Kudanshita Warayakiya

There weren't many restaurants near the park we were wandering around. We stumbled onto a beautiful narrow building wedged between two fast food restaurants, a dentist, and a bunch of commercial real estate. Hungry, and kind of tired, we figured we'd take our chances without checking reviews. Sometimes, it's a challenge to navigate Tabelog (Japan's version of yelp) on the phone and we weren't in the mood to decipher translations. 

If you're going to luck out anywhere for good food with minimal research, it's going to be in Tokyo. Kudanshita Warayakiya is a beautiful restaurant. They had an English menu for us, and the staff was incredibly friendly.

We ordered bonito with wasabi and salt, which had a really unique flavor because of the way it was "cooked" (it's mostly raw, just seared). They had an entire section on their menu that was fresh food from "the market of Tosa" - mostly fried vegetables and meats.  "Otooshi" was served to us, which was described on the menu as "a simple dish served at restaurants and pubs to accompany alcohol before the ordered dishes come out. They are served whether an order is placed or not, and can be chargeable." It was ¥380. They had Japanese Nabe Hot Pot dishes that we didn't try. Instead, we opted to share the garlic and salt yakisoba that was found under the "Rice of Tosa" section.

When they served us our otooshi, we had no idea what it was and since no one spoke English it was fun trying to figure out what we were about to put in our mouths. We ultimately determined it was some sort of corn dish with the help of the translate app and Google images. The food was delicious, the service was excellent, and the ambiance was amazing, but we did discover that they serve horse and whale at this restaurant, so, if that's something that offends you, don't add it to your list.