Saboten Tonkatsu @ Aberdeen Centre now open

[Kentan]

More tonkatsu awesomeness has arrived from straight from Japan! The first Canadian branch of Saboten, the Japanese tonkatsu chain, has opened in the Aberdeen food court.

Anyone tried it yet? I hope the quality here will measure up to the standards in Japan.

Canadian site here:
http://www.saboten.ca/

For comparison - menu items available in Japan (with calorie count!) here:
http://www.ghf.co.jp/saboten_rest/men...

[clutterer]

There is a new(ish) donburi place on Seymour and Hastings called Kita No Donburi, which may be of interest.

[Kentan]

A little more intel on Saboten:
- This is their first North American shop, but they have locations in Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong
- Using Canadian pork, rice from California, but other ingredients will be from Japan
- Green House Foods of Japan, which owns the chain, partnered with the Fairchild Group to bring it here
- They're looking to open up to 10 locations in Metro Vancouver

[flowbee]

Their website says they use pork that's been aged 10 days. Technically, isn't all pork that's sold on the retail level at least a few days old? Maybe even a week since the original pig was slaughtered? (I may not know what I'm talking about, but that factoid intruiged me.)

[LotusRapper]

Aged or not, they already got me at the top of the web page :-D

http://www.saboten.ca/images/slide1.jpg

[flowbee]

yeah, that fatty edge is awesome. i can taste it now...

[fmed]

Interesting that they age the meat. It will taste more "porky" and concentrated. Most tonkatsu here is so devoid of flavour that it tastes more like chicken breast

[flowbee]

I'm thinking around 10 years ago, that Clubhouse was really good. The original Japanese owner was a golf nut and it sorta showed in how he decorated the place. Then he sold it about 5 years ago and I found the food afterwards to be really blah.

I really liked their okonomiyaki and deep fried sushi (back when not many places did deep fried sushi) up until he sold the place.

[LotusRapper]

Interesting you tell the history, then. Thx for the insight. First time I went there must have been around mid-2004, so that was prolly the original owner. Since the first time I've gone maybe 7 times in all, so I was definitely no regular.

[LotusRapper]

Thx for the heads-up ! I love tonkatsu, but no expert, I just go by texture and greasiness (batter), moistness (cutlet) and taste. My current faves include i-Cafe and The Clubhouse in Vancouver, however I've not tried 29th Avenue Cafe (former Yoshoku-Ya on Denman).

Will try Saboten soon :-)

[flowbee]

You mean Clubhouse didn't go down the shithole after the original owner sold the place? Hmmm...I used to love their cheap 'n cheerful atmosphere and good food.

[LotusRapper]

Last I was there was around Aug 2011. Didn't notice any difference from my visit before that time. Guess I'm not as regular as some of you are.

[grayelf]

Good to know about Saboten (though I can't seem to resist a Chinese variation when in Richmond...) and that Clubhouse is still holding up. I'm well past due for one of their mammoth moddan-yaki.

[LotusRapper]

Not to mention their very decent okonomiyaki ......

[grayelf]

Yeah, same thing. Moddan or modern is the noodles-added version and rather hard to come by in these parts.