Hatsune Sushi

This place is a bit farther out from the city center but is worth venturing out to. There are definitely less tourists out here. Lucky for us, some of the other diners and the chef all spoke some English, so we got to take full advantage of the chef’s demonstrations and explanations.
Notable things to start:
— A small intimate setting with tatami seating
— Varied sakes depending on at which course you ask for more
— Efficient water refills
— All the plates are warm with steam to help bring up the temperature of the fish
— He uses 7 year wasabi from Mount Fuji (25,000 yen for 1 kg?!)
The whole meal is learning about the process; therefore, he started us off with the sushi rice that was just made. It was sticky, vinegary, and al dente, and throughout the meal, we got to see how it’s character changed.
With each piece, the chef hands it to you personally. It’s mean to be held on your tongue for 5 seconds so that it gets warm and that you get the entire base flavor. It’s also meant to be placed fish side down on your tongue, so the seafood really is the highlight.
1. Octopus: slightly warmed, sliced in front of us. It had a wonderful texture without being rubbery
2. Kohada: with the bone dissolved in vinegar, also served on a warm dish
3. Fresh water oyster: grilled and sweet. It was Barely cooked so it was firmer but still very rich, almost as if it were sous vide
# Presentation: Tuna from Aomori: giant steaks of fish that were from 168 and 213 kg fish. We watched him filet and cure and cut cut the fish. It yielded chu toro, o toro, and maguro (he showed us the different parts that they came from)
4. Spanish mackarel (fish prosciuitto): with salt and vinegar, dry aged for 2 weeks. It was 2 pieces in one: (silver) back and the front, which led to a rich flavor
# Presentation: Snow crabs: 1 big male and 2 females, which were all feisty and alive upon presentation, then steamed — to be served later
5. Fatty fish and skin: with fish liver («fish foie gras»). This was a seasonal autumn item
6. Kawahagi: legend has it it can be poisonous? It melts in your mouth
# Presentation: Uncured and soy sauce cured tuna from earlier
7. Chu toro: uncured and cured with soy sauce — light and buttery
8. O toro uncured and cured — melts in your mouth
9. Maguro: probably my favorite of the 3
10. Sea eel: killed recently, so some nerves are still alive, and it still responds to touch. It’s supposed to be famous in Kyoto. He showed us how he cuts the bones and meat to break it up, and the bones basically disintegrate upon cooking. He left the skin perfectly undamaged. It was served steamed and hot, mixed with cold sushi rice
# Presentation: Ikura formed into a heart shape on a plate
11. Ikura: these were quite large. It was less salty but very flavorful, and it didn’t have as much of a pop as the kind in the US. It’s amazing how he molds it so that you can old it upside down without it falling apart
12. Shirako (milt): basically the seminiferous tubules of cod. The chef wouldn’t say what it was until after we ate it, but based on the appearance, I could tell. It was very creamy and mild, but the texture and knowing what it was made it difficult for me. The saving grace was the generous white truffle slices on top. He cut them fresh from a huge white truffle from Alba (I’ve never seen one so large)
13. Crab (now cooked): Body meat and eggs, then leg meat and tomalley on top — basically every part of the crab. This was super fresh and sweet
14. Grilled o toro: this looks like a steak and smells amazing
15. «Perfect tuna roll»: all the tunas from by meal mixed together into a fat roll — awesome and super flavorful
16. Mini roll of pickled squash
17. Tamago: almost like a pound cake. Good texture
I love that the chef and his wife had a sense of humor and were ok with photos — they even created photo ops for us and took selfies with us. It’s a very educational and wonderful step by step experience to see how something changes from the raw ingredient to sushi (uncured, cured, cooked, etc).
It was a longer meal (almost 3 hours), but it was entertaining and educational all the way. The chef’s English is quite impressive. It’s definitely worth venturing out to Hatsunezushi.

Hatsunezushi. It’s a 2 Michelin star rated restaurant in Tokyo. It’s a diamond in the rough and a 40 minutes cab ride from Shinjuku. It’s run by Chef Katsu Nakaji, a 4^th generation sushi chef, and his wife. He prepares the sushi and his wife handles everything else in the restaurant. The hospitality of the Chef and wife is amazing. He’s probably the most down to earth Michelin rated chefs I have ever met. He’s a type of person you could go watch the game and drink beers with on a Sunday. He’s always cracking jokes and a pretty jolly fellow. Think Santa Clause but Japanese.
Hatsunezushi is an eight seat sushi bar filled with friendly locals. The Chef serves only sushi. In other words, there are no appetizers or any other dishes. He uses slightly firmer rice and red vinegar. The red vinegar makes the rice… well… red. He has his technique down to the tee. He starts off the omakase with certain fishes due to the temperature of the rice and the meal progresses as the temperature of the rice simmers down. He doesn’t have a kitchen staff. It’s all him.
In addition, you eat the sushi upside down. In other words, the first thing that hits your taste buds is the fish and not the rice. He doesn’t put the sushi on a plate but he personally puts it on your index finger after he prepares it. I’m not going to touch on all the dishes because they were all memorable. However, I’m going to touch on the most unforgettable ones and the ones that dissolved in my mouth like a tab of acid.
1) Red Snapper — This was amazing and simply perfection. The red snapper is usually firm in texture but Katsu got it to be buttery and sweet in flavor. It was pretty astonishing how he did that. He said he only uses soy sauce and salt to prepare his fish. I say, «WTF?»
2) Uni — Uni usually comes with this silky and rich texture. However, the way he prepared the uni made it fluffy and evaporated in your mouth after two seconds. You close your mouth and it was gone. The uni was half baked, pure heaven and the texture was nothing I ever encountered. A pure feeling of bliss like a teenage boy losing his virginity.
3) Fatty Tuna Belly w/​Soy sauce — You put it in your mouth for 5 seconds without chewing and it dissolves in your mouth without a single movement of your jaw. There is a slight wasabi after taste but it was gone like someone who owed you money.
4) Fatty Tuna Belly — This was pretty awesome. It was buttery, rich and tender. He was a different contrast from the one prepared with soy sauce. It melted away like a woman’s make up in a Vegas club.
5) Tamago — The best tamago I’ve ever had. It was fluffy, cake like and surrounded the rice. The rice breaks down the tamago as you chew and dissolved in your mouth after 3 chews. The texture tasted like pound cake. Simply perfection.
The one thing that I really liked about Chef Katsu as a person was he allowed me to take pictures of every single sushi he prepared. What’s so special about that? Well, he held it in his palm every single time for 16 courses with a huge smile and no complaints. How many people do you know who would do something like that?
To be honest, Hatsunezushi is probably the best sushi experience of my life. It’s a pure sushi dining experience. The technique, the hospitality of the couple, the friendly locals and the sushi were all amazing.
US 2015 Michelin 3 Stars Count: 8 down. 4 more.
2015 Michelin Rated Restaurant Count: 16
San Pellegrino 2014 World’s 100 Best Restaurants Count: 7
San Pellegrino 2015 World’s 100 Best Restaurants Count: 9