A Consultants Party with “Ichinokura” at “Botan” in Gotanda

Good Day!
Thank you very much for visiting this blog.
I went for a drinking party at an Izakaya restaurant, “Botan” in Gotanda the other day. I’d like to introduce the restaurant today.

I have a license called “Small and Medium sized Enterprise Consultant”, personally, I think it should be “Certified Business Consultant” ^^;
To get this license, passing an examination is not enough. You need to have more than 15 days of practical experience in small and medium-sized companies’ management diagnostic business.
You can do corresponding job in your company you work for, but most of the examinees including me, pay money to the industry group for practical training to fill the requirement.
In this training, the examinees make a group of 6 people and diagnose 3 companies’ management. I see my team members some times in a year, and today’s report is about the day I met them to have dinner and drinks.

By the way, the reason why I wanted to get this license was to do hands-on in an IPO fund of a stock company which I was working for at that time.
Unfortunately, the fund was redeemed, and the new fund was not established any more.

I originally wanted to do a business consulting job, so I tried to change my job to a consulting firm using my consultant license, but no companies showed an interest. I didn’t even pass documents screening.
It was indeed a difficult time before “Abenomics” (economy policy of Japanese Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe), but I still keenly felt that only possession of licenses doesn’t work at all, and actual work experience is absolute requirement.

But let’s think about it.
If the system is like that, it’s difficult to get chance to start working in the scene and change their lives. If the person didn’t take it at very first point, he will never get it after.
I think that such system is making a situation that companies need more people but many people have no other choices but doing low-paid jobs in Japan.
I have a dream in my mind to change such strange world, but in real, I’m even having difficulties managing my personal finance…(T T)

Anyway. Let’s get back to the subject.

You go along the Route 317 (Loop 6) to the Shinagawa direction from the east exit of Gotanda Station. You see a supermarket “Maruetsu Petit” in the left side, and the restaurant is just near the junction there.
If you open the door in the first photo,

You see a place like this. The restaurant is over the door on the left wall.
The inside was like this.

The first floor to the third is their floors, and every floor was full of people.
This is the drink menu.

Menus with “x” were discounted by 100 yen or so, so beer was only about 190 yen!
Usually, restaurants who offer very cheap drinks don’t have many Nihonshu, but they had some cold sake.

“Ichinokura Honjozo Karakuchi”.
This is a dry sake with rich flavor. The taste is very clear and easy to drink.
Another one was “Hakutsuru”.

I couldn’t find more detailed name, but the taste was dry and light.

The price of Nihonshu is higher than other alcoholic drinks.
I guess that many Izakaya restaurants set Nihonshu’s price normal, and discount other drinks such as beer and whisky and soda instead because they can expect much more orders of those drinks and it’s easier to minimize the cost.
That’s a good pricing for people without much money like me. However, in my case, I order more food instead of cheap drinks^^;

The food menu is here.

The food was cheap, too.
There were many menus, but when you come to this restaurant, I want you to try this one.

The dish of “Botan”, “Geta Mori”!
4 Gunkanmaki (sushi wrapped with nori sheet around) of ikura (salmon roe), 5 kinds of sashimi, Negitoro (minced tuna with welsh onion leaves), and omelet were on one wooden plate, and it was only 1980 yen!!! Of course, each of them was fresh and nice.

For others, we ordered the standard Yakitori,

And Kara-age (Japanese deep fried chicken). Their Kara-age was my favorite style of thin and crispy coating. I enjoyed my sake “Ichinokura” with these foods.

We stayed there for about 3 hours drinking and eating, but it only cost about 3000 yen. I really hope that such reasonable and nice restaurant will open near my work place.

It’s our great pleasure if this article is helpful for you.