Matsugen (241 Church St., NYC) - 5/10/09
Mother's Day Sunday was a special treat. To celebrate the best mom ever, we headed over to Matsugen in TriBeca. As you may know, this is a Japanese spot run by a partnership of Jean-Georges Vongerichten and the Matsushita brothers -- it got 3 stars from the NYT's Frank Bruni, which apparently is not easy to get. Sure it is a bit pricey and trendy, ... but we go where the food is good. And we had some amazing selections on that day. For starters, we ordered the Seared Fatty Blue Fin Tuna, which was absolutely perfect. Then came a couple of rolls -- a Sea Eel Cucumber roll and a Soft Shell crab roll. Very tasty indeed, and it got us ready for the next dish... the Kurobuta Pork Belly. Wow, ... talk about heavenly. It's hard to describe how good it was; let's just say that we will order this every time we go back. Another must have is the Kamameshi -- Rice cooked in Earthenware Pot w/snow crab and Japanese mushrooms. As you can imagine, the soft and sticky rice absorbs the aromas of crab & mushrooms and what you get is a subtle and delicious masterpiece. It was the perfect complement to the pork belly. By this time, we were quite satiated, but Matsugen is known for it's home-made soba. And Ella loves noodles. So we finished our meal with two soba offerings, one cold and one hot -- Rin No Husk (Center Of The Soba Delicate cold only) and Kizami (Kitsune Fried Tofu with scallion, in hot broth). Both were so good, with perfect soba texture. By the way, mom and dad enjoyed a bottle of cold sake called Fukui Kokuryu (aka Black Dragon) with the meal; it was one of the more superior sakes we have tasted, and it made mom very happy.
