I’m not sure how it happened so quickly but Arnold and I reached our 5th year anniversary this past January. To celebrate I took him out to Jungsik and he took me out to Cagen.
Aside from cost (and they just raised prices) Jungsik is one of my favorite restaurants in NYC. Calm, romantic, excellent service and amazing food.
I’m tempted to say that we got our money’s worth just with the amuse bouches, a perfect progression of amazing tastes. All the other courses with the exception of a surprisingly bland and overly soft languoustine ranged from excellent to stellar. A standout among the desserts was a perfect replica of a calamansi (filipino lime) filled with various sweet goodies. Gorgeous and delicious. For my budget just about the ideal “special occasion” restaurant.
We had the regular omakase at Cagen which started out disappointing. It began with a tasteless mush of an amuse bouche (warm yam and daikon radish) and was followed by a first course of 5 small dishes each of which competed to be blander than the last. We agreed that we wouldn’t return. Then the sashimi course arrived and we agreed that we had to return. I have never had sashimi at that level of quality before. Simply brilliant. This was followed by a wonderful bowl of soba ,some excellent miyazaki beef, an entirely fine cooked fish course, and wonderful sushi. Desserts were delightful. Lesson learned - when you go to a restaurant known for its raw fish - order the raw fish. We’ll be back to do just that.