Belated thanks to @J_L for spotlighting this new place.
I went Sunday night for an early dinner. Excellent unagi and servers were warm and attentive. One hiccup I realized later was that they forgot to give me pickles with my Hitsubabushi unagi rice with tea set. Oh well, it’s in soft opening mode so that’s ok.
Since the unagi was going to take 30 minutes, I ordered a bunch of appetizers and small plates.
The roast duck breast was very tender, but true to traditional Japanese diner preferences, it was medium (I prefer it a bit rarer).
Out of curiosity, I also ordered Toku’s chawanmushi seafood steamed egg custard and it was full of a melange of the ocean’s bounty both raw and cooked. One of the counter chefs started beating eggs right after I placed my order. While it didn’t have the traditional ginkgo nut or Mitsuba leaf, it did have some sea bream within along with shrimp and was topped with uni and ikura. Very unique combo of bling bling ingredients befitting WeHo.
I spoke with the staff in Japanese during my meal and when they offered dessert, they told me they had matcha and hoji cha ice creams and a pannacotta. After mentioning to my server I had a hard time choosing, they told me the pannacotta was made in house and was a chef’s recommendation.
One of the counter chefs by the name of Makoto-san explained that since they’re an Unagi-ya, they use sansho pepper in the pannacotta’s sweet savory topping which is similar to the sauce used for the broiled unagi - it’s their signature dessert (it doesn’t appear on the menus in Japan and appears to be a U.S. only dessert). The cooked sansho peppercorns were soft and juicy with a bit of a kick, but not as intense as it’s Chinese cousin, the Szechuan peppercorn.
Like the entire meal, the dessert was very balanced in flavors taking care to not have the sweet savory soy based sauce overwhelm the sweet, light and creamy pannacotta cream (some other Japanese restos in SoCal serving unagi don or Hitsumabushi smother the eel with a cloyingly sweet and overly salty sauce). I think my server highly recommended this to me assuming I was familiar with Japanese sensibilities, but for the less adventurous I’d suggest ordering one of the ice creams and splitting a pannacotta between 2 people just to be safe. As for me, I’d definitely order the pannacotta again.
Can’t wait to go back to Toku Unagi again for ultra fresh broiled eel and other delicious dishes!