Tentake

Description:

• People who really know their fugu, or blowfish, will tell you that the proper time to eat it is October through March, when it's fresh. You can eat fugu year-round, however, and a good place to try this Japanese delicacy is Tentake, popular with the Tsukiji working crowd. An English-language menu lists dishes such as tempura fugu, along with complete fugu dinners with all the trimmings. Otherwise, if you want suggestions, try the fugu-chiri for ¥2,800 ($23/£12), a do-it-yourself blowfish-and-vegetable stew in which you cook raw blowfish, cabbage, dandelion leaves, and tofu in a pot of boiling water in front of you -- this was more than I could eat, but you can make a complete meal of it by ordering the Tsukiji course for ¥6,500 ($54/£27), which adds tempura, yakitori, and other dishes. You can wash it all down with fugu sake. If someone in your party doesn't like fugu, I recommend the crab set menu for ¥4,090 ($34/£17). And yes, that's fugu swimming in the fish tank. (Before you eat here, be sure you read about fugu in "Tips on Dining, Japanese Style," earlier in this chapter.)

• © Frommer's 2013