate in his stack, the waitress waived the cost.  Interestingly, she also did not accuse nor mention it to him even though it was quite obviously his. This only happened once for the 10+ years we've been in Japan but it's sad that it marred our first year here.

This plate of chutoro is ¥550.

  Since chutorou is my favourite piece of sushi, I judge most sushi restaurants by it.  Chutorou is from the belly of tuna, and there are different names for the different cuts of tuna meat; akami is leaner and ootorou is fattier.  I find that akami is tough and not that tasty while ootoro is sometimes too overpowering.  For kaiten sushi, I love the shop in Yokohama, Miura Misaki-ko, which is on the 6th floor of the Cial shopping centre in Yokohama Station.  They have another branch in the World Porters near Sakuragicho Station but this restaurant is not as good as the Yokohama one.  Miura Misaki-ko always has amazing chutoro (the tuna comes fresh from Miura port), an excellent salmon toro, nama yuba, and salmon mayo - the last two of which isn't done in many shops but is great here.  Their "aburi" plates (broiled with a hand-held blowtorch) are wonderful - especially the tuna and salmon.  Most kaiten sushi bars will do these types of sushi and simply let you dip them in soy sauce, Miura Misaki-ko has a topping of mayonnaise or marinated daikon that really enhances the flavour of the dish.  In Shinjuku, the best chutorou has been at Numazukou Kaiten Sushi which is underground close to the Keio department store at Shinjuku station.

How to get to Numazukou:  From the street level, the best place to go underground is at staircase number 6 (not Exit No 6 - it's a completely different area).    After you go down the staircase, turn right.  It's just pass the glass doors.

The west side of Shinjuku Station with a view of the main entrance to the Keio Department Store Building.  Staircase 6 is across the street from the right side of the Keio Department Store.

A street level view of staircase number 6 which has a sign with its number on the side and a view of the right side of the Keio Department Store across the street.

  Numazukou is reasonably priced and the quality is consistently good.  They do a very nice aburi engawa (broiled flatfish) and a great anago (boiled eel) that they will warm again when you order.  Also good is the toro tekka, which is tuna with shiso (perilla leaf) in a roll.  The bitterness of the perilla leaf gives the roll a nice bite and this type of roll is not common to all sushi restaurants.  The chutorou is a bit pricey at ¥550 a plate but it's usually good.  I also like to have aji (horse mackeral) and buri or hamachi (yellowtail).  Numazukou is thankfully a non-smoking sushi bar, however the line-ups for lunch and dinner time can be very long, it's best to go during the off-times since they are open all-day.

Toro tekka is ¥550.

Aburi engawa is ¥400.

Anago comes in a long strip (¥550) or cut into two pieces (¥330)

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Breizh Cafe Creperie - Shinjuku Stn, Tokyo

It's not uncommon to smell the sweet, fresh-made scent of crepes wafting in the breeze as you walk around Tokyo. There are many tiny stalls dotted around the city that will make crepes with fresh fruit or jam, cream or custard, ice cream or cheese cake.  Some are good, some are not; but for an authentic French crepe, one must either fly to gay Paris or simply visit your local Breizh Cafe.  Brieizh offers not only desert crepes, but also savoury buckwheat galettes (non-sweet pancakes) filled with cheese, egg, assorted vegetables and meat.  The desert menu has light sweet crepes topped with fruit, jam, sauces and ice cream.  In particular,

Dame Blanche

the chocolate sauce is rich and mellow; it obviously hasn't come from a bottle labelled Hershey's.  Breizh prides itself on the quality of its ingredients and this is what makes the crispy galettes and soft crepes so amazingly delicious.  It's hard to recommend just one galette, most are great and the same goes for the crepes.

Complete Tomate Champignon

 It's more worthwhile to go to Breizh for lunch during the weekdays as they have a special lunch course that is much cheaper than dinner.  At Shinjuku Takashimaya, the weekday lunch course is offered from 11am to 3pm.  There is a different menu for dinner, weekends and holidays.  For the weekday galette lunch course, you can get a classic galette of your choice, salad and drink for ¥1480.  With one of: soup/dessert crepe/ bowl of ice cream, it becomes ¥1680.  The last course choice is a Caesar Salad galette with a drink and soup for ¥1680.  The lunch galettes offered are the

Complete Artichaut

simple "complete" ones.  For example, the "complete tomate" has egg, shoulder ham, Swiss gruyere and tomato.  (On the dinner menu, this galette alone is ¥1280.)  The desert crepe lunch menu comes directly from the dinner menu but is more limited.  For the drink choice, there is a wide variety of coffees and teas but they also offer 3 types of alcoholic cider: dry, sweet or organic.

Soup, salad and a cup of cider

If you choose the soup course, be careful to inquire as to the soup of the day.  The pumpkin soup is fantastic, but not all are. I recently had a soup at Breizh where the consistency reminded me of potatoes and there seemed to be a hint of onion, but it was so bland that I could not tell what it was.  All in all, not one I would choose again.


Briezh also offers seasonal galettes and crepes.  The seasonal crepes usually feature fresh fruit but I've recently had several where the fruit had been preserved.  There are several branches of Breizh Cafe such as Le Bretagne in Omotesando Station - Yokohama station, Tokyo station, Akasaka station, etc.  The Breizh Cafe on the 13th floor of the Shinjuku Takshimaya building is smoke-free.



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Tatsunoya Ramen Restaurant - Shinjuku Stn, Tokyo

 One of my favourite restaurants in Shinjuku is Tatsunoya, a ramen restaurant that serves tonkotsu (pork-bone broth) ramen and tsukemen.  The piping-hot tonkotsu ramen is great for wintertime but not during the humid Tokyo summer when just walking down the street causes sweat to pour down your neck.  So when you crave noodles in summer, luke-warm tsukemen is a more practical solution.  Tsukemen consists of cold noodles and accompaniments that are dipped into a warm broth.  Both are tasty:  the tonkotsu being a bit saltier of the two but having soft pieces of cha shu (bbq pork); the tsukemen more filling since it comes with a porridge as well as noodles but the pork pieces are tougher.  Whenever I visit Tatsunoya, I generally alternate between the tsukemen and the tonkatsu with a hard-boiled egg (which always has a perfect, slightly-runny yolk) and finish with the torokeru purin, which translates directly into 'melts in your mouth pudding'.   It's made from yellow bean and is utterly amazing.

  When you enter the shop, simply place your money in the vending machine on the right and choose from the picture menu.  Each bowl of ramen comes with 2 pieces of cha shu, green onion, fungus and a serving of thin, straight noodles. The shop offers tonkotsu in 2 ways: regular and strong-flavour (with added miso paste).   The top row of the vending machine, from right to left is:  an extra serving of noodles (¥100), regular tonkotsu (¥700), strong-flavour (¥750), regular with a hard-boiled egg (¥800), strong flavour with a hard-boiled egg (¥850).   Tsukemen is on the 2nd row from right to left: small (¥750), medium (¥750 - yes, you've read it right, the same price as the small), and large(¥850); followed by extra vegetables (¥100) and an extra egg (¥100).

Torokeru purin

 The third row are side dishes: a small bowl of rice with mentaiko (pollock roe - ¥250), rice with tororo (grated Japanese yam - ¥250) and rice (¥150).  The fourth row is: extra green onion (¥100), 3 extra slices of cha shu (¥250), and the last in this row is torokeru purin (¥300).  The last row is a bottle of beer (¥400).

Once you have received your pink tickets and got your change back from the machine, the waitress hovering nearby will show you to your seat.  Glasses of water will be placed in front of you and the waitress will take your tickets.  This shop offers to prepare noodles to differing consistencies: harigane (extremely hard), barikatai (kind of hard), katai (hard), futsuu (normal), yawarakai (soft), bariyawarakai (very soft).  Each seat usually has a card on it, with these options on the bottom right.  If you have ordered ramen, this is the first thing that she will ask you.  If you order beer, she will ask you how many glasses and you can simply count with your fingers.  If you order pudding, she will ask before or after, so simply say 'ato' (after).

 After stating your preferences to the waitress, you'll notice 3 jars in front of you.  These are the appetizers and are meant to occupy you until your order arrives.  Simply use the chopsticks to scoop some into the small white dishes.  Do not use these chopsticks to eat with.  The disposable chopsticks are in the rectangular box under the white dishes.

Tonkotsu ramen

 Then the ramen arrives, which most people seem to inhale.  If you have broth left after eating all the noodles and are still feeling peckish, simply order another serving of noodles by flagging down a waitress, pointing to your bowl or saying 'kaedama' and giving her ¥100 - this is possible for both ramen and tsukemen.  If you order another serving of ramen, you'll have to choose the hardness again.  Note that this is for noodles only, no extra broth will be forthcoming.

Tsukemen comes with green onion, bamboo shoots, seaweed and pork.

 When you have completely finished your tsukemen noodles, you'll probably still have quite a bit of broth left.  Flag down the waitress, point to your empty noodle plate and nod to her question.  She'll bring you a bowl of warigae, rice porridge, which you're supposed to dump into the broth to dilute it.  It's still remains flavourful and this allows you to spoon up all the bits of meat on the bottom along with all the broth.

 The restaurant itself is a bit cramped, with only 2 tables at the back.  The majority of the seats are stools at the counter which runs most of the length of the restaurant.  However, the counter seats allow you to see directly into the kitchen where the staff can be seen flinging ramen noodles into the air.  It's also comforting to see the cooks place the already clean bowls into boiling hot water right before they fill it with noodles and broth.  Hygiene is sometimes a bit questionable at ramen shops- I've come across places where I've wondered if the bowls are only cleaned once a day and even then it's probably only done by the cockroaches during the night.  In a typical ramen shop kitchen,  the water from the noodles is flung to the floor with abandon and this is the case with Tasunoya, but it's by far the cleanest ramen shop I've been to.  It's a good place to eat but not to linger and chat, as there really isn't the space to relax.  But the staff are friendly, the prices are reasonable, the food is great and the entire restaurant is non-smoking.  If you're near Shinjuku station, you really must make the 8-minute walk and check out this restaurant.


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