azuma
azuma
Originally uploaded by bluepupae.
in a section of gardena where most signs aren't in english, the warm glow of azuma invites you into a cozy diner-esque japanese restaurant whose authenticity and down-to-earth feeling is almost startling. we sat at one of the two seat tables huddled against the wall beneath vertical strips of paper with kanji and numbers. i really should learn some japanese as i often feel like i may be missing out on some special morsel reserved only for those in the know or who can read the signs.
there is one small eraserboard of specials in english and menus come in both english and japanese. how nice that you get a small dish of EDAMAME to snack on while you wait for your food. they are perfectly seasoned, where the salt has been absorbed into the beans themselves.
their AGEDASHI TOFU was a little disappointing. although i enjoyed the lightly toasty skin encasing delicate silken tofu insides, i thought the broth needed more flavor. luckily, everything else we had was quite good. the GINDARA, a piece of broiled black cod with miso, was the highlight. it was sweet, salty and full of flavor infused into the buttery flakes of white fish. the skin was lightly crispy. some parts were a little more burnt than i liked, but overall, very tasty.
the CREAM CROQUETTE-an oval ball of shrimp, vegetables and cream that has been deep fried--was standard, good.
somehow, i ended up ordering quite a few deep fried dishes without really noticing until the food came out. the EBI-FRY, is a dish of panko crusted deep fried whole shrimp prepared well.
i think i like the YAKI ONIGIRI here better than at torihei. you have a choice of salmon, fish eggs, bonita flakes, seaweed or plain, which is nice. the salmon adds a lot of flavor to where they could have cut back on some of the soy.
glad i discovered this place. the main sign is in japanese, and you can just make out the lit green Azuma sign in the window, so you have to be on the lookout to find this place. there's a lot of variety, and even the combination dinners look good, which i usually steer clear of. i'll definitely be back to try other dishes soon. the place is small, and the staff seems limited, so service was mostly ok, but sometimes slow. it wasn't slow enough to bother me though.








