ebisuya

We met up with two of Satoshi's co-worker friends.

They both grew up in Kansai and work at the same office as Satoshi but everyone are in different departments.

One has lived in Tokyo for over 10 years, so he took us around to see the "sights".

Lunch was monjayaki or monja (moan-jah) for short at Tsukishima.

Tsukishima which is a couple of stations from Tsukiji has tons of monja shops.

Have you had monja?

I was leery because I heard it is similar to okonomiyaki but super watery and not very photogenic.

We started with some butteryaki...bean sprouts, mushrooms, squid legs & scallops..cooked on the griddle with butter and some shoyu (soy sauce)...delicious.

Then the ingredients for the monjayaki arrived...mochi pieces, cheese, mentaiko (spicy pollack roe), dried ramen, cabbage, dried shrimp, and I think some katsuobushi (shaved bonito).

Underneath all of that is the liquid "batter" which is more like a very unappetizing looking slurry.

They put the cabbage, dried shrimp, katsuobushi onto the griddle then as it cooks, they use the bera (bay-rah...metal spatulas) to "chop" up the cabbage, dried shrimp and katsuobushi into smaller pieces.

Then some of the liquid batter is added and then all the goodies (mentaiko, mochi, dried ramen & cheese).

The bera is used to spread everything out over the whole griddle and everything melds together.

Each diner has their own smaller bera and you scrape and press the monja with the bera against the griddle, whatever sticks to the bera is what you eat.

Monja is definitely not "fast food" it is meant to linger over while "talking story" (what we say in Hawaii meaning to chat).

I'm not a fan of mentaiko, but this was delicious.

I think the burnt cheese & mochi parts were the best.

The texture of monja is just that--burnt cheese off of a frying pan.

Click on the link to see a video of monja cooking...

We also had a curry cheese version.

It was my first time trying this it is totally different from okonomiyaki and I would eat this again.

Ebisuya
3-9-10 Tsukishima
Chuo, Tokyo
Phone: 03.3531.0731
Hours: Lunch 12:00-15:00, Dinner 17:00-23:00
Closed Tuesdays