Yes that is a great lineup they have, though I would check that yelp? photo for the date to see if that whiskey list is current and chances are a lot of it is gone except for the No Age Statements and perhaps Kurayoshi which is still available in some markets (I saw the 8, 12, and 18 and the sherry cask versions last night up here in NorCal). I have not seen the Mars “Lucky Cat” whiskey in over a year (when it was available for a limited time, it got snatched up quickly…these are exported versions distributed and sold for the US market).
Not much of a J whiskey drinker myself, but most of the food that is posted would not be the best match (other than the really heavily flavored grilled/smoked animal proteins, or something like braised beef cheeks). Any of the fish or sashimi based dishes would be easily overpowered by any of the whiskey offerings.
i would order alc. the only caveat is most times they have dishes that are exclusive to the omakase, so if you really want that dish you’ll have to order omakase.
I believe it’s soy sauce by Kubota company, made in town of Yuasa (Wakayama) which is considered to be the birthplace of soy sauce. Original tamari is from the byproduct of kinzanji miso, an old school chunky type of miso from a local temple. This is a dark soy sauce made from that, I believe.
if you’re still interested i would setup a notification on resy in case of any cancellations. the two seatings are at 7 and 9, everything that evening will be served alc.
I’ve heard mixed things about Yardbird in HK although it’s heavily visited by foreigners more than Japanese expats. It may not be Hong Kong’s absolute best yakitori shop to be honest. To their credit, the same group owns Ronin, Sake Central and a few other projects. Elliot Faber is in charge of their beverages over there and is also one of the early sake samurai (along with Micky Chan and Louis Ho).
However this collaboration or pop up seems interesting enough. Give it a go and I look forward to reports! For those who drink, try pairing Den #7 with some yakitori with salt if Shibumi has it.
I really enjoyed it. I wouldn’t put it up there with the best yakitori you’ll find, but it’s a hell of a good time. It’s kind of like a hipster version of what Tao is to Chinese food, albeit with above average food instead. It’s a fun spot in HK and worth a visit, especially late night when imbibing heavily. I’d certainly take it over Hatch in Little Tokyo any day of the week.
Going in November (unless the unrest intensifies and I receive some negative reports closer to our trip) - what places would you suggest for yakitori? I was going to go to Yardbird 20-30 minutes before opening but open to other places as well. Yardbird isn’t necessarily convenient to where we are staying.
Based on my little research, you have other choices that you can look into:
Toritama (that might not be the most logical choice but could be better)
Birdie (sister restaurant to Porkie) assuming that is the one that features a chef from Fukuoka and sourcing chickens from Kyushu.
Bon Yakitori Bar (not sure if they are still around)
You may want to google translate yakitori and search for the Japanese characters + Hong Kong (in kanji) or English and see what else you come up with. Look for places that are heavily visited by locals and Japanese expats, import and use charcoal (binchotan) which is quite rare given one needs a special license, and they source chickens specifically from certain regions in Japan, don’t have a dumbed down menu that caters to Hong Kongers, have unique rarer parts beyond the typical. A friend told me last night there is a shop that does Saga prefecture specific skewers but I forgot to ask for the name…the downside is that they don’t carry shochu from that area and sell primarily unicorn sake and less jizake which kind of sucks.
I went to the Yardbird pop up a couple of weeks ago and I’m still torn on what to think.
First off I initially thought they were going to name the new restaurant Yardbird, but the menu said “Yakido” and now their instagram posts also mention that so I’m assuming that they changed course and the new place will be called that.
Got to Shibumi around 8:50 for the 9 p.m. reservation slot. The place was completely packed and it seemed like mayhem. The second we sat down one of the staff mentioned they were already out of neck and knee cartilage. Then a minute later I overheard one of the chefs saying they were down to 2 skewers of inner thigh and tail. I credit that to either bad planning or they were selling however many the first wave of reservations (7 p.m.) ordered with no limits. I saw Matt trying to keep up with orders grueling over the konro…was told we needed to wait 15 minutes before placing our order. Slightly disappointing.
The skewers weren’t as good as I hoped they’d be. A lot of them were slightly burnt and lacked flavor.
I’m still hoping this was only because of how packed the place was and it was their first trial run in L.A.
The corn tempura also lacked flavor, which sucked because they’re beautiful and I’ve been wanting to try them since I got the Chicken and Charcoal book months ago.
I hope when they open the restaurant they got their stuff dialed in.
