Sakagura -- NYC

Jon and I were in New York a few weeks back and wanted to take our friend Tina out to thank her for her generous hospitality! Both Jon and I did some diggin' (him online, me via my friend's own food blog) and found Sakagura to be a good spot.

Cuisine: Japanese Tapas

Price: $$-$$$

http://www.sakagura.com/

If you are a fan of sake, this is a place I would recommend to try in the city. Their sake menu was much, much longer than their food menu and quite comprehensive. We weren't that big on sake and actually a little bit confused, so we had to ask our waiter to make a suggestion. In the end, I didn't really like it but I'm pretty picky about my liquors.

The place was cute and tucked away, inside an office building. Reservations are highly recommended; a lady had walked-in for one and the wait for her was one hour. Expect the food to be a bit pricey, more than usual for a Japanese tapas place. I thought the food wasn't extraordinary, but it wasn't bad in any way. Here is some of the dishes we ordered:

FYI, Blogger's inability to be flexible with photos is really, really annoying. So I guess I will have to write this review backwards! That's okay because this dish, the dessert, was my favorite part of the meal. You are looking at BLACK SESAME CREME BRULEE, my friends. D-freaking-licious. Now, I'm really picky about my creme brulee. It shouldn't be too soft inside (not liquidy) but shouldn't be solid either. This was perfect in texture and in taste. I would go to Sakagura just to eat this again. It was also accompanied by Black Sesame ice cream, yuuuuum.
Porkbelly! This dish had good flavors but was a disappointment compared to Musha in Torrance, CA. I don't think I'll ever find porkbelly as good as theirs again. The main problem with this dish was that it wasn't soft at all. Guess they didn't braise it long enough!

Scallops served with mango sauce - this one was my favorite dinner dish. The scallops were raw, which was a little weird but still delicious. The sauce was a puree of fresh mangos. I'm not sure what else they added to it to make it thick, but it was smoothee like without any other flavor than pure mangos. Winnerrrr

Tuna tartar served with caviar and roe. Nice presentation, but only okay flavors.

All in all, it was a nice dinner but I've had better Japanese Tapas. But, of course, Japanese Tapa menus are always a million pages long so perhaps we just didn't order the right stuff. And, of course, if you like Sake, check this place out!

--fatty regina