Sharaku

What we ate:

Nate - Tendon: 4.25 out of 5 stars
Alec - Yakinikkudon: 4.75 out of 5 stars
Jack - Tori Nanban Udon: 4.75 out of 5 stars

Near Washington Square Park, many Japanese restaurants line the streets.  We selected Sharaku with an expansive list of sushi and other Japanese fare.  Having spent a fair amount of time in Japan and trying plenty of the country's cuisine, I was pleased to see one of my favorite styles of cooking, donburi.  This simple dish contains some sort of meat or fish over steamed rice.  I ordered "tendon," which consists of tempura shrimp and vegetables.  If you are not familiar with tempura, it is lightly battered meat or vegetables that are deep fried.  This tendon was excellent, and I have not had one since I was in Japan.  The batter on the shrimp and vegetables was sweet and not too mushy.  The shrimp were plump, and I was served an array of vegetables that included carrot, pumpkin, onion, and a few others.  It was a well prepared dish at a great Japanese restaurant.  The dinner provided us with another ethnic food experience on our journey.

-Nate

When we left for the day, we had originally chosen a spot called Otafuku, known for its Okonomiyaki. After visiting the place, we decided against it and continued to search the street for some other Japanese spots. We're all Japanese students and know what will be good (or at least what we're ordering), but Nate really could tell us what the great dishes in Japan were, and could point us more precisely towards what we wanted to eat. I ended up ordering the Tori Nanban Udon, which was some chicken and herbs in a succulent fish broth. It wasn't exactly what I was craving (I had come into the restaurant dead-set on ordering sushi), but the Tori Nanban hit the spot. I respectfully slurped up the entire bowl and almost ordered seconds. The thick noodles absorbed the brothy soup like no other noodle could, and I greatly appreciated the calm and delightfully Japanese atmosphere. Overall, I'd give my dish a 4.75 out of 5 stars. If you're in the lower east side of Manhattan and want some great Japanese cuisine, check out Sharaku and you won't be sorry.

-Jack

I was pleasantly surprised when my food came to see that I got a good amount of food for only $9, being that it was a Japanese meal and we were in New York.  I ordered yakinikudon, or grilled beef over rice, and it came with scallions, onion, ginger slices, and pickled radish, all typical in Japanese cuisine.  The yellow of the radish, pink of the ginger, and green of the scallions popped visually against the dull brown beefy background.  Diving into my meal, I was immediately and uncannily brought back to Philadelphia, for the beef and onion tasted remarkably similar to the contents of the cheesesteaks I had tried in the days prior to arriving in New York.  The beef was shaven thin, and I could tell it had some good marbling of fat prior to its cooking.  The sauce that soaked into the beef and rice was a bit sweet, a good contrast to the pickled vegetables in the dish.  I found the rice to be a bit starchy (which may have been due to the sauce that soaked throughout it), but besides that it was a great bowl of yakinikudon.
-Alec


-Alec