Speciality of Aizu, “Sauce Katsu Don” at ”Hetsuri Garden”

Good evening!
Thank you very much for reading this blog.

The last blog is about a beautiful place called “Tou no Hetsuri”.

Today I’d like to write about lunch I had after “Tou no Hetsuri”.

Hetsuri Garden

I enjoyed the scene of the valley and rocks, and then I went back the way I came to the parking area.

A man kindly told me about a free parking area at his restaurant.
So I visited his restaurant “Hetsuri Garden” to buy some souvenir in return of his kindness, and entered the 1st floor.

I was browsing the shop watching the goods and trying samples of Kitakata Ramen and pickles, and after a while, I noticed that it was already close to 1 pm.

I was planning to go to Iimori Mountain next, and to have lunch of local foods in Aizu Wakamatsu City.
But I decided to change my plan to have lunch at this restaurant because by the time I get to the city the lunch time would be finished.
I thought that it would be a good chance to try Sauce Katsu Don (deep fried meat with sauce on rice) which is a famous Aizu food here anyway, and I remembered the man saying that his Katsu Don is better than others.

 

Its speciality, Sauce Katsu Don

The restaurant was on the second floor, so I went upstairs.
I took a seat by the window, and ordered a “Sauce Katsu Don”.
After a while, starters came first.

It was a plate of small dishes such as Kiriboshi Daikon (dried daikon-radish strips), cooked sansai (edible wild plants), and pickles.
Ummmm…… very much feel like drinking….
A man in front of me was drinking beer and Japanese sake, and it made me want it even more^^;

In a while, the main dish, Sauce Katsu Don arrived.

It’s hard to tell in this photo, but the Katsu on rice was very big and thick.
It reminded me of a huge Katsu Don appeared in the first chapter of a cartoon “Mr. Ajikko”.

Another thing which surprised me was that the small bowl beside Katsu was sansai Udon noodles because the side bowls of Don are usually miso soup.
I would be so happy to see it if I was younger, but my stomach had been much smaller and the view of a massive Katsu Don plus Udon already made me feel full ^^;

However, the smell of the sauce was very attractive, and it was good enough to move my chopsticks.

When I had the first bite, a sweet taste of the sauce and thick but not too heavy flavor of pork juice came out in my mouth.
The batter coating was crispy and the meat was soft.

Indeed, this Katsu Don was very nice as the man at the parking area said.
Because it was very big, I thought that I had enough when I came to the three-fourths.
However, I could eat all because it wasn’t too oily.

 

Sake served in Hetsuri Garden

By the way, as I mentioned a little in previous sentences, this restaurant served Japanese sake.
The labels they had was “Suehiro” and “Yumegokoro Honjozo”, but the menu only said “Japanese sake” or “cold sake” instead of writing the label names.
Unluckily, I couldn’t try those because I had to drive….
Then, how did I know the labels?

The answer is easy; I stared at the bottles which other customers ordered, and when I couldn’t see the name exactly, I looked up the design of the labels on google.
I should’ve asked the restaurant’s staffs what they had, but I hesitated to do it because I thought that they might think I was a strange person.
I put this information in the database of web site, so please check it out!

I stop here today. Please look forward to the next blog!

 

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Tipping

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