Sunday, January 18, 2009

Octopus Garden
















“Octopus Garden” is one of our favorite restaurant in the world. It is a Japanese restaurant, but they have unique named roll/food there. It is totally Sada-san’s (chef/owner) world. We’ve been one of the frequent customers there since we immigrated in Vancouver (1999). Every time we feel we want to eat Japanese things, we go there and have a great time.
That night, we ate “Uni (Japanese sea urchin) shooter” at first. He put dashi (bonito broth) and soy mix, grated mountain potato, rice, Uni (sea urchin), quail egg yolk, and a little bit of wasabi. You can mix it up with your chopsticks and drink it one shot like “shot”. All the flavour are incorporated together beautifully. My husband and I were fully satisfied to start our meal like that.
Next, we ate fresh raw oysters(6pcs). I forgot the name… something loco oyster. They were kind of big and tasted OK. Usually, when we go there, we eat Kumamoto (very small size oyster), but they didn’t have on that day, only that loco one were available, so we ordered them. I didn’t take picture of oysters (A) I forgot doing that, (B) people know what is raw oysters. Next, we ate Spanish mackerel sashimi. It was pickled with Kobu(Japanese sea weed). I don’t know it is right expression “pickled”, but Sada-san sandwiched Spanish Mackerel with Kobu and left in the fridge for few hours or over night. “Umami” from Kobu makes fish more tasty, so it was yummy! We put in Ponzu sauce on it. Delicious.
Next we ate Tuna Sashimi. Every one knows what is Tuna sashimi, so I didn’t take picture. Of course, they were great. After that, we ate “Ninja Roll”, which is soft shell crab roll. My husband loves soft shell crab, so we ordered.
This is “Olympic Roll”. The candle in the glass is Olympic flame. It was basically salmon roll. Teacup face is Octopus face, I guess…
This one is Wagyuu NY steak. It was stuffed with smoked salmon and asparagus. He put Yuzu Pepper(Yuzu Kosho in Japanese) on steak for taste. It sounds odd, like smoked salmon and beef, but this smoky flavour matched well with beef. And pinch of citrus taste from Yuzu pepper was good punch of this dish.
Finally, we ate Foie Gra Nigiri. We were so full by the time we finished beef, but as always, we could put Foie Gra in our another stomach! It was a nice end of the entire meal.

Like I said, we were very full, so we didn’t order anydessert, but they have some nice home made dessert there. Banana Tempura, Cream Caramel, home made Black sesame ice cream, and so on.

They have some other interesting food, so I will put more picture next time I go there.

Please try Octopus Garden when you have chance! Sada-san and his team are great! I recommend sit down on the sushi bar and talk to Sada-san. He and his team will do best to make you happy!

Octopus Garden
1995 Cornwall Avenue Vancouver
(604) 734-8971
http://www.octopusgarden.ca/

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