Sakurazaka Watari

Sakurazaka Watari (桜坂 渡利)

⭐⭐⭐⭐

🍣 Sushi / 📍 Roppongi 1-chome

📓 Visits: 1

Where can you find sushi that's objectively better than the sushi at Sushi Namba, will cost you half the price and were you can get a seat the same day if not the next?  Tetsuya Watanabe almost certainly has a unique background as a sushi chef in Japan.  After working at Sushi Ginza Onodera he opened his own 'virtual sushi restaurant', Ginza Watari, on YouTube.  That might sound strange but it coincided with the height of Coronavirus restrictions in Japan when restaurants were asked to close early, close altogether, or not serve alcohol, borders were closed and people were not generally going out.  With so much being virtual at that time why not a sushi restaurant and Watanabe-san obtained over 100,000 subscribers in under a year.  In October 2020 he opened a real restaurant in Shibuya and then relocated it to its current location, two years later, taking over the former premises of Sakurazaka Kato.  That alone wouldn't pique my interest but what happened next did.  In April 2023 Watanabe-san appeared on Nippon TV's (0テレ) "The 5 Renpa Muso" or "five consecutive victories" where, in a format similar to Iron Chef, a "master chef" is pitted against five other challengers and their food blind-tasted.  A year earlier Namba-san had seen off all-comers and took away the prize of 500,000 yen.  This year the prize was doubled.  Namba-san saw off his first challenger, the chef from Anago Tamai.  But he was wasn't simply defeated by Watanabe-san's kuruma ebi he was killed by a 0-5 vote.  I made a reservation at 9am the next day.

Now, in fairness, sushi isn't just about kuruma ebi and anyone who's dined at Sushi Namba Hibiya (review here) will know that Namba-san rarely serves kuruma ebi, preferring bottan ebi.  But it was still a fantastic achievement and even the best sushi chefs can completely fail when it comes to kuruma ebi.  Omakase at Sakurazaka Watari is priced at JPY 17,600 at lunch and JPY 27,500 at dinner.  Prices are inclusive and I went for lunch.

I rated the tsumami all 8-8.5/10. i.e., good or very good but I've had better.  The nigiri were more varied.  Seasonings and some of the neta were very strong in flavour.  The maguro was too strong in flavour for me.  I would have scored yari ika higher but it was tarnished by sesame oil.  Nodoguro aburi needs little additional seasoning when you have really good fish.  Here, the seasoning was doing all the work.  These I rated 7.5-8.  Other than the kuruma ebi (more on that in a bit) a generous kegani mini donburi and an exemplary bafun uni were the pick of meal, which I both rated 9/10.

The nigiri are tiny.  This is a feature of modern sushi restaurants and it's perhaps getting a little tiresome as chefs with no buying power try to compete with each other on squeezed margins.  It just didn't work when it came to the hokkigai.  The shari was way too small for the kai and the balance was off.  The chef should adjust the size of the shari (which was firm and quite sour) for large neta.  On one occasion the rice was far too hot for the neta.

The kuruma ebi was outstanding.  I've had bigger kuruma ebi but never with a bouncy or "fuwafuwa" texture.  I rated it 10/10.  You can, of course, see how Watanabe prepares his kuruma ebi on YouTube.

You could order extra sushi but I stuck to the course.  No anago was served so there were just 8 nigiri in total, 4 fish tsumami and 2 other tsumami and dessert.  On item count that doesn't compare favourably to other restaurants at a similar price, though it compares quite favourably to other restaurants trying to mix up kaiseki and sushi.

A bit like Hato I was more impressed by the chef than by the sushi.  Watanabe-san is a nice guy and can speak good English.  It might be somewhere to revisit in a year or two when the chef has taken on more constructive feedback, can raise some of the other items to the same level as the kuruma ebi and can be a bit more picky about the neta.  The kuruma ebi was better than Namba's but that's all.

📌 https://tabelog.com/tokyo/A1307/A130701/13280118/

❓ My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4.0 (value: 3.8)

📱 Booking: 🟩 Easy.  I booked well in advance but on my visit there were only two other guests.  English spoken.

📍 Location: 

1F Ark Hills Executive Tower, 1-14-5 Akasaka.  1F multi-tenant building.  To avoid an uphill slug you can take the outside lift to the South-West of the ANA InterContinental hotel to 4F and then follow the road South-East.
Map data ©2023 Google

📅 Visit June 2023

Tachiuo owan
Bottan ebi, umi budo
Tomorokoshi, togarashi su-age
Sakuramasu warayaki, horseradish
Junsai, ponzu
Akami zuke (nigiri)
Chutoro
Kohada
Hokkigai
Kegani mini donburi
Yari ika
Nodoguro aburi
Kuruma ebi
Bafun uni
Miso soup
"Zabaglione"

💴 Damage: 17,600
⏱️ Time taken: 1h30m