' Haute Dining' at the Hikariya...a 120 year old establishment...

Rastam looked through the list of recommended restaurants in the city's tourist brochure and we picked the 'Hikariya' for our dinner - an establishment 120 years old. According to Rastam, 'Hikariya' means light or lamp merchant. So it must have been an old light merchant shop or residence which has now been converted into a restaurant.

This is a 'haute cuisine' restaurant - and naturally was quite pricey. The establishment has two sections - one offering French cuisine and the other Japanese. We opted for the Japanese restaurant.

The dinner menu on offer only had 3 choices of a 'degustation menu' - in sets of 7 or 9 courses of small portions of dishes that featured the variety of local and national cuisine.

Pakdokter settled for the 7-course set ( recommended for those who enjoys to drink with the meal ) and Rastam and pakdokter's partner took the second set which came in 9 courses. Pakdokter's set cost 5800 yen while the other set cost 7500 yen.

Pakdokter ordered two rounds of 'sake' to go with the meal. The sake was smooth and sweet like the 'tapai' juice at home.

above were some pictures of the

lovely ambience of this old establishment..

the reception of the Japanese section...

'sake' was served in a pretty 'pewter' mug and cup...

the durian looking fruit is the chest nut fruit...

a selection of potato crisps and nuts...

appetisers of salmon roe, fried fish and miso...

fish sashimi....

mushroom and sea urchin...

horse-meat sashimi...

'horse-meat' is a delicacy of the region....

another set of fish sashimi...

beef dishes...

potato, yam, asparagus, beans..

fish-ball, potato and beans...

fish and chest-nut..

fish, chest-nut and soup..

'pisang kaki...'

fish and mushroom...

rice, pickles and soup..

jelly dessert..

another dessert from Rastam's set..

green tea with a biscuit and star-shaped lumps of sugar..