Meat meat

We needed to get to Rokurinsha this trip, obviously.  I had originally planned to go to the Haneda branch, not once, but twice, first when we arrived from SFO, and also upon departure.  However, the Haneda website is obviously incorrect (either it was there, but is gone, or it will be coming soon).  We had a limited amount of time, so we decided this day was a good day.  The hitch, for me, was that we were going to Satou for lunch, so I couldn't really eat a lot.  Fortunately, the regular Rokurinsha breakfast portion is relatively small.  Sammie was going to go to Satou, but she decided against it.  So, she had the deluxe Rokurinsha breakfast tsukemen.

The small portion had a small piece of kamaboko and a thick piece of chashu.  Sam's came with a larger portion of noodles and an egg with a perfect center.

Em isn't too much of a ramen/tsukemen fan, so she skipped this in favor of our free hotel buffet breakfast.

We (Connie, Sam and I) joined the four others after finishing and then we headed out to Kichijoji for steak. Satou has been blogged to death in the last several years and there are usually more foreigners there than Japanese. We had a little bit of time to burn, so we hung out at the JR Kichijoji station.  The last several years there, we had seen a lot of construction going on, and finally we saw the fruits of that disruption.  There was a brand new mall there, Atre. The food court there was clearly high end. Kichijoji is a very nice area of Tokyo, about 20 minutes by train from Shinjuku, and many well-to-do live here. It was a Sunday AM, so there were perhaps less people around than on a busy commute day, but there was a ton of food ready to be purchased and consumed.

Only Donna, Cal, and I decided to go to Satou.  The rest preferred to have less rich food.  Everyone has a right to be be wrong. There was a line upon our arrival about 15 minutes before opening at 11. Good thing we make the first seating. The poor guys who just missed have to stand at the top of the steep stairway, staring at everyone eating for the better part of an hour. We arrive and are seated at the counter by the manager, Takashi Ryu. We recognize him. I've seen him at each of my visits. 

I showed the pieces of meat we were going to ingest already in my prior post.  Our portion was actually 1 1/2 of those pieces for three orders of their ¥10,000 Matsuzaka Sirloin beef. 

Mmmm. Here is Cal posing with the beef, and Donna laughing in the background.

Our set.  We all order the same meal, with some beer. A refreshing salad and a couple of sauces (like that Satou wannabe place made famous by Rocky). And below that, our meat grilling.  I think that each portion measured out at 180 or 200 g (not certain).

Here is our chef and our meal.  A perfect medium rare.  I prefer, in my older age, a bit more warmth in my meat.  Gone are the days of ingesting cold beef.  Besides, the marbled fat is best when liquified a bit.

Cal loves the ninniku, so I ask for extras at ¥100, but they don't charge us in the end.  

I get more and more full by the second that afternoon.  We travel back to Tokyo Station later and walk over to the new JP Post Kitte building across from the Tokyo. Kayla tells us about it (I'd not heard or read anything about it -- a very large open 7 floor building (B1F to 6F) with upscale trendy shops and restaurants. This is in the site of the old Tokyo Central Post Office.

I, for one, am too full for dinner.  I just want dessert at Mihashi!  Sam and Donna agree and we head there. The rest, Cal, Em, Kayla, and Connie go to Ochazuke En in the basement floor of the Shin Maru building.

Sam has Ozone, with cooked mochi with a crunchy exterior.  Looks good, but I just needed my standard macha ice.

Afterwards, to the bath at our hotel...