5 years! A long overdue post sir. Glad to have you back with us on FTC.
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Errr not true
The chefs (on all ends of the sushi spectrum) I’ve talked to would indicate otherwise. Locally, Santa Barbara murasaki uni quality has diminished, and San Diego uni is also lesser in taste and quantity as before. My own experience when shopping at the Japanese supermarkets has been the slimmest pickings at anytime I can recall. As I recall seeing on your posts, you seek out uni purveyors all over the globe, so you might be able to see better uni and more often.
Don’t they source most of their fish from Japan? Just tack on a tray in their overnight delivery when local offerings are not ideal. Just sayin…there is a lotta uni out there beyond CA waters
https://www.instagram.com/p/BurjWkdlPya/?igshid=1jtgc8xpesjxk
Uni season is very particular so far and we are in a very weird stage this very point in time.
Aka uni season just about wrapped up (very short), and pricing for Hokkaido bafun has skyrocketed (along with many other seafood) as a result of typhoon season. The so called brand name uni is scarce right now and up the point of ridiculously expensive and cost ineffective for numerous chefs in California (NorCal included) especially doing takeout and trying to keep their costs in check, unless they have die hard fans willing to pay and/or take a hit just to keep them happy. In Hong Kong, the Awaji island aka uni pricing has gone up also quite a lot (despite being much closer to Japan and getting more frequent shipments).
So if you have difficulty finding run of the mill Hokkaido bafun, that is also why. Next few weeks should be better.
Prices were way better and lower about a month ago.
Also, coronavirus wrecked havoc with a lot of other things
The instagram photo you linked is dated March 2019, with probably much better pricing then.
I was in Tokyo exactly two years ago at a Michelin sushi omakase restaurant, one week after a really bad typhoon… kuruma ebi was prohibitively expensive but the chef bought all the wild specimens he could get just to serve them to us, and they were ridiculously great quality. I’m sure he took a major hit that night but eventually made up for it later.
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ototo
passion fruit cheesecake cream puff - cookie crust cream puff stuffed with passion fruit curd and cream cheese filling, topped with swiss meringue
order this as soon as possible, so good. this reminded me of the mpfcp, perfectly balanced with the sweetness coming from the meringue instead of the mango.
@hanhgry, @butteredwaffles, @TheCookie, @rlw, @J_L, @js76wisco, @attran99, @Starchtrade, @NYCtoLA, @foodshutterbug
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Holy Omg!
In honor of @PorkyBelly’s ahem, underwhelming, Vespertine: Japan experience, I wanted to recreate it with a bunch of substitutions from spots with track records executing these dishes.
I’d been caught up in the hype, and despite my own gut feeling, ordered right away for the second weekend. Without that critical first report, my friend and I (his trip to Japan was cancelled due to COVID) likely would have been saddled with a highly disappointing meal 
thankfully we were able to save ourselves.
Let’s begin.
soft tofu - Meiji Tofu
fresh and non-gmo
I could have eaten this whole thing with a spoon.
zaru soba - Otafuku
cold buckwheat noodles served with dipping sauce and accompaniments
Incredible buckwheat taste and toothsome, perfectly cooked noodles. I could have drank the dipping sauce straight.
broiled black cod - Nozomi
with sweet saikyo miso
This was a highlight–superbly flavorful and great char.
tonkatsu - Kagura
premium black pork fillet cutlet
Nearly as good with takeout as served fresh, and no trace of blood. Kabocha squash was good.
sashimi - Wadatsumi
five kind assorted sashimi (10 pcs)
Perfectly sized cuts.
taiyaki - SomiSomi
baked fish waffle cone filled with custard on top of milk soft serve
Confirming this was filled with custard.
fruit sando - Katsu Sando
strawberry, mango, kiwi, raspberry
The bread was still soft, but the variety of seasonal fruit is what really stood out in the sweet whipped cream.
le matcha - Patisserie Chantilly
green tea mousse
They were out of cream puffs when I got there, so I pivoted and stuck with the matcha theme. Outstanding.
The end.
Full disclosure I couldn’t eat all of this–it was a massive amount of food and I have rice for days.
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Dayum next level!
I also went to Kagura today, the hype is real but I wanted the millifue (sp) katsu (I have no idea how to pronounce it or spell it) and I think they heard “filet”
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So good–quite the portion too. Ordering over the phone was touchy, but looking forward to dining in again in the future.
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fucking brilliant, you and @foodshutterbug just invented the vespertine “kahn-seki” bang bang.
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Great post!!
I have drank it straight, but usually the more trad way is asking for sobayu (そば湯), literally ‘hot soba water’ and add it to the remaining dipping sauce for a “soba tea” to finish the meal. A good soba shop will happily provide the soba water.
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Golden Bird - Western
Tender juicy crispy fried chicken and damn good mac n cheese and greens. The biscuits were on the dry side but otherwise great flavor. The 8 piece meal is a boatload of food. The chicken was so juicy I may need to get my car floor mats dry cleaned.
This place is awesome. I think I found my new fried chicken replacement to Flossie’s!
Mama’s Lu - Rowland Heights
Dear lord this place was jam packed, so many take out orders the wait was super long. Food quality same as Garvey location.
They have a robot server.
Win-Dow at American Beauty
Fried chicken sandwiches were pretty good, I enjoyed it more than the burger. On the small side, would need two + fries for a meal.
Phillips BBQ - Centinela
Rib tips
Tire Shop Taqueria
Chorizo taco close up.
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Sounds fantastic–I’ll definitely do this next time!
BBR
Hayato
Every single bite is still elite, but my favorite among them continues to be the snow crab tofu. It’s a bit agonizing now knowing that Chef Go is doing R&D and we’re all just waiting to see what’s to come.
Phenakite (by the Porridge + Puffs team)
Sneak preview of the rest of the write up, but this NA drink was insane. It’s the cornsilk chamomile and it tasted like drinking sweet corn. Everything else in the dinner was fantastic–making it hard to parse out one outstanding course–but this really wowed me.
Go Get Em Tiger
In the midst of batch 2 research for the Chocolate Chip Cookie Death Match I picked up a cookie mentioned by @film_score2. Not to give too much away, but this center bite that was loaded with chocolate and basically raw was delightful.
Fat + Flour
The weekly drop delivered with the blackberry/blueberry hand pie. The fruit was delicious as always, but I’m learning the real reason that I’m in love with these things is because it has so much more of that slapping pie dough–crisp on the outside and still tender where it meets the fruit.
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Superfine x Tire Shop
Superfine
salami honey
No crunch, very flabby, too much cheese, cornicione wasn’t nearly as airy and didn’t rise as much as before. A bit underwhelming.
pepperoni
This slice was much better. It was very crunchy even though the pepperoni cups didn’t char very much.
Tire Shop
I was inspired by @A5KOBE and had to make my first trip here in 6 months. Honestly, I was a little concerned about the seemingly lack of social distancing though. People were definitely less than 6 feet apart…
The usual: asada and chorizo
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First time at Konbi and all the sandwiches were quite tasty
Tamago with Jonah’s crab
Pork Katsu
Maine Lobster
Yuba salad (no longer on the menu 
) - light, yet with some nice intense flavors
Inaba Torrance Okura Tororo soba
Ototo Strawberry and grape daifukus (thanks @PorkyBelly)
Wanderlust Some of my favorite flavor profiles!
Amboy Outstanding decadent, unctuous pies! Still need to try the burgers.
Pecan + chocolate + bourbon pie
Smores with peanut butter
Hayato
The sake had this melon fragrance that I like from the daiginjo, but with a much more intense and longer finish
Needle char siu just continues to deliver
Katsu-Sando Their wagyu katsu sandy (btw, the walnut shrimp one was as tasty as you would think - definitely one of those guilty pleasures)
Neighborhood takeout from Taste of Tehran I continue to really enjoy it
Neighborhood takeout from Il Fico - the same chef who cooks at Vincente - continues to be solid
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A grand tour of our LA landscape - Bravo,NYCtoLA, bravo!
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