Yakitori Alley in Ginza

Yakitori alley is a cool collection of stalls underneath the Yamanote line in Ginza, just south of the Yurakucho and Hibiya stations. Unfortunately, most of them were still closed for lunch today (it looks like they are more of a nighttime operation), but fortunately, one stall was open, and we popped on in for a quick lunch. Mmm...my mouth is watering just writing this. We got all the usual skewers, be it the tongue, eggplant, leek, or standard chicken, and wolfed them all down. All of it turned out well, but the standout by far was the chicken itself, which was one of the most tender, moist, and tastiest things I'd had.

We also got an interesting garlic skewer, which wasn't really a skewer in the end, but just the entire clove thrown on the fire. This became interesting to eat, since the skin flaked off and flew all over the place, and at the same time we basically resorted to using our hands to get into the cloves themselves. When we finally got into them, they were admittedly a bit of a letdown, as they didn't really taste like much anymore. But they provided a bit of a miso dip that helped address that.

Was there anything not to like? Well, the gyutan was sliced into big chunks rather than the ultra-thin cuts that I prefer (it makes it easier to get crispy and tastier that way), but in the end, it was definitely still something that went down very easily. I can imagine how much fun (and addictive) this type of place would be at night with all the excitement coming from the drunken salarymen and the aroma-filled smoke coming through the air.