Kakurenbo - Another new izakaya in Vancouver
Pictures here: http://picasaweb.google.com/gustibus.maximus/Kakurenbo
Preamble...
It's been a while. I haven't been on an izakaya crawl in months. A friend and I did one last night on the way to a concert (The Silver Jews at Richards on Richards). We hit three izakaya - Kakurenbo, Guu with Garlic and the Orginal Guu on Thurlow. This review will focus on Kakurenbo.
I have been hearing some buzz about Kakurenbo for some months. A colleague of mine had some inside scoop on its imminent opening (his good friend is a owner-partner). He told me of the expensive interior design of space. They had imported Japanese antiques and timbers at great expense. It reminds me of the interior of Kingyo just down the road. The space is certainly quite nice....how about the food?
Since we were on a crawl, we only ordered three items from their extensive menu and a couple of drinks. We had the smoked duck breast, ebi-mayo, and chicken tsukune skewers done five ways.
Kakurenbo is most definitely on the fusiony end of the izakaya spectrum. Similar stylistically to Shiru-Bay and the Gastown Guu.
Two of the dishes we had seemed over-embellished.... too many things were going on. It took us a little while to deconstruct the duck breast dish to figure out how best to eat it. The ebi-mayo was lost in a mountain of garnish. The minimalist dishes we had at Guus later that evening offered a polar contrast in style. My preference for izakaya cuisine leans towards the simplistic and minimalistic. However, I should return soon to try more of the dishes to offer fair critique. I noticed that they had a decent selection of sake - I didn't order any because I was in a beer and cocktails mood.
Overall, despite the general disappointment I felt after dining at Kakurenbo, I thought that it is a great addition to an already crowded izakaya scene here. They are certainly upping the ante with respect to interior design.
Pictures here: http://picasaweb.google.com/gustibus.maximus/Kakurenbo
Pictures of the rest of our crawl at Guu with Garlic and the Original Guu are here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/gustibus.maximus/GuuWithGarlic#
http://picasaweb.google.com/gustibus.maximus/GuuOriginalOnThurlow#
Shokutsu over at foodosophy offers a much more detailed review and some excellent pictures of Kakurenbo here: http://foodosophy.wordpress.com/2008/...
By fmed
on Oct 2, 2008 10:04 PM
Thanks for giving us your preliminary take on this resto, fmed. Combined with Shokutsu's comments, I'd say I'm going to stick to the Guus and my super-stick-friendly Zakkushi for now, although I think I would consider Kakurenbo if I was taking out more conservative friends who would appreciate the decor and the less boisterous atmo. Me, I'm all about the food :-).
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Another nice report fmed!
Kay, I'm going to take my son out tomorrow to our first izakaya! We live by Commercial Skytrain, so I want to go somewhere on the transit line. His palette is better than mine! We don't care about decor (I do, he doesn't! but he's 18)...he loves Japanese (think - Iron Chef Morimoto!)...me, I just want good value & good food!
Since joining Chow, I realize how much we DON'T see/get out in Vancouver! I always "Chow" out of town on vacation... I'm trying to change this...I've done 5 of your reccomendations since I've been home, but that's another thread! :-)
Any first time thoughts - appreciated!
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I suggest a crawl: Take the train to Burrard Station and walk to Robson and Thurlow to the Original Guu. Have 3 dishes and some drinks (they have interesting non-alcoholic Japanese drinks and pop) then walk down the hill to Guu with Garlic...do the same then walk to Hapa, then walk to Zakkushi. You should be stuffed by this time.
If a crawl is too much, then just do the Original Guu for now.
Read this article if you haven't: http://www.chow.com/stories/10980/ . The authour Lessley Andersen, photographer Chris Rochelle and I did a crawl last year to support her research for it.
Have fun!
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Thanks fmed! Will do your plan or at least 3 of them! That was a great article too! Looking forward to getting off work & starting! Again, thanks for your advice, much appreciated!
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