Shichifukujin, Fugetsu, Soya, Sake restaurant in Osaka

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

Today I would like to write about a night in Osaka searching restaurants which serve Nihonshu, Sake.

Contents

From Asaka to Osaka

After lunch at “Attaka Plaza” in the castle town of Takeda which I introduced in the last blog, I went to buy souvenirs at a nearby shop, filled my car with petrol, and then left for Suita City in which I booked a hotel for the night.
I drove along Bantan Renraku Highway and Chugoku Expressway, and arrived at the destination at 3 in the afternoon.

I checked in at the hotel, washed my clothes, had a shower, and then went out to Ogimachi Station for an appointment to see my junior at work at 19:30.
My plan for the night was going out for drinking with him who was transferred to Osaka.

Well, this website might look like a tourist blog, but this is originally a website that you can search what kind of sake are served at which restaurants.
The data is collected by myself who is a business man living in Tokyo, so it can’t be helped that the data is mainly from Tokyo, especially around the stations along my commuting route.

I’d been hoping to add Osaka, Nagoya, Hiroshima, Fukuoka, Sendai, and Sapporo.
It was a great opportunity to collect data of Osaka.
I invited the colleague because I wanted a guide who lives in and knows well about Osaka, and also because I was a bit worried about him because he can’t use money on a budget (bought bland bag as much as his salary on the payment day, every month sold investment funds which he bought every month because he have money shortage… though he is financial planner ^^;), so it would be nice to share dinner as it was nearly his payment day.

#1 “Shichifukujin”

I asked him ”What was the plan for the first place?”.
He replied to me, “What do you like for the first place?“.

Because his characteristic is like that, I didn’t say that I’d already asked him to choose somewhere good with reasonable Osaka-like foods and he should’ve chosen some, even though I thought so.

I wondered what would be good – I could only think of Kushi-Katsu (cutlets on stick), Okonomiyaki (flat unsweet cake with various ingredients such as cabbage, seafoods, meat, etc.), and Takoyaki (octopus dumplings).
For that time, we started to wander along “Tenjinbashisuji Shopping Street” which is the longest shopping street in Japan.
There were a lot of people there, and I thought that it was more crowded than Shibuya or Shinjuku.

We walked for 20 minutes or so examining restaurants, and the one we finally decided to enter was a Kushi-Katsu restaurant called “Shichifukujin“.
I usually take photos of the outside appearance, but I forgot it.
I regret this mistake because today’s blog is the memorable 100th blog….

I’d been moving from early morning, and it was a hot day, so we ordered beer first.
We also ordered “Dote-Yaki” (stewed beef tendon) which I also missed to take a photo of, and this.

Kushi-Katsu.
I expected that a Kushi-Katsu restaurant like here would have only beer, whisky and soda, and shochu (Japanese white destilled liquor),

But they had Nihonshu, too! What was good was they had some local sake.
I wanted to try one of the local sake “Goshun“, but I ordered this because it was a hot day.

“Kikusui Dry“.
The taste is plain and clear, and it refreshed my mouth after eating thick sauce of Kushi-Katsu.
I wanted to order another local sake “Goshun”, but I reconsidered that as I wanted to try many sake at more restaurants after.
I stopped with “Kikusui”, and we left for the next restaurant.

#2 “Fugetsu”

The second restaurant we chose was an Okonomiyaki restaurant, “Fugetsu“.
I forgot to take the appearance here, too….

My colleague told me that there was the main shop of a famous chain Okonomiyaki restaurants of Osaka called “Fugetsu”.
We decided to go to the place, and walked to the south along the shopping street for more than 10 minutes.
Unfortunately, the last order time had already passed by the time we arrived.
Like Asakusa, the restaurants of this street closes ealier than expected ^^;

Therefore, we tried a branch shop at the north along the street, and the branch was open until half passed 10, so we entered.
The time we had seats was a little before 9.
There were not so many customers then.
I thought that the people of the area finish early at night.

I checked the menu first.

They had one label of Nihonshu!
I ordered the Nihonshu iced for sipping, and whisky and soda for gulps.
The Nihonshu was this.

“Kizakura Tsu-no-Junmaishu“.
It has a unique flavor, and I thought that it was sweet while the brewery’s website says that it’s “dry”.
Is my tongue showing a sign of diabetes…!? ^^;

Their main menu, Okonomiyaki is here.

Okonomiyaki named “Fugetsuyaki” from the restaurant’s name, and “Gyusuji Negi Tsukimitama (Okonomiyaki with beef tendon, spring onion, and egg”).
At most Okonomiyaki restaurants in Tokyo or Gunma which is my hometown, the customers cook Okonomiyaki by themselves.
However, in Osaka,

The staffs cook for the customers.
I knew it, but it was the first time to see it, and I was impressed a little.
This is the cooked Okonomiyaki.

It wasn’t so surprisingly delicious like we see in a certain gourmet cartoon, but it was well harmonized even though many different ingredients were mixed.
It was casual and nice to have while chatting.
Thanks to the Okonomiyaki, we had a lot of talking, talking about complaining of our job ^^
Because we had a lot of chatting, got drunk, and had a big walk on that day,

We had another dish called “Tompei Yaki (a kind of omlet)” as well ^^;

#3 “Soya”

We stayed at “Fugetsu” until the last order time, and left there around half passed 10.
We decided to go to one more Izakaya restaurant, and we chose here.

It was the one of the photo at the first part, “Soya“.
This was one of the favorite restaurants of my colleague and the people at his office.
The inside was like this.

It wasn’t really a big restaurant with 5 or 6 counter seats and some table seats.
I checked the menu first.

They had many recommends, and I chose a sake “Osaka Sakari” from them.

This is a sake for business use made by a brewery “Nihonsakari“.
It had vivid flavor and its aftertaste was clear.
We ordered only little food as we had already had much.

“Soya Salad” and,

Chicken Sashimi.
The meat was fresh and nicely chewy.

The next Nihonshu to go with these foods was,

“Rumiko no Sake Junmaishu Yamahai Bizen Omachi“.
This is a sake made by “Moriki Shuzojo” in Igaueno, Mie Prefecture, with a label of unique picture.

I love manga, and “Maison Ikkoku” by Rumiko Takahashi is one of my favorites.
I’d been interested in this sake because the name is “Rumiko’s sake“, and the picture on the label could look like Rumiko Takahashi‘s cartoons (this is only my personal opinion).
I ordered it for a try.

It is a dry sake without too much accent, and it matched chicken and liver sashimi.
The sake made the food’s taste richer.

By the way, I’d like to add some more information about “Rumiko no Sake”.
This Nihonshu is not related to Rumiko Takahashi at all.
According to Moriki Shuzojo’s website, this label’s picture was drawn by a cartoonist, Akira Oze, who made a manga about Nihonshu brewery, “Natsuko no Sake” after an episode that Moriki Shuzojo’s managing director, Rumiko Moriki, sent a letter to him after she read this manga.
The name of “Rumiko no Sake” seemed to be named (probably) after the managing director’s.

We stayed there until a little passed 12 in midnight, and then my colleague went back to his home near there by walk, and I took a taxi to my hotel in Suita City.
All the restaurants had good foods with reasonable price, and I enjoyed the night in Osaka very much (I very much appreciate my colleague!).

As a famous phrase about Osaka, “Kuidaore (ruin yourself by much food)” says, there were so many restaurants in Osaka.
If I didn’t have to worry about health or money, I would try more restaurants. I hope I will be able to visit Osaka more and get more opportunities to visit such various restaurants in future.

By the way, the colleague who works for a stock company got late for the next morning’s meeting, “Newspaper Reading” from 7 o’clock which is held at most stock companies.
Oh dear, forgive me!!