Helen Le, Author at One Piece Left

During our trip to Tokyo we came across a traditional Japanese style restaurant, Hashidaya Honten located 5 minutes away from Shibuya station. Now the unique thing about this restaurant was that it specialised in chicken, cooked and raw. Although my husband was a bit hesitant to go after hearing that they served raw chicken, I was dying to try it out. When and where else would we ever get to try raw chicken? So after some convincing we headed out. The entrance was not easy to find as the signs were in Japanese but we eventually found it.

Once we were seated and handed the menus we also realised that there were no English menus. Fortunately a kind lady who was seated next to us was able to translate and placed the orders for us. To ease into it we tried the raw chicken salad first. It was deliciously refreshing and we thoroughly enjoyed it.

Raw chicken, with cooked crispy skin — Raw chicken,with crispy skin

Next up was the raw chicken with crispy skin. I have to say that with a squeeze of lime it actually tasted really good. It had a chewy satisfying texture which was complimented with the crispy skin.

Oyakodon - chicken, egg and rice — Oyakodon – chicken, egg and rice

After being quite impressed with the raw chicken dishes we moved onto their famous Oyakodon dish. This was the best chicken, egg and rice dish we’ve ever had. The chicken was so tender and the egg was runny and cooked to perfection. Overall the food was delicious and if we’re ever in Tokyo again we will definitely be making another stop here.

Hashidaya Honten
Address: 3-15-4 Shibuya, Tokyo 150-0002, Japan
Phone:+81 3-5774-4105

We came across this by chance as we had plans to go to another tapas restaurant in South Melbourne however they were booked out and didn’t allow walk-ins. A quick search on the internet for another place close by brought this little gem up which was only about a 5 minute walk away. Nestled just on the edge of the South Melbourne market it was buzzing when we arrived and as we sat down we felt like we were in Spain all over again with the smells and the atmosphere of the streets of Madrid. You have the option to sit indoors or outdoors but outside is where the buzz and experience is.

The tapas were delicious and served in just the right quantities. I recommend the garlic prawns, fried balls of goats cheese served with beetroot relish, the squid ink and tiger prawn paella, pork belly and the sauteed mushrooms. However everything we tried was impressive. If you have been to Spain and you want to have a taste of it in Melbourne then Simply Spanish is the place to be.