I have been wanting to go to Matsugen since it opened in 2008 (there are a lot of restaurants for me to try in NY, and believe me I do!). I'm normally not such a fan of Jean Georges, I prefer Daniel Boulud's restaurants but I do love Japanese food! And I so love interesting exciting new styles of food and just because I haven't loved a chef's work before doesn't mean I won't like it this time. I finally went last week.
The trains were running haphazardly adding a layer of frustration and the "2 hour hike" from the station was rather a pain. But once I saw the exquisite old "Victorian wedding cake" concrete building I knew I was falling in love. The interior was very Japanese, clean woods, white tables, and the original steel girders holding up the building also painted white and was a rather glamorous combination.
Normally I ignore restaurant week menus but my glam best friend is in somewhat straitened circumstances so we have to be very careful. He loves fancy things as much as I do. What I don't ususally like about the special menus are the lack of choice and the mediocrity of the choices there are-even in fancy restaurants. Perhaps it's I don't eat meat and so often the main course option is chicken, steak, or sea bass none of which I eat (though I will eat fish if it's raw or smoked but a fillet tastes like a steak to me).
I looked through all the restaurant week menus and found them wanting-except Matsugen. Japanese is one of my favorites and the menu sounded lovely. I chose it, told my friend and made a reservation. The food was as delicious it sounded. We started out with edamame garnished with grains of sweet, spicy, and salty, making them much more interesting than your run of the mill edamame. And-they were dry, they didn't feel like they had just emerged from boiling water and I loved the care that suggested. Next was a plate of fried soba noodles. Interesting flavor but too skinny for my taste so they were just about texture. Settled at the bottom of the plate was salty chopped fried rosemary and I would have wished that was more incorporated through the dish as it added so much flavor and depth. Next we had a bento box of sorts. 4 little dishes on a larger plate, each a tiny meal unto itself. A tiny pile of warm spinach with a sesame paste; 2 tiny rectangles of silky tofu and a salad of seaweed; a bowl of sea urchin jelly (with a sea urchin hidden in the jelly; and 2 tiny breaded and deep fried shrimp over a spicy mayonnaise and a shisito pepper. Next we had 2 pieces of exquisitely colored, rich silky tuna sushi (perhaps not quite in proportion to the rice but I will survive) that was marinaded in soy sauce so no extra was needed. Really. Next we had a 1 inch by 3 inch piece of cod in miso sauce, also rich and silky with a deliciously smoky skin. Then we had a cold soba noodle dish with a bit of broth at the bottom and sesame seed paste droplets with toasted nori strips as a garnish-amazing! In authentic Japanese style they brought over the steaming hot broth flavored with buckwheat powder (some soba noodles are made from buckwheat as these were so it all went together, beautifully) to pour into the last bits of broth when finished with the noodles. I've had this before in other restaurants and have enjoyed the flavor more but this certainly wasn't bad...The dessert that came on the prix fixe menu was a vanilla custard of sorts. The chef refused to substitute the chocolate dessert for it so I had to pay extra for it (tacky, huh?) but I won't waste calories on food I don't like. It was a warm chocolate tartlet with yummy runny chocolate oozing out(this is a Jean-Goerge restautant aftr all, and his chocoloate torte was the first and created quite fashion for it, I am happy to say) and green tea ice cream which I ignored but my friend ate. We loved it all and want to come for the real menu when my glam friend is back on his feet.
Then, on the way home an exceedingly drunk man was on the train. He wobbled over to the doorway I was standing in front of and I was mildly concerned as it turns out I had every reason to be. He soon fell over and his head hit my shoulder then because he was behind me I can't tell you exactly what happened but as I was moving away from him and the disgusting experience somehow the length of his body slid down the length of mine. I finally succeeded in getting away from him with the pole and someone's bag blocking my speedy way I saw that he had landed and was stretched out on the floor. I stopped hyperventilating after a moment and heard one or two people asking, "are you all right"? I lifted my head to say yes but a little shaken when I realized they were not asking me!?!?!?!? They were worried about the drunk on the floor!?!?!? Not I, the victim. I moved to the other side of the car and a man stood up for me to sit down and really did ask me if I was ok. I'll get over it soon but thank God I wasn't wearing fur or that it was the summer where he would have been touching my skin or that he had the power to ruin my glorious evening.
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