A note on the words: shiten means the branch shop, told apart from the honten, the original, which comes up in passing here. A course, on a menu like this one, is a set meal of several dishes brought out in order. Mapo tofu is tofu cooked in a spicy sauce of fermented bean paste and minced meat; at this shop the tofu is crushed rather than left in cubes, which is what people come for. Ebi chili is shrimp in a sweet, ketchup-and-chili sauce, a Japanese-Chinese standard. Reba-nira, the alternative offered to the liver and green peppers, is liver stir-fried with garlic chives. Century egg is a duck egg cured until the white turns dark and translucent. Annin tofu is a cold, wobbly almond-milk jelly served as dessert. Prices are as of this writing (August 2026).
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Book a table at Mihosai Shiten on AutoReserve (English)
Hello, this is Hangover Meshi. Mihosai, the shop with the crushed mapo tofu that turns up on television fairly often — is the original branch no longer running, I wonder? The shiten looked as though it could be booked online through a site called Toreta, so I made a reservation and went along. Daimon it is! Not a part of town I go to much, if I am honest, but there are a good many decent restaurants around there, are there not. I must explore more!
The shop is in the basement — is it a fairly new place, I wonder? It gave me a distinctly new impression^^
The walls along the way down to the basement are covered with the food menu, and it makes you hungry already!
Casual course 3,500 yen
Standard course 5,000 yen
Full-enjoyment course 7,500 yen
You can only book seats without taking a course if there are four or more of you, and that day we were a little short lol
Never mind, I thought — we would take the simplest casual course and add a dish or two if it was not enough.
Each course can have all-you-can-drink added for 2,000 yen, but thinking we might not drink that much, we started without it.
A highball first!
It was a hot day, so the highball sinks right into your throat!
And then, the assorted cold appetizers.
Jellyfish, poached chicken, century egg, and a sharp, fermented napa cabbage pickle! Like a version of kimchi without the heat^^
The appetizers come in real quantity too, since there is a good pile of these pickles. The napa cabbage is perfect with a drink.
The ketchup-based sort of ebi chili, I suppose.
Sweetness and the scent of ginger are what mark this one out. The shrimp are plump and thoroughly good.
The sauce is so good that it keeps you going to the very last drop. Set a little of it aside in a small dish and you can enjoy the trick (hardly a trick, but still lol) of pouring it over the fried rice at the end — recommended.
They asked whether I would prefer reba-nira or liver with green peppers, and since it is the unusual one, I picked the peppers^^
Reba-nira, liver with garlic chives, is the normal choice, but these peppers had been properly passed through oil: crisp to the bite, yet sweet with it, and thoroughly good! They had been prepared carefully and the color is lovely too. Peppers like these, I reckon, even children would eat! Delicious.
Right, this is the famous one — Mihosai’s mapo tofu!
A mapo tofu in which the tofu is thoroughly crushed. This is the one people say is so good.
One mouthful and — oh, that is good. A mapo tofu with a fairly strong scent of ginger. The texture of the crushed tofu is interesting^^ You feel the heat clearly, but it is never too hot; the impression is on the mild side, if anything.
This would be wonderful with rice, I was thinking — and the fried rice arrives!
Here too you can choose between yakisoba and fried rice, and since I wanted to pour the mapo over it, I chose the fried rice.
The loose, separate grains are just right. The seasoning is the classic fried rice flavor.
Pour the mapo tofu over this and it is wonderful! And the ebi chili sauce I had set aside earlier goes with it beautifully too! Well — one way and another, this fills you up. The 3,500 yen course may well be enough.
Last of all, annin tofu for dessert, and that was that.
I have been eating fairly little lately, but the 3,500 yen course left me full^^ There were plenty of other things I wanted to try, so next time I shall gather four people so we can book seats without committing to a course and come again. Lunch looks like something you could drop into easily, and there is plenty on offer, so that might be good as well. The crushed mapo tofu is as good as its reputation, and I can quite see why it wins people over. I have a feeling the method has been shown in various places, so perhaps I shall try making it myself sometime.
Mihosai Shiten (Chinese / Daimon Station, Onarimon Station, Hamamatsucho Station)
Tabelog dinner rating ★★★☆☆ 3.5
I ate here and paid for it myself. Nothing on this site is a comped meal.
One more for the road?
