Day One hundred and twenty one - An unlikely place for Camembert

Last night, I ventured to an izakaya restaurant that I'd heard a lot about and had been wanting to try for a while, Zenkichi. Located a few blocks away from the hussle and bussle of Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg, this was like stepping into another world. Walking through the unmarked door, you enter an intimate and Zenlike maze restaurant. Each table is protected by a straw screen allowing for an extremely private meal. The only way to reach your waitress is via the service button on the wooden table you and your dining companions are seated around.

You must be thinking, why is she telling me about a Japanese restaurant in Williamsburg? Isn't this a blog about cheese and aren't the Japanese not known for cheese?? Well, not to worry an element of our meal had cheese...shockingly enough...

Before I get to that dish, I will tell you the other dishes we had, each more delish than the last, full of delicate flavors and really unique, this was certainly not Americanized Japanese food, it was authentic!

We started off sharing two of their small plates - Tako Wasabi or otherwise known as wasabi-cured octopus along with kinpira renkon which was lotus roots & carrots simmered in soy sauce and sesame oil, served chilled. Before I ordered the octopus, the waitress asked me if I liked wasabi and if I liked the chewyness of octopus because as she said this was not a dish for the American palate and boy, was it fantastic! So flavorful, so simple yet dynamic, a homerun of a dish. The lotus root and carrots dish was equally yummy, sweet yet savory, crunchy yet silky. Really delish! I think lotus root is an under utilized ingredient in western cuisine and it has such unique flavors.

Next up, I had their Zenkichi salad which contained homemade tofu, baby greens and was topped with a sesame dressing. There are very Japanese restaurants in New York that I know that make their own tofu, in fact, I can only think of one other, En Japanese Brasserie on Hudson Street. Homemade tofu is as far from the packaged blocks you get in the supermarket as you can imagine - luxurious, creamy, delicate and full flavor, it melts in your mouth, it has the consistency of a really fresh young cheese.

Instead of telling you about the cheese dish, I will tell you about the other two dishes that were ordered, the first of which was their grilled miso oysters which were grilled on the shell with a red-miso sauce. This dish came in one big oyster shell and was covered with the red miso sauce, instead the large shell were about a dozen oysters out of their shells, salty, sweet, tasting of the ocean but with a spin! The other dish was Saikyo Black Cod grilled black cod marinated in saikyo-miso. Delicate, delish, simple, and perfect!

Moving along - the dish that featured the camembert was a shrimp, corn and camembert tempura served with green tea salt and a light scallion and soy sauce broth to dip each of the four pieces in. A completely unique and unusual pairing to see on a Japanese restaurant menu, the camembert added the perfect creamy tang to the fishiness of the shrimp and the corn. It was the glue that held all the distinct flavors of this dish together, truly a success! I imagine it does not sound like an ideal combination, but isn't that one of the reasons that makes dining out fun -- tasting ingredients that you would never have thought to put together but that create an aha moment!

Definitely worth the trip to Williamsburg.