I am a viking.

In my recent post about all the yummy stuff I ate in Tokyo, I refrained from discussing my appetizer at Les Saisons on account that I thought it was so good it deserved its own post. The appetizer was seared goose foie gras with warm strawberries and a spritz of twenty-five-year-old Balsamic vinegar, garnished with a fragile ring of crispy batter.

On the menu, it didn’t sound that amazing to me. I mostly just wanted to get foie gras because I didn’t know when I’d be able to have it again. I had had foie gras before - only once, if memory serves, at a Belgian restaurant in Hong Kong - and I must say, I was underwhelmed. Or at least, after having had this particular foie gras, the stuff I had before seems, in retrospect, incredibly underwhelming

This foie gras was like nothing I had ever tasted before. It was like eating softened butter, or a warm custard of heavy cream, encased in a carbonized, perfectly firm skin; the foie gras was solid, and structured, and yet the way it melted upon my tongue suggested Swiss milk chocolate. The flavor was unfathomably deep: silky, mellow, fatty sweetness washed over the inherent earthiness of liver. Satiny pâté, tender chāshū, luscious ōtoro, all synthesized in this one, supple masterpiece.

It sounds heavy, and it was. Nevertheless, it was dangerously easy to eat, somehow light and delicate in spite of its richness. The strawberries and vinegar (I hesitate to call it vinegar; after a quarter of a century, it is much more like syrup) provided a pleasant twang, a flicker of sweetness and mild sourness to contrast and focus the fat-packed liver. But in my opinion, the foie gras hardly needed any accompaniment - it was just that good.

The whole thing nearly made me weep. And I believe that is the first time food has ever made me feel that way.

I should move to France.

In my post about beer in Sapporo, I wrote: “Even in huge, international cities like Tokyo and Osaka, you have to go a bit out of your way to get the good stuff when it comes to beer.” Boy, was I wrong.

I don’t know how I never noticed it before, but this time around Tokyo I was amazed at how little effort it took to find good beer. I suppose on my first two trips to Tokyo I wasn’t yet the beer geek I am now, and on my last trip I didn’t have much time to get out of the hotel. And of course, many of Tokyo’s best beer destinations do take a bit of research to find, but some are in the most high-traffic of areas, extremely easy to simply happen upon. For example, there is a fantastic bottle and glassware shop in the middle of Shinjuku Station, a small Belgian specialty bar in Tokyo Station, and one of the city’s better import selections latched onto Ikebukuro Station. But the best thing about Tokyo is that you don’t even really need to go to any special shops to find good beer. Lawsons, 7-Elevens, and am/pms around the city stock Yona Yona and Ginga Kōgen. Guinness is a standard at bars rather than a novelty. There is a local chain of English-style pubs boasting their own real ale, plus guest beers from Japanese microbreweries. Museum cafes serve Duvel and Chimay. Random restaurants serve a mysterious Witbier brewed by Sapporo. Even the Ramen Museum now offers regional craft brews to pair with their regional craft noodles.

Tokyoites are famous for demanding the very finest in food and drink, and this demand is now turning the eastern capital into a world-class brew city, nearly in the same league as other international beer boomtowns like San Diego, Chicago, Boston, and Bruges. There are dozens of viable craft beer destinations to choose from in Tokyo, but in the interest of time, money, and effort, I was able to whittle my agenda down to just two one-stop shops. Together, they fulfilled all my beer goals quite nicely, just as I’d hoped.

The first place I visited was Tanakaya, a bottle shop recommended by fellow Beer Advocates as well as my friend Sam, a Kantō-region veteran expat who has recently become quite the craft beer connoisseur himself. Actually, Sam is a connoisseur of most things, especially food, fashion, corn dogs, and bars that have two-story aquaria in them. Anyway, Tanakaya turned out to be totally, thoroughly awesome. The only comparable selection I’ve seen in Japan to date was at Mugishutei in Sapporo, and that was a bar, not a bottle shop. Especially exciting to me was their spectacular selection of American craft beer: AleSmith, Stone, Southampton, Dogfish Head, Avery, Great Divide, Full Sail, Bear Republic, North Coast, Sierra Nevada, and several others I can’t remember are all represented. Among them, many (most?) are what might be called extreme beer–barleywines, IPAs and double IPAs, imperial stouts, wood-aged ales, and the like. These aren’t necessarily my favorite styles, but it’s always thrilling to find them in Japan because they’re so rare here.

They also have a cooler full of Japanese craft beer that seemed small at first glance, but upon closer inspection, it was easily the most comprehensive selection of ji-beer I’ve ever seen: Baird, Minoh, Iwatekura, Kiuchi, Echigo, Hakusekikan, Swan Lake, Coedo, Yo-Ho, and the list goes on. Even Kyushu is represented! I picked up a Harvest Moon Yuzu Ale and a Sankt Gallen El Diablo Barleywine, mostly for the bizarre, opaque violet spire it comes in. I also got an adorable hand-painted ceramic Hitachino Nest cup.

And of course, Tanakaya’s European selection is fantastic as well. Their assortment of Belgians would be enough to keep any monk-loving yeast-freak happily drunk for months, and their German shelves are stocked with the crème de la crème of Pilseners, Bocks, Doppelbocks, Hefeweizens, Weizenbocks, and Altbiers. The UK section is somewhat small, but I can’t call it disappointing thanks to their lineup of barrel-aged J.W. Lees Harvest Ales, which had me seriously geeking out.

There was some debate in the Beer Advocate forums as to whether Tanakaya or Tobu is the best beer store in Tokyo. I went to Tobu, too, and having been to both stores, I can’t believe this debate ever took place. Tanakaya is absolutely, positively, hands-down, no-doubt-about-it the better beer store.

However, there was never any debate over the best beer bar in Tokyo: Popeye. The main draw to Popeye is their forty taps, two or three of which deliver gravity- or hand-pumped real ale. Most bars and restaurants in Japan serve only one draft beer, so the sheer quantity of taps is reason enough to pay Popeye a visit. But it gets better: all forty taps pour craft beer, mostly Japanese with a handful of American offerings thrown in for good measure. Not only that, but their range of styles is remarkably wide: mighty barleywines, lively IPAs, mellow wheat beers, balanced pale ales, crisp pilseners and rich stouts have all found a home at Popeye, not to mention the deliciously bold “IBA” (”India Black Ale”), a sort of porter-IPA blend brewed by the bar’s proprietors.

I must say that Popeye’s real ales were disappointing; the Yona Yona, so creamy when I had it on cask in Osaka, was weirdly watery and stridently carbonated, and the Swan Lake Amber Ale didn’t deliver the cask-conditioned nuance I was hoping for, either. But the real ale letdowns were easy to forgive and forget after a goblet of Hakusekikan’s brandy-esque Hurricane Barleywine and a pint of Baird’s hop-charged, nitro-tapped, smooth-as-velour Shimaguni Stout. Mmm!

But the good beer didn’t stop flowing after leaving Popeye. Back in Shinjuku Station, Sam led me to the very impressive bottle shop I mentioned above, where I picked up a bomber of Baird’s Morning Coffee Stout and a Celis White for Laura. Then we met up with Laura and capped off the evening at Hub, a rather average gaijin bar that serves a decidedly above-average house pale ale. Later in the week Sam and I ventured to Yokohama, and after stuffing ourselves with three bowls of mini-ramen, we washed it all down at the aptly (if unimaginatively) named Craft Beer Bar, a classy-but-not-too-classy tucked-away tavern with eight taps and two hand-pumps, all pouring Japanese craft beer. This is where I really got my real ale fix; the casked Iwatekura IPA and Minoh Amber Ale were both creamy, complex, full-bodied and robust–just as real ale ought to be. The Fujizakura Sakura Bock and the Hitachino Nest Weizen were lovely as well. Oh, and Craft Beer Bar also boasts a comprehensive, moderately-priced Scotch list; I closed my session with a nice glass of twelve-year-old Dalmore for only ¥700.

I had high beer hopes and ambitious beer goals in mind when I set off to Tokyo, and by the end of the week (actually, by Tuesday night) they were all completely fulfilled. Plus, I still have plenty of bounty from Tanakaya stashed away at home, so I should be set for a while. Good thing, too; over the course of the week I burned through about three months’ beer budget. I’ve always thought it would be really awesome to live in Tokyo, but then again, it’s probably better that I don’t. If I did, I’d be perpetually drunk and destitute.

The food geek universe has recently been abuzz with the news that Tokyo has more Michelin stars than any city in the world, including Paris. In fact, it has twice as many as Paris. I couldn’t really offer anything beyond mere conjecture as to how this happened, as the publishers of the Michelin Guide are notoriously conservative, and their decisions are often mysterious and controversial.

But it doesn’t really matter anyway. The point that should be taken from this honor is that Tokyo is a really, really amazing city when it comes to food, from those noble three-star French meals to simple (or not-so-simple) bowls of noodles.

Let’s discuss the noodles first.

I had five excellent bowls of ramen over the course of the week. First off was Ramen Jiro’s ラーメン二郎 notorious, voluminous, and delicious pile of raggedy hand-pulled noodles, tender pork chops, cabbage, bean sprouts, and shards of raw garlic softened in a stock so heavy with pork fat you could use it as a substitute for axle grease. I am no stranger to super-rich ramen - my love affair with tonkotsu has been going on for many years now - but honestly, I could barely get through half the bowl. Worldramen.net reports: “some Jiro fans would claim ‘Ramen served at Jiro is not a ramen! It is an independent food called Jiro.’” and I am tempted to agree. At least in terms of sheer intensity, Jiro stands alone. Astoundingly, they also offer a larger portion, which I have never seen, but I imagine it could comfortably feed a family of four for at least three meals. I went to the original Jiro outpost, but I hear other locations offer cheese as a topping. Crazy.

The ramen is extraordinary in and of itself, but the context of the tiny, dirty shop heightens the whole Ramen Jiro experience: outside, a formidable queue of hungry college students and businessmen wraps itself around the block; inside, the air gurgles with voracious slurping, the walls are brown with fire and grease, and in the middle of it all, two seasoned, sweaty cooks stir huge pots of bubbling liquid with wooden beams and bandaged hands. How I wish I hadn’t forgotten my camera at the hotel that day.

Later in the week, Sam and I took a trip to Yokohama to visit the ever-popular Ramen Museum, which three years ago inspired me to write my senior thesis on food museums. Each shop in the museum’s nostalgic, meticulously detailed “downtown” area offers a conveniently sized mini-bowl, perfect for sampling a variety of ramen over the course of an afternoon. We had three: Hachiya’s 蜂屋 stock was ripe with the salty tang of soy sauce, roughed up by the bittersweet, carbonized flavor of barbecued lard; Ryū Shanghai 龍上海 offered pudgy handmade noodles in a thick, nutty miso soup perforated with a confetti of aromatic seaweed, minced garlic, and red chili; and Ide Shōten’s 井出商店 suprisingly meaty soy sauce-tonkotsu blend tasted like the delicious drippings from a lovingly slow-cooked beef brisket.

Finally, just before heading to the airport to fly back home, Laura and I lunched at Shodai Keisuke 初代けいすけ, a rambunctiously creative nü-ramen joint that focuses on black miso. Keisuke’s basic stock was greenish-black and almost pasty in its thickness–imagine split-pea soup from the wrong side of the tracks–with a mysterious pesto-like herbal quality. Its flavor was so rich and robust that it even overwhelmed the yolk of a soft-boiled egg I ordered as a topping. Mine also came with shredded cheese, which helped to glue bits of vegetables and miso directly to the noodles for extremely satisfying, textured, salty, and flavorful mouthfuls.

I would have been pretty content just eating ramen all week, but luckily Emiko, our true gourmet navigator, had other, far more ambitious and wonderful culinary plans in store for us. On Don’s birthday, we began the day with a beautiful sushi breakfast at a shop just outside Tsukiji Market. We chose a place stuck in a slot between two apparently more famous (or lucky) competitors, both of which had long queues waiting outside their doors. But of course, sometimes popularity is a poor measure of quality, as it was hard for me to imagine how sushi could get much better than it was at this unassuming little shop. I ordered the chirashi set, which included (among many other things): solid, juicy hunks of crab; extremely fresh, hearty katsuo; some of the sweetest, saltiest salmon eggs I’ve ever eaten; and my favorite, a huge scallop with a gorgeous, silky texture and an almost chickeny flavor perked up by a thin slice of kabosu. The chūtoro tasted like ōtoro, and the sea urchin tasted like no sea urchin I’ve ever had before. It was exceptionally delicious, and exceptionally satisfying.

That night we had another amazing meal at arranged by Emiko, at Les Saisons in the Imperial Hotel. Actually, “amazing” isn’t quite the right word. I mean, it was amazing, but to me it was also a revelation as to how beautiful, delicate, and artistic cooking can be. And that’s saying something, because I’ve had my share of kaiseki meals. Let me put it this way: the chef, Thierry Voisin, warmly introduced himself to us before the meal, and at the end I wanted to meet him again so I could shake his hand and thank him dearly. Actually, a hug would have been a more accurate expression of how I felt, but at any rate, he had already gone home by the time we finished.

First off was an inscrutable amuse-bouche consisting of a cold jelly that tasted something like potato soup with chives, and a bite-size croquette with the same taste, but a very different, crunchy-creamy texture. Next came the appetizer, which… well, actually I’m going to write about my appetizer in a separate post because it was just that beautiful and special. Moving on, my main course was a plump chunk of rare lamb shank served with a salty relish of tongue confit and onions atop a fluffy custard of green peas. It was yummy, but even more yummy was Laura’s beef, topped with parsley paste and baked in buttery puff pastry, like some sexy cousin in the Wellington family.

After that, Laura and Emiko ordered dessert while Don and I indulged in some outstanding cheeses. I don’t know what kind of cheeses they were, except one: a three-year-old French Comte that had most of us convinced it was Pecorino before I asked our server what it was. Ah, Comte, of course! Not salty enough, too dark, and a tad too floral to be Pecorino. Anyway, it was superb, as were the other mystery cheeses: a very balanced Roquefort-like blue-veined goat’s milk cheese; a different sort of goat cheese with a blackish green rind and mellow, fruity flavor; and a gooey, lightly stinky washed-rind cheese that tasted something like Pont-l’Évêque, but with an agreeably sticky mouthfeel. Figs, apricots, and red wine provided a sweet, tangy counterpoint.

The cheese was followed up by petits fours, espresso, chocolate, and Don’s birthday cake. (I was glad I opted for cheese instead of dessert!) The petits fours and chocolate were too diverse to describe, but needless to say they were all very delicious, especially taken between sips of pungent black espresso. The cake was a happy marriage of light texture and rich flavor, a structure of dark chocolate, lush mousse, and cocoa-flavored mille-feuille. It was balanced, elegant, and addictive; I had no problem cleaning my plate despite the fact that I was already stuffed like a Christmas goose. Stuffed and oh so happy.

The next night, Emiko treated us all to yet another exceptional meal, this time at a Chinese restaurant in Ginza. The dinner began with a creamy and subtle shark’s fin soup, followed by shrimp in a snappy chili sauce and oil-scalded green beans with sesame seeds. It all led up to the climactic pièce de résistance: (strike gong here) Peking duck! The noble bronze bird was wheeled to our table on a cart, then ceremoniously carved into glisteningly moist slices before our eyes. But before we indulged in the actual dish, we were all served a few shreds of the duck’s skin, which we were instructed to dust with a spoonful of sugar. It seemed odd at first, but wow, what a charming little morsel that turned out to be; I was amazed at how nuanced a flavor came from the the simple combination of sugar, fatty meat, and melt-in-your-mouth crispness.

But that was just the teaser. The duck itself was tenderloin-tender with a fine, brawny taste, sweetened by a rich plum sauce, brightened by shreds of leek, then wrapped up in a fine pancake and thoroughly enjoyed. Each sumptuous bite reverberated with the glossy baritone of that venerable skin and the taut tenor of its condiments.

These meals I’ve described are only the highlights from a solid week of fond food memories: grilled corn, tres leches and matcha donuts, three kinds of agemanjū, bacon and eggplant pasta, cappuccino-flavored popcorn, straight-from-Tsukiji kabayaki, and fabulously tasty oysters paired with Guinness Draught.

As far as I can tell, Tokyo deserves every one of those stars, possibly more. Just think, what if the Michelin Guide included places like greasy ramen shops, street stalls, and random sushi bars? Tokyo would be untouchable. Paris should consider itself lucky.