If you feel like dining on sukiyaki the traditional way and can stand sitting crossed leg on the floor for an hour or so, then Hiyama in Nihonbashi would be the perfect restaurant for you. I personally like the Nihonbashi area where you can still find many old traditional restaurants. Designed like an old tea house with many rooms of various sizes (most of them tatami ), Hiyama is one of those quaint, vintage Japanese restaurant with a Michelin star discreetly hidden under it’s sleeves.
I asked the lovely lady in a kimono who helped cook our sukiyaki dish about this Michelin star and she said she had no idea how, when and by whom her restaurant was rated. She did not mind the acknowledgement but explained that many Japanese restaurants didn’t really care that much about the little French star.
There are a variety of lunch menus at Hiyama with prices based on the quality of meat. Prices vary from about 7000 to 10.000 yen for about 200 grams of meat.
The meat and vegetables are cooked for you and then dipped into a bowl of raw egg. The taste of the raw egg mixed with the sweetness of the sukiyaki sauce is simply divine.
To end things, a very simple yet lovely dessert, a single deliciously sweet strawberry.
To summon things up, I think that price, taste and meat quality wise, Hiyama actually matches my other favorite sukiyaki restaurant in town, Imafuku. I wrote about their shabu-shabu before but just realized I haven’t written about their sukiyaki which is excellent. It just depends on what kind of experience you are looking for. Imafuku is more modern, Hiyama more traditional. Both are excellent.
Price : $$$
HIYAMA. 2-5-1 Nihonbashiningyocho, Chu0-ku, Tokyo. Phone : 03-3666-2901
