As I mentioned in Part 1, Captain Jack and I had already consumed almost all of the first 5 Kozara Ryori (small plates). At this point, CJ turned to me and said; "ok, it's time for some meat!" Opening the menu, I started ordering items from the Grilled Dishes and Side Dishes potion of the menu.
The first dish to arrive was the Grilled Beef Tongue (Gyutan – $5.50):
5 slices of Grilled Beef tongue, served with a lemon wedge and a sprinkling of Shichimi Togarashi, the standard Japanese chili and spice blend. If I may digress for a brief moment; the translation of Shichimi Togarashi is basically "seven spice chili pepper". Whenever I use it around the house, I will often show the bottle to the Missus and tell Her; "your people may have 5 spice…but we have SEVEN spice!" At which time I need to duck and scamper away quickly…very quickly. I thought the slices of tongue would have been better off texturally if it were sliced a bit thinner, and grilled a bit more crisp. As served it was a bit more rubbery than what I prefer. Still, the flavor was excellent…..and a good sign of proper preparation was evident. The Gyutan was permeated with the unmistakable fragrance of Binchotan, which adds a distinct smoky flavor to whatever is being grilled.
Next up was something not on the menu. But seeing that there were a few Yakitori style items on the menu involving various cuts of chicken, I asked if they had Tori Kawa (chicken skin). Nanase pointed to the Japanese menu over the doorway to the kitchen, and said yes. So this was a no-brainer.
Served in a ponzu style sauce, and topped with a good, mildy, sweet-pungent Negi (green onion), this dish delivered as expected.
Off the side dish menu, we ordered the Spicy Chicken Karaage ($5.25):
The Karaage was decent, but nothing special. What was delici-oso good was the "spicy sauce" which was more tangy than spicy, and tasted great on the Mizuna…..they should bottle the stuff.
Grilled Chicken Wings (Tebasaki – $4.50):
Not the largest chicken wings you'll ever see, but these were grilled to perfection. And the smoky Binchotan flavor came sailing through. And even though I haven't met very many chicken wings I didn't like, I thought these were especially good.
What was called 1-Bite Deep Fried Pork on the menu($5.50).
This was basically 2 bite Tonkatsu nuggets. The pork was fried to perfection and had a good amount of fat, but was on the tough side. The katsu sauce was really good, very tangy, and I think it's made in house.
I saw a plate of tempura pass by….the color and shape caught my eye. So of course, being with CJ, I had no fear of unfinished food…we ordered the Okra Tempura, which I didn't see on the menu.
This was fried with a skilled hand; the okra still had a nice bite to it, and had not wasted away into mushiness, and the batter was light. What really caught my attention was the Tentsuyu, the dipping sauce, which had a nice dashi flavor, without being too salty.
As we were finishing the okra, CJ turned to me and said; "we need one more thing…." Which gave me the opening to order the Asparagus Wrapped with Pork ($4.25):
Under any other circumstances, this would be plain-Jane bacon wrapped asparagus. It was the addition of grilling over binchotan that added an additional layer of flavor over everything. Overall, this was a decent dish.
12 dishes, along with a small Tokkuri of Kubota Manju came out to a tad over $70. Not bad at all.
Funny thing, a day later I was craving that Gobo Salad. And knowing how much the Missus loves all those nimono (simmered) dishes, I talked Her into having a nice light dinner at Okan. Unfortunately, the Sataimo, Kabocha, and Nasubi dishes weren't "on the table". Of course the really bad tuna-daikon salad, and the strange sweet-sour chicken were…. But all was not lost, for tonight there were a couple of items the Missus enjoys.
We started with some Gobo Kinpira (sauteed than simmered gobo):
Man, this was good, and motivated the Missus to order some Gohan (rice). All the textures were perfect…..this was much better than anything I've tried to make at home.
The Hijiki Nimono (simmered Hijiki):
Nice and crisp, but very mild in flavor. The Missus preferred the version I make at home.
I was surprised when the Missus ordered the Simmered Saba (Simmered Blue Mackerel) from among the specials lining the counter.
Inability to handle the high oil content and the texture, Saba has never been one of the Missus's favorite fishes. And this was no exception. Saba had never been one of my favorite fishes either……but I really enjoyed this. Nice oil, fairly dense meat from the preparation, not as fishy as I had expected.
We also ordered one of the Missus's favorites, Agedashi Tofu ($4.25 – fried tofu in a broth).
The Missus loved the tofu, perfect in texture. The tentsuyu, the sauce for the tofu was very mild, except for the flavor of ginger, which over-powered the otherwise delicate flavors of the dish.
Along with all of those dishes, we had the wonderful Gobo Salad I had been craving, and the Okra Tempura. The Missus had a Calpico Sour, I had tea, and the meal came out to $35. Not bad at all. Many of the dishes are really home-style, and I'm sure many of us makes at least some facsimile of them at home. But some of these dishes take a good amount of time, and to make many small plates…..sheesh!
As we were driving home, we started discussing the salad. The Missus mentioned the textures and also the flavors…..in the very Chinese way She said, "suan, tian, ku, xian." Suddenly, in a moment of clarity I understood, "Okan" (Mom) was teaching us about life in this dish. Life is made up of sour(suan), tian (sweet), bitter (ku), and xian (salty) moments, and we must devour it with zeal. Of course, She may just want us to eat our greens……..
Wa Dining Okan
3860 Convoy St
San Diego, CA 92111
Hours:
Mon – Wed 530-11pm
Thurs – Sat 530pm – 12am
Sun 430pm – 9pm
Part 1, can be found here.