Shogun Restaurant

A little over three years ago, I wrote about Shogun. I have been eating there for more than two decades; it was always a special-occasion-dinner destination for much of my childhood, a tradition I continued well into adulthood. When Elizabeth's sisters came out to visit us in the fall of 2009, my parents offered to take us all out for dinner. Shogun was a pretty easy choice and it was a very fun meal, sitting at the teppanyaki tables while the chefs cooked the food right in front of us.

But there is another section to Shogun restaurant: half of it is a traditional sushi bar and dining room with standard Japanese dishes. The other day, my mom and I were trying to decide where to eat lunch. When I suggested Shogun, she jumped at the opportunity.



We got there shortly after they opened (neither of us had eaten breakfast and we were hungry). We were the first customers in this section of the restaurant, though several other tables showed up within ten minutes.

I am sure I have eaten in this room before, but I don't remember when. It's possible it has been more than a decade.

I thought about getting a tapas-style entree and a sushi roll, but in the end I decided to get a bento box. I was vacillating between the 2 or 3-item box. Being as hungry as I was, I decided to get three.

As usually happens, the bento box started with miso soup. It was fine. Not great, not bad. I didn't finish it.

Next up was the salad. It's the best Japanese salad dressing I have ever had. (Both my mom and my friend Murph agree.)

I don't believe I ate any of the rice.

I laughed when the bento box arrived. I do not believe I have ever received a larger one. I had ordered chicken karaage, vegetable tempura, and gyoza. The karaage alone would have been enough of a meal. But it was accompanied by large pieces of tempura and nine gyoza. (I was expecting four, maybe five of the latter.) This whole box, with the rice, soup and salad, was $11.75.

(My mom's bento box, of which I did not get a photo, was even funnier. She had asked if the shrimp tempura came with vegetables or if it was just by itself. "In the bento box, it's just by itself," our waiter informed her. So she ordered the shrimp and veggie tempura. When it arrived, it turned out the shrimp tempura did indeed come with veggies, so she got about twenty pieces of tempura. Way too much.)

All of my food was delicious.

But neither of could come close to finishing our food.

So this is what we took home with us - enough food for me to have a complete dinner that night and still have plenty left over.

I don't like the traditional dining room nearly as much as I like the teppanyaki, but there is no denying that it's really good, and a great value.