The miso wings are some of the city’s very best, the woody burdock-root fries are strangely addicting, and each of the four varieties of Hiroshima-style layered okonomiyaki is worth a try. The cocktails here are serious and exciting enough that owner Kenta Goto, a Tokyo native late of the Pegu Club, could get away without offering food at all, but the short-but-potent menu of small plates is just as big of a draw. It’s all just unpretentious and incredibly fun.
Best of all, the place is vaguely sumo-themed, which means they play mesmerizing footage of matches and have a whole section of the menu devoted to chanko nabe, a variety of hot pot that tends to be part of the wrestlers’ diet. It’s laid-back and casual, but comfortable and classy, too - a perfect place to camp out (on tall stools at one of the big, high communal tables) for an entire evening, sipping “cup sake,” which comes in glass jars with metal pop-off tops (or shochu highballs, or beer, or even a brand of Japanese nonalcoholic beer called Hoppy) and grazing on reasonably priced, deceptively simple, perfectly prepared bar snacks like takoyaki (octopus balls), deep-fried skewers, and excellent karaage fried chicken. On a weeknight, this unassuming spot on the Lower East Side feels like an undiscovered gem.
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