うなぎ Unagi, more specifically 蒲焼 kabayaki-style unagi, is one of my favourite Japanese cuisine. And specialty shops like this one always hit the spot for me.
うな重（桜）香物 肝吸 付 Grilled eel on rice (Sakura) with pickles and liver soup
A dish called kabayaki 蒲焼 was created in 1399. At that time, eels that were skewered and grilled whole were called kabayaki. Since then, it has been popular in Japan for over 600 years, and its deliciousness and health efficacy have been recognised. I ordered the house-special unaju 鰻重/うな重, which come with a whole unagi kabayaki 鰻蒲焼 or grilled freshwater eel in their own kabayaki sauce.
The fresh water eel is skewered is grilled over charcoal. The flesh is cooked over a charcoal fire that exceeds 1,000°C, sealing in the fatty flavour with a beautiful, crispy crust.
It also comes with a 肝吸 付 liver soup with a single ball of the traditional temarifu 手まり麩, wheat gluten balls with colourful stripes that often added to clear soups like this one more for aesthetic purpose than taste. To the untrained diner, this might seem like a random piece of pork or chicken that’d you find in a bowl of soup, but instead, this unassuming piece of flesh is actually the liver attached to the stomach of the eel.
肝焼き Grilled eel liver
Eel liver and guts in sweet soy sauce. The sauce used was similar to those used for the kabayaki. It was no way near the ones I had before.
These days, there is a lot of controversy on the unagi trade, especially among chain restaurant that use imports from China that exceeded in antibiotics and growth enhancers level. Here, the eels used are all locally sourced. I think there are more delicious eel restaurants, but it was really cold outside and I didn’t want to walk far. This was the closest one to Hyatt Regency Shinjuku.
Wadahei Shinjuku 和田平 新宿店
Basement of Hilton Shinjuku, 6 Chome-6-2 Nishishinjuku, Shinjuku City, Tokyo 160-0023, Japan
Tel : +81 (03) 3342 5678
Visited Mar 2025
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