Japan March 2014: 1 Day in Kyoto- Places to Eat: Kyoto Hyoto “Dashi- Shabu” & traditional Kyoto style sushi at Izuju

First up! Hyoto for shabu shabu!

The pictures from their website are so pretty- mine totally don’t do the place or the staff service at all!
Here are screen shots from their website

Do you love Japanese spring onions? I LOVE THEM. (so much that I finished this entire container and asked for another :/)

 

Look at the gorgeous beef. It was melt in the mouth tender.

Aside from the set, we ordered a plate of roast beef salad to try as well- really good! Just that it was cold. I was almost tempted to dip it into the piping hot soup. Hehheh.

YUZU sauce. Another of my favourites!

And that concludes my shabu shabu meal. I love shabu shabu meals because they are so well balanced, yoummy and light. Makes me really happy! 🙂 This was a great shabus shabu place because of the service and ambience. Food wise, I think most Japanese places serve really good food so they are they are almost the same in that aspect but this place, they bow when you enter and actually kneel when you leave– not sure about you, but I’m not used to such ‘service!’ Haha!

Hyoto Kyoto Shabu Shabu

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Next up was Izuju- home of traditional style pickled mackeral sushi!

I would really recommend stopping at Izuju just to sample wht traditional kyoto sushi tastes like because it’s really different from the normal sushi. Kyoto is landlocked with limited access to the sea so traditionally, they preserve their supply of fish by salting and pickling it before turning it into ‘sushi’.

Can’t remember how much this cost but it was pretty substantial for a family of four. Izuju is famous for their inari as well 🙂

THIS was really the star of the entire dish. You remove the hard kelp around it and eat just the slightly glutinous rice with the preserved mackerel. It’s mildly salted so it’s not taste bud assaulting and the fish is tender and flavourful. Very good!

If I may be totally honest, the rest were just meh. Maybe I just wasn’t hungry anymore.

This was their winter style don which is SO PRETTY!!! It’s shredded egg and seafood on a bed of rice and the egg was done so well-just light shredded and fluffy. They have smaller orders of the subazushi (preserved mackerel) and inari for about Y1500 so you can order that if you don’t feel up to a massive selection 🙂

You can read more about the place here : http://kyotofoodie.com/izuju-best-kyoto-style-sushi/


GION Izuju
祇園いづ重
住所：京都府京都市東山区祇園町北側２９２−１
電話：０７５−５６１−００１９
How to Get There
By bus: Take 100 or 206 from Kyoto Station and alight at Gion bus stop.
By train: Alight at Gion Shijo Station (Keihan Line), or Kawaramachi Station (Hankyu Line)

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Before my phone batt died, we saw a couple of ‘geishas’ posing for photos on the streets. Lots of people were jostling for a photo! I doubt they were ‘real’ geishas though as most of them don’t like to be pictured and are very private. Still, it was fun to check out their costume and watch them 🙂

We leave Kyoto and head back to Japan the day after and stopped by Nagoya to see sakura lined streets!!! Will share the pictures tomorrow! xx