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word of mouth
When popular restaurant Roti closed its Harumi Triton Square branch in March, there were a lot of sad diners. Fortunately, a new and exciting restaurant and wine bar has opened to take its place… or perhaps we should say “dramatic,” since that is how Garden Bay describes itself. Garden Bay offers modern Italian cuisine in a casual style at reasonable prices. The dinner menu is quite extensive. For starters, you can pick from carpaccio, tomato and basil salad, pancetta, terrine, or bacon and egg salad, for ¥680 to ¥1,380. For entrees, Garden Bay offers lots of grilled meats, seafood, pasta, rice dishes and some vegetarian fare. No entree item costs more than ¥2,400, and there is an ample selection of red and white wines from Italy, Spain, France, Argentina and Australia to go with your dinner. The restaurant is also popular with the lunchtime crowd.
Sets, which change daily, include pasta, a rice dish and a one-plate combination of salad, rice and meat. Of course, no meal is complete without dessert, and Garden Bay offers the likes of tiramisu, gateau chocolate cake and fruit tart. The restaurant is available for parties as well, starting at ¥2,400 per person for a two-hour period. Having just opened, Garden Bay doesn’t yet have an English menu, but the staff are friendly and floor manager Kanako Uehara is more than happy to help with any inquiries.

Harumi Triton Square 1F, Harumi 1-8-16, Chuo-ku 104-0053. Tel: 03-5547-0561. Open daily 11:30am-11pm. Nearest stn: Kachidoki. www.gardenbay.jp CB
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564: Culinary Resolutions
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563: Losing Its Pop
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561-562: Seasonal sipping
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560: Comfort Food
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559: A bright Thamara
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558: Mac attack
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557: Warming trend
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549: Say cheese
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546: Drinking fountain
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544: Style guide
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542: Behind closed doors
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539: In the raw
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538: Spanish lessons
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537: Red, white and brew
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536: The nihonshu express
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535: In the market
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534: Branching out
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533: Think pink
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526: Grains of truth
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430: Bottle shop
429: The Italian job
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425: Show time
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423: Gift of gusto
422: Crossing the Rhine
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419: Top of the food chain
418: Small awakening
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416: Sakura sweets
415: Modern master
414: Star turns
413: A sip of style
412: Digital bites
411: The loving spoonful
410: Fried & tested
409: California Drinking
408: Puff daddy
407: Let's do brunch
406: Spice world
404: Party poppers
403: Roll with it
402: Festive feasting
401: From bush to bottle
396: Gastronomic expolorations
395: Gourmet to go

394: Gourmet to go

391: Imperial Cuisine
390: Pizza pizzazz
389: Eat elite
388: Don't eat the scenery
387: Niku nashi
386: Shanghai Surprise
385: Uncorked
384: Cake walk
383: Gastronomic nomad
382: Short fuse
380: Eating eelectric
378: Through the grapevine
375: Culinary dancer
372: Roy raves
359: Love feast
354: Fugu Ryotei
351: Gateau de Noel
350: Seasonal specials

ISSUES 349-
ISSUES 299-

By John Gauntner

Dive in

Aged sake is worth exploring, but the good stuff is forever young

While sake can be enjoyed in ways similar towine, and while there are some parallels between the two, there are stark differences as well. One such difference is aging.

The long and short of it is that almost all sake is intended to be consumed while very young. It is not something you will want to lay down or cellar for long, but rather dive into relatively soon.

Does this mean that sake is never aged? No. A miniscule amount of sake is laid down and can be very enjoyable. This type, however, is hard to get, fairly expensive, and overall a totally different animal to regular sake. What it is not is better in any unequivocal sense.

A look into history can be enlightening. As far back as the 13th century, some sake was being aged. There were those in the aristocracy that were very fond of such sake, and typical aging periods were three to five years. Yet the truth is that most people back then just wanted a buzz, so even though aged sake may have been considered precious by the nobility, most folks were drinking the freshly brewed stuff.

To finance a couple of wars in the late Meiji Era, the government leveled its gaze at the potentially rich source of income from sake, and eventually sake tax comprised more than 30 percent of all tax revenue. In order to ensure they got their money as soon as possible, tax was due when the sake was brewed, not after it was sold. Naturally, this eliminated any motivation to lay sake down. Nobody wanted to wait three to five years to get their money back. This also served the taxman quite nicely, as a faster flow of sake meant more tax revenues.

The law finally changed about 50 years ago, and brewers are now taxed when the sake ships, a change that opened the door for renewed aging experimentation. Today, the word koshu means aged sake, but it can also refer to sake that has inadvertently aged for one reason or another. Sake deliberately matured for long periods is known as choki jukusei-shu, but koshu will always do in a pinch.

In another difference from the wine world, the methods and results of aging sake are quite varied. There is no consensus in the industry about how sake should be aged, or how aged sake should end up. Some brewers age sake in large tanks at room temperature, others will use tanks at refrigerated or freezing temperatures, while still others use a hybrid of these methods. There is no one correct way—it’s all over the map.

Naturally, all of these methods lead to vastly differing results. Higher aging temperatures and larger vessels (i.e., tanks vs. bottles) yield more drastic changes in color and heaviness of flavor. Colder temperatures and smaller vessels produce less noticeable, more subtle variations. But it is all referred to as “aged” sake, in spite of the variations.

Still, it must be emphasized that aged sake is an experimental anomaly, and is but a drop in the bucket of all that is made. Almost all sake should be drunk young, which usually means within about a year of being shipped from the brewery (the date is printed on the bottle), but varies according to storage conditions, as cooler temperatures better fend off changes.
What about aging sake at home, either deliberately or inadvertently? Of course, should you come across something that has been sitting around (unopened!), by all means try it. You may like what has happened to it. It will be better-rounded, deeper and heavier—sherry like, even. But the inescapable truth is that it will not be what the brewer wanted you to taste.

There will be those who disagree with me and feel that sake truly comes into its own after aging. And for the curious, there is even a sake pub, Shurason in Shinagawa, which serves nothing but aged sake.

Most brewers echo the sentiments of Hiroshi Sakurai, owner/brewer of Dassai in Yamaguchi Prefecture: “That is one of the beauties of sake. It has always been something that we could enjoy very soon after brewing it; there was no need to age it much. The entire brewing process is really geared toward making an alcoholic beverage that can be enjoyed young.”

So, should you be curious, check it out, but bear in mind that your best stuff will still be dancing within the throes of youth.

Shusaron, 4-10-18 Takanawa, Shinagawa-ku. Tel: 03-5449-4455. Open Mon-Fri 3-11pm, Sat 1-11pm, Sun 1-10pm. John Gauntner will hold a seminar at Takara in Yurakucho on Saturday, Sept 24. Email sakeguy@gol.com for information.

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