Enjoyable night at Sushisho Saito

I was merely looking for a half-decent place to eat on my last evening of the trip in Akasaka - hardly a destination when you think of good sushi - when I stumbled across Sushisho Saito on Tabelog, and I couldn't resist checking it out, given my previous experience at other "Sushisho" restaurants were nothing but spectacular. Chef Keiji Nakazawa of Sushi Sho at Yotsuya was known to have a unique way of serving edomae sushi, and many of his disciples named their restaurants "Sushisho" (which literally means Sushi Master) out of respect of their teacher - including Sushisho Masa near Roppongi, which I went last November and Sushisho Saito.

More Tokyo - The refined, old-school Unagi Akimoto

I dashed through immigration and customs, hopped on to Narita Express, arrived at downtown Tokyo and checked in to my hotel at record speed (in less than 2 hours), all because I was starving and in desperate need for food as I got off the plane. And one metro stop away from my hotel in Akasaka, I arrived at a quiet neighborhood of Kojimachi slightly after 5pm, in front of a tiny restaurant called Unagi Akimoto, a 105 year old "institution" specializing in Unagi, or freshwater eel, cuisine. The restaurant just opened for dinner service at 5, but I decided to call this meal a late lunch instead, an excuse for myself to stuff myself with more food later on, at "proper" dinner hours.

The Perfect Tempura Lunch - Tokyo's Rakutei

For the past few trips to Tokyo, I always tried to find time for at least one decent sushi meal, and one tempura meal. This time, I booked myself a lunch spot at the Michelin 2-starred tempura restaurant Rakutei in the neighborhood of Akasaka.