My husband and I take golf lessons over the weekend (learning to play golf opens up our holiday options a fair bit we realised a while ago, so here were are!), so every Sunday we find ourselves in Chiswick, hungry. This weekend being the Ride London bike event, we landed up on Chiswick High Road on a Saturday. Just as well, Kisaku it turns out is closed on Sunday!
You can't really miss it, there's a big red neon sign saying 'Sushi' on their window. We hurried over, looked at their menu, were pleased, but just to be sure, ran across to a few other places around that were vying for attention, and then having satisfied ourselves that this was going to be a Japanese night, indeed, we stepped in.
The restaurant is cozy, with walls painted maroon, and paper lanterns everywhere. They serve a range of sushi, sashimi, yakitori, tobanyaki, maki, tempura, soups, noodle soups, pan fried and grilled dishes, and yaki soba and udon. Took us a while to figure out what we wanted to eat!
Finally ordered some agedashi tofu and chicken gyoza for starters, and pan fried black cod with miso and a spicy chicken tobanyaki for mains, with a couple of portions of steamed rice.
Boy were we hungry! The starters were really very good. The agedashi tofu especially. Deep fried cubes of bean curd in soy sauce with spring onions and Japanese radish. Soft and hot on the inside, crispy outside, and when you bite in, you get a mouthful of fresh strong flavours that complement the bland beancurd beautifully. Delicious.
The black cod was fantastic. Pan fried in white miso paste, and topped with some pan fried asparagus, with fried lotus stem slices on the side. The fish juicy and flaky, but firm, and the skin wonderfully crispy. The steamed rice had been sprinkled with crunchy sesame seeds, so in every mouthful you get this nice flavour you weren't really expecting.
I really enjoyed my meal, and though the fish was a little expensive (£16), the rest of the meal was reasonably priced (the chicken tobanyaki was £10.50 I think, and the starters around £5.50 each). Definitely recommend Kisaku if you're heading to Chiswick.