Yujiro - Tasty High End Japanese

When anyone asks me for the best Japanese restaurant in Winnipeg, I quickly answer with Yujiro. When I last blogged about it, I was impressed by the freshness of the fish as well as the care and effort the chefs put into their dishes. Thus when a few fellow residents asked to do a monthly handover event at Yujiro, I could not help but well up with excitement.

On Grant Avenue just off of Kenaston Bouvelard, Yujiro has amassed a well known reputation as high quality Japanese. Indeed everything about the restaurant exudes modern elegance with the pleasant but simple exterior signage, the gorgeous wooden tables and and magnificent sushi bar that gives a window into the world of sushi making. Always busy, one must make sure to grab a reservation to ensure a table is available.

The menu is attractive and features a wide array of Japanese staples. Appetizers including the ever popular Goma Ae or lightly fried soft shell crab; the usual tempura, donburi suspects; an assortment of the usual salmon and tuna sashimi as well as the unusal hamachi or gin dara and a dizzying array of house rolls and makis to round out the affair. Bento boxes are also available for those unable to choose and wanting a variety. Where Yujiro strives above the competition is in a daily features menu which houses award winning chef Ed Lam's daily adventures and experiments. Here Mr. Lam pushes the boundary of traditional Japanese cuisine and strives to introduce customers to unusual ingredients and unique pairings. Exciting indeed!

And of course I had to order off the daily menu. The Omakase Tempura assembles an assortment of mushrooms (Wild Morel, Shiitake, Wild Woodear, Shimeji), lightly dusted in tempura batter and fried to perfection. The absolutely gorgeous dish was almost too pretty to eat; and the first bites were equally pleasing. Light and airy tempura batter coat the dense and rich mushroom all finished off with a hint of powdered salt. Each mushroom had a distinctive textural contrast: the beefiness of the shiitake, the earthiness of the wild morel, the delicateness of the woodear and the softness of the shimeji; all working invariably well with the tempura batter. Incredible.

Wanting to try a bit of everything again I went with the a bento box. With any bento ordered diners are treated with a Salad and Miso Soup. Nothing terribly impressive or unique; the freshness and crispness of the salad goes well with the light ginger dressing, meanwhile being contrasted by the earthiness and saltiness of the miso soup.

  The Deluxe Special Bento Box features (from top left) Assorted Sashimi, three pieces of Nigiri, light Tempura vegetables and two handrolls (California and B.C.). The large pieces of sashimi include two Tuna, Two Salmon, one Octopus and one Scallop. Incredibly fresh and springy and devoid of any fishy smell or aftertaste, each fat piece of sashimi literally dances in your mouth as you eat. The star here is truly the salmon with a wonderful mix of soft springy meat with belly fat all accentuated by a touch of soy.

Similarly, the Nigiri feature the same delicate and delicious fish but now on a bed of sushi rice. Here the sushi rice acts as a nice textural compliment to the fatty fish. Furthermore, because of the thinner cut of fish, there is more room for the sweetness of the light soy dipping sauce to come through and envelop each tasty morsel of sushi.

The two handrolls are of equally good quality. The California Roll features the usual suspects of real crab meat, cucumber and avocado while the B.C. roll slightly more exciting with BBQ salmon skin and cucumber. The star here is the rich but surprisingly delicate salmon skin; toasted to perfection and drizzled with a light BBQ sauce.

Each meal finishes with your choice of ice cream. The Green Tea version here is traditional and tasted as you would expect. An nice complimentary ending to a fantastic meal.

Yujiro safely remains for me as the best Japanese restaurant in Winnipeg. Featuring absurdly fresh fish and a consistent attention to detail and care for flavour, the chefs have created a world class Japanese dining experience. Well worth the visit.

Read about my previous experience at Yujiro here: http://korean2016.blogspot.com/2014/10/sushi-ramen-at-yujiro.html

BIMI - Disappointing Korean

I have a soft spot for Korean food. Featuring a delicate balance of rich spicy flavours that punch through the soft pillowy rice and augmented by a number of crunchy banchans, Korean truly delivers food I can eat on a daily basis. You can understand my excitement when I discovered a new restaurant that I had missed on my initial perusal of Winnipeg's offerings: BIMI Korean/Japanese Restaurant.

Located on Grant Avenue in River Heights, the large restaurant has a modern, warm and welcoming sign that exudes an air of confidence. The interiors are similarly decorated with large oak tables, tasteful artwork and a large sprawling section dedicated to those wanting Japanese (sans footwear and all).

My biggest gripe with these types of restaurants is their need to serve both Korean and Japanese cuisine. Spying on the chefs and overhearing them speak, it was obvious the owners were ethnically Korean. The menu itself is rudimentary with a smattering of the basic Korean dishes and a large list of the usual rolls, sashimi, sushi and Nigiri. For those unsure of what to order, Bimi also has an All You Can Eat Sushi option which allows one to try as much sushi as possible without breaking the bank - a popular option amongst those dining this particular night.

This sorry excuse of a stew was their version of Gam Ja Tang. What is supposed to be a flavourful dish of pork bone in a spicy Korean bean paste stew turned out to be lukewarm thin water with overcooked and flavourless pork. My disappointment was further punctuated by the two pieces of potato in the soup: both hard, undercooked and completely tasteless.

Thankfully, the Bibimbap was much better. The large bowl of Korean rice is topped with a kaleidoscope of vegetables (carrots, zucchini, mushrooms, daikon, bean sprouts) and marinated pork with a over-easy egg in the middle. Breaking the yolk and mixing the dish together with the supplied Korean spicy sauce makes a tasty, but average, version of Bibimbap. The addition of daikon and mushrooms, both atypical, worked well here to add a textural crunch (from the daikon) and a meaty bite (from the mushroom).

Further evidence showing that BIMI does not know whether it is Japanese or Korean, the mix of Banchans were Tempura Vegetables, Kimchi, and Marinated Daikon. Altogether average, the kimchi lacked the strong pungent flavour of high quality counterparts and the daikon were too large and volumous that the spicy marinate did not puncture through to the core.

BIMI was a complete disappointment and a classic example of a restaurant making food on mass without caring about quality. In fact, the large portion sizes made it seem that BIMI tried to overwhelm me by the litany of food in the hopes that I would overlook the complete utter lack of flavour. Do yourself a favour and skip BIMI, there are better Korean food all over Winnipeg.