Sakagura

Sakagura is the Japan Centre's most authentic Japanese restaurant ...

It’s 40 years since Tak Tokumine launched the Japan Centre in Piccadilly to create a ‘home away from home’, and to celebrate, the team has opened its most authentic restaurant yet, Sakagura Considering the tumultuous events of 2016, it’s reassuring talking to Tak Tokumine: ‘British people are remarkably open to different cultures, despite what the recent political results were,’ he smiles.

But that is clearly not enough, as the Japan Centre is teaming up with Royal Warrant holders Gekkeikan, Japanese plum wine brand Choya and the Tridoll Corporation to open Sakagura on Heddon Street.

‘This allows us to blend our expertise to offer our guests exclusive sakes, cocktails and special seasonal collaborations for a truly unique Japanese experience in London.

‘Sake is an integral part of Japanese cuisine, being made to beautifully match it,’ Tokumine says.

Sakagura’s sake is served from exquisite ceramics at our dedicated natural wooden bar counter, and guests can even choose their drinking vessel from our presentation display, a unique offering in London.

Restaurant review Sakagura in Mayfair

The Resident takes a trip to Mayfair to dine at the infamous Sakagura and learn all about the ways of ‘washoku dining’ The Shoryu group (‘chain’ would not be an apt description) have done a superb job ever since they arrived in London half a decade ago.

Introducing countless locals and visitors alike to ramen, they have used top-notch ingredients, welcoming environments and deceptively sophisticated service to ensure that an industry once dominated by Wagamama has managed to have competitors functioning at the highest level.

If you’ve been to a Shoryu, you’ll know a lot of the ingredients already.

The cocktails that begin the meal use sake as their main ingredient, which is a relief; lighter and more versatile than heavier spirits.

It is the main courses where matters really come into their own, and wagyu beef and lobster, both cooked on the robata grill, manage to bring something fresh to luxury ingredients that have become well-worn through their ubiquitous presence on menus round Mayfair.

Sakagura Mayfair | London Restaurant Reviews | DesignMyNight

A restaurant specialising in southern Japanese food and sake cocktails in Mayfair’s Heddon Street.

Sakagura serves Washouku - which a quick Google search will reveal translates literally to “food of Japan” - and you’ll be able to pull up a stool and watch the chefs do their thing from the theatrical open kitchen.

Interiors are modern and authentic, and you’ll be able to choose between delicacies like Hakata Yakitori and freshly prepared sushi.

The Gekkeikan sake company have been drafted in to run the dedicated bar, where a vast range of the spirit will be on show to take either straight or as part of a cocktail.

Sakagura, Mayfair: restaurant review | Foodism

In the tranquil close of Heddon Street, just a hot stone's throw from the rush of Regent Street, you'll find Japanese steak and sake bar Sakagura, another opening from Tak Tokumine, the founder of ramen joint Shoryu.

Sakagura offers an impressive selection from Gekkeikan, the Japanese Imperial family's brewery of choice.

If a syrupy-sweet start isn't for you, though, the Furano Fields offers a refreshing floral hit, and there's often an impressive weekly Japanese wine special, too.

Instead, Sakagura is all about yakitori, encounters with the robata grill, and the thrill of cooking your own food over a shichirin barbeque or, even better, a hot ishiyaki lava stone at the table.

And, let's be honest, laying a faultless cut of Australian wagyu on a super-heated sizzling hot stone will never not be entertaining – or quite frankly, delicious.

Sakagura - London Restaurant Reviews | Hardens

From the group behind Shoryu ramen, a much higher-end venture just off Regent Street with involvement from sushi specialist The Araki (by some way London's most expensive restaurant).

The new restaurant, reported to open autumn 2016, will serve a southern Japanese menu of Washoku, Hakata yakitori, udon and soba noodles and sushi.

Restaurant Review: Sakagura, Mayfair in London | Luxury Lifestyle ...

Combining some of the finest aspects of Japanese fine dining and with sake firmly in the windows and on the menu, the dishes at Sakagura deserve some loving attention.

A menu that is as delicate as the tastes of the suited Japanese businessmen sat within the suave booth aside of us; ‘Washoku’ the culinary heritage of Japan is the concept behind Sakagura’s refined menu.

Heartier dishes which have seen some flame follow from the Robatayaki (Japanese fire cooking).

The other two Kamameshi bowls expand to madai and ikra (red sea bream and salmon roe) and kinoko medley (umami rich mixed Japanese mushrooms).

A tribute to Washoku, a Japanese every day style of cooking that is also an intangible UNESCO recognition; from the sake to the sushi and even the seafood based desserts, the significance of Sakagura and its offerings are designed to tempt, educate and delight.

Restaurant Review – Sakagura

There’s just something so heart warming about giant bowls of ramen noodles in silky bone broth, demanding to be slurped; slivers of fresh raw fish; dominoes of sticky rice laced with sugar and vinegar, topped with all sorts of marvellous creatures; and genuine wasabi that’s not just green-dyed horseradish squeezed from a toothpaste tube.

As expected from a restaurant that takes its name from the Japanese term for ‘Sake Cellar’, the bar here is impressive.

Stretched across the whole far-side of the dimly-lit ground-floor typically furnished with light, bare wood and a trellised ceiling, this bar has an impressive repertoire of spirits, including some Japanese whisky rarities.

Downstairs, a sake cellar is stocked with a wide range of premium sakes from Gekkeikan – one of the oldest sake companies in the world – amongst a selection from other sakes sourced from a number of local producers across Japan.

Conversely, Sakagura is not the best Japanese restaurant in Mayfair, but it’s a welcome addition to Heddon Street and London’s growing repertoire of Japanese restaurants.

Sakagura | Restaurants in Mayfair, London

Just off Regent Street is Sakagura, a smart Japanese restaurant and sake bar.

It’s like somewhere you would actually find in Japan, rather than your typical clichéd translation of a ‘Japanese restaurant’.

You get all the trimmings – hot towels, impeccably polite service, a sake menu so vast that it’s organised by province and, of course, really excellent food.

The traditional crockery is beautiful and the chopsticks are double-ended, which is a nice touch for when you’re serving food for sharing (the Japanese frown on using the same chopsticks for eating and serving, unless, of course, those chopsticks have two ends).

And be sure to leave enough room to order a raindrop cake.