A note on the words: ebi-chili is shrimp in a sweet-spicy, egg-laced chili sauce, a Japanese-Chinese banquet classic. Huajuan are soft steamed flower-shaped rolls. Tianmianjiang is the sweet fermented bean paste served with Peking duck, negi is Japanese long onion, and annin tofu is a silky almond-jelly dessert. “Barley soda” is the author’s tongue-in-cheek name for a fizzy barley drink.
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Raika Seirankyo on Tabelog (English) — opening hours, payment details and the Japanese address are kept up to date there, not here.
Drinkers of the world, thank you for waiting. It is Hangover Meshi time!
So, this time: a Chinese restaurant in Aoyama, “Raika Seirankyo“! The seating is all fully private rooms, and they even have courses that come with all-you-can-drink, so it is a perfect place for a business dinner. My purpose this time was, once again, a small business dinner. The Raika group is a family of high-end Chinese restaurants, with branches in Shinjuku, Hibiya and so on. A place billed as nouvelle Chinoise in the “food as medicine” spirit — looking forward to it!
This time we went with “Kirin” (15,000 yen), a course aimed at casual business dinners that comes with three hours of all-you-can-drink. There is also a 17,000-yen course called “Kujaku.” Three hours is a happy thing.
Now then, let the course begin!
Today I am going with “barley soda”!
The course opens with three appetizers, one bite each. The glass dish, dressed with bamboo leaves and green maple, looks cool and is a pleasure for the eyes! A head-on shrimp grilled until fragrant and stood upright, dark-colored chashu steeped in rich seasoning, and crunchy black wood ear mushroom. Each is a single bite, so they go down quickly.
The soup of the day. Edamame and crab, if I remember right.
This ebi-chili, they say, is Raika’s signature. Plump, springy shrimp thoroughly coated in a silky, egg-laced chili sauce where sweetness and heat melt together. True to a house that keeps the oil restrained over a Shanghai-cuisine base, it is not too heavy and the aftertaste is light. How to put it — the image is less ebi-chili and more something like soft-shell crab, ha. Either way, the sauce being the delicious part is the same. Lovely eaten together with the huajuan rolls.
Next up, Peking duck!
It looks striking on the black plate! Peking duck rolled into a single wrap. The skin is crisp and fragrant, wearing the sweetness of tianmianjiang and the aroma of negi, and the moist wrapper folds it all in. Yes — delicious.
The star is “Asano” pork, a brand pork from Tochigi prefecture. Chunky cubes finished to a glossy sheen in black vinegar sauce. The mellow acidity and depth that only black vinegar gives, layered with the sweetness of the bean paste — a deep flavor with the edges rounded off! Unlike the usual sharply sweet-and-tart “orthodox” sweet-and-sour pork, this thick, clinging sauce seals in the pork’s savor, a soft acidity drifts up, and shiraga-negi and cilantro sweep the finish clean.
The closer is fried rice dyed a golden color. That upscale-Chinese fluffiness is out in front, ha. Each egg-coated grain falls apart loose and separate — lovely! The mix-ins are shrimp, ham and green peas. Properly stir-fried fragrance, with a refined, oil-restrained finish!
Dessert, and we are done!
That wrapped up rather briskly, ha
Hmm. The balance was not all that great, ha
We still had more than an hour of all-you-can-drink left after this, so it turned into time spent simply drinking, ha ha (not that I mind). Maybe the course could have been paced a little longer, or had a few more dishes? For me the amount was just right, but everyone else looked like they could have eaten more. And for what it is worth, upgrading to the 17,000-yen Kujaku does not change the number of dishes, ha. If you are visiting casually you can simply order extra, but at a business dinner that is often not so easy, ha. A place that calls for a little care when used for business dinners.
May you meet something good to eat today too.
Raika Seirankyo (Chinese / Gaienmae Station, Omotesando Station, Aoyama-itchome Station)
Tabelog dinner rating ★★★☆☆ 3.0
I ate here and paid for it myself. Nothing on this site is a comped meal.
One more for the road?
