Curry-rice, menchi-katsu cutlet, kani (crab) cream croquette, and kaki (oyster) fry... Dinner at Toyoken reads like a roll call of retro comfort food from a long-passed era ¡ª but with one big difference.
This is not the bill of fare at an old-school company canteen or some fusty provincial hotel. You¡¯re in a grand new dining room in the heart of Tokyo, and this menu has been put together by one of Japan¡¯s best and most innovative chefs, Yoshihiro Narisawa. His mission: to restore to its former glory the genre of Japanese cuisine known as ²â¨²õ³ó´Ç°ì³Ü.
Literally, the term translates as ¡°Western food.¡± But what it really means is European dishes as interpreted and assimilated by Japanese chefs over a century ago, at the time when foreign foods ¡ª and chief among them meat dishes ¡ª were being discovered for the first time.
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