itadakimas!

When the day began yesterday with a migraine headache, I thought I was in for a very very terrible day. Which made me sad because I was looking forward to dinner with a girlfriend of mine visiting from Hawaii later that night. And speaking to all you fellow migraine sufferers out there - y'know how you lose your appetite when an episode comes along so I was REALLY ANGRY. Anyway - I took off early from work to get some quick meds from home and then I was off to fight the L.A. traffic. I still had my migraine when I arrived in L.A. to pick up my friend but it was starting to subside. We then headed straight over to the restaurant since by this time we were both starving. Just talking about the Pork Skewers and Grilled Rice Balls we'd be eating made us even more hungry. We finally arrived at our faaaavorite place: Sakura House. It's a little Japanese Kushiyaki place tucked in the corner of a strip mall on the south side of Washington Boulevard (across from a Costco).

Oh man! Did my headache go away so fast...the smells of the place were grrreat. Restaurants making traditional Kushiyaki (Skewered food) grill all their skewers over REAL coals. Ohhhh - it's so good. One of my favorites is such a plain thing: Grilled Rice Ball. I get mine with Ume (umeboshi: Japanese marinated plum) inside while my friend got Sake (Japanese for salmon) chunks inside of hers. But back to the main attraction of this restaurant...the skewers. We ordered mostly the skewers of the pork variety because we loved what the pork on the skewers were wrapped around: asparagus, enoki mushroom (mmm, mushrooms), garlic sprout and Okra (yuk, but my friend likes this one). I love this leaf called "Shiso" (beefsteak-leaf in english)and so we ordered some chicken with garlic/shiso/ume maki. We also had mashed potato stuffed mushrooms on a skewer, yum-e! There is a miso sauce made by the house to dip your skewers in and ofcourse, there's the soy sauce. The miso sauce is excellent. There must've been more skewers - but I don't remember them all. I also love anything mochi (Japanese rice cake) and so we got grilled mochi wrapped with pork (not on a skewer). We finished off with a grilled banana dessert...though I think we'll try another dessert next time.

It's a great place and I highly recommend you give it a try. Though at $2.60 a skewer - this might not appeal to the hearty eaters. But if you're the type willing to pay for a new experience and you like grilled food - this is the place for you. We were surprisingly full afterwards. However, we both had our doubts to whether our boyfriends would feel the same satisfaction. But this is an interesting side of Japanese cooking that is rarely seen in your typical Japanese restaurants...in fact it isn't seen in your typical Japanese restaurants.

The address for Sakura House and thier phone number is:
13362 W WASHINGTON BLVD
LOS ANGELES, CA 90066
Phone: (310) 306-7010

Parking is fairly tough due to the limited number of stalls in the small strip mall area and I would definitely recommend making reservations if you're not getting there early due to our observation of the long line of patrons that developed throughout that Monday night. Yes, a MONDAY night. They are closed on Tuesdays though - so don't go tonight. :)

I'll have pictures posted later...and boy, are they Yum-e!

itadakimas!