'If nothing's changed, this place will be listed in my year-end top picks of 2015 for sure," I told my dining companions during our truly satisfying dinner at Hida Yakinikuten.
An assortment of the restaurant's seven most popular beef cuts.
Occupying a large front space on the first floor of Charn Issara II Tower, the five-month-old establishment's opening coincides with the growing popularity of "A5" Japanese Wagyu beef in Bangkok's high-end restaurants.
The yakiniku restaurant is the brainchild of young entrepreneurs Vorasit and Ditawat Issara, who teamed up with the well-established Honmono Sushi restaurant group to introduce Hida-gyu — the creme de la creme of Japanese beef — to the city's tabletop BBQ scene. We started off our dinner with shirauo salad (420 baht), Honmono's signature dish, which has maintained its bestselling status since it was first introduced to Bangkok several years ago. The jumble of deep-fried, lightly-battered whitebait and fresh salad leaves dredged in creamy house dressing offered profound taste-bud contentment.
Following the appetiser, beef aficionados will want to head straight to the hefty number of meat dishes available. The restaurant carries only A5-grade beef, from certified black-haired Japanese cattle raised in the serene town of Hida, Gifu prefecture. Hida beef is renowned for its high level of marbling and exceptional texture.
Enjoyed amid impressive ventilation (after the three-hour dinner, we left the restaurant without any food odour on our clothes), the beef was cooked on a tabletop grill over charcoal.
From a menu offering sets and à la carte choices, our party of four settled for, in my own words, Hida's "magnificent seven" (4,900 baht). It's an assortment of the restaurant's seven most popular beef cuts, each coming with four slices and a name tag.
Recommended to be eaten in a specific order according to the degree of marbling and tenderness, the set promises to lead beef fans to gastronomic ecstasy via beef shank, chuck tender, chuck shoulder, striploin, short ribs, rib-eye and tenderloin. All cuts are also available in 50g à la carte portions.
It's hard to say what cut I loved the most, considering that everything tasted brilliant. The shank (350 baht if ordered à la carte), eaten first, was rich and sumptuous.
More subtle in taste were the chuck tender (450 baht) and chuck shoulder (550 baht). The densely-marbled strip loin (900 baht), short ribs (900 baht) and rib-eye (800 baht) were delightfully moist. The tenderloin (1,100 baht) finished things off on a tender note, and did not disappoint.
As delectable as the beef was taraba kani yaki, or Japanese snow crab (2,500 baht per leg). The sizeable crab leg arrived in its shell and was grilled for a few minutes, revealing a naturally sweet meat so flavourful it didn't need seasoning (there are three choices of dipping sauce, green tea salt and pickled wasabi to complement the grilled meat and seafood).
Hotate butter yaki (600 baht) proved another good seafood option. The freshly shucked Hokkaido scallop was cooked in its shell in front of us by the service staff, who seasoned the shellfish with special sauce and butter. The scallop, so big it could be served in four bite-sized pieces, yielded a very subtle and sweet flavour.
Even though Hida labels itself a premium yakiniku joint, the barbecued fare isn't the only thing worth having here. Taking its cue, again, from Honmono, the 110-seat restaurant also serves top-quality sushi and sashimi. Fresh seafood, as with the beef, comes from Japan to the restaurant chilled and never frozen.
A platter of Hida sashimi (1,700 baht) included salmon, maguro (tuna), hamachi (yellowtail), chutoro (fatty tuna), amaebi (sweet shrimp) and hotate (scallop). Each sashimi option came in generously thick slices and boasted impressive taste and texture. The hamachi, chutoro and hotate stood out for their exceptional sweet and subtle qualities.
The sushi menu features approximately two dozen variations, from classic nigiri to innovative sushi rolls (hurricane roll, 280 baht, was great). Non-barbecue diners can always sit at the sushi counter and choose from a wide variety of ready-to-eat entrées and set menus, including rice bowls, teppanyaki steaks, sukiyaki hotpot and deep-fried items.
I recommend Hida-gyu don (200 baht). The mediocre-looking rice bowl topped with A5 beef slices was delicious and good value, whereas snow fish steak (350 baht), featuring a sizeable fillet of snow fish in butter-soy sauce, was a delectable catch.
My dining partners and I agreed that, of the six dessert options available, kariazuki, or red beans with shaved ice (150 baht), was the best value for money. In fact, thanks to the tastiness and velvety texture of the imported candied beans, it must be one of the best dessert options in town.
Shirauo salad.
