FuGakYu

Recently Sarah and I had dinner at FuGakYu, a Japanese restaurant located in Coolidge Corner. There are two FuGakYu locations but we dined at the one in Brookline. FuGakYu opened a couple of years ago and has been wildly successful. It's positioned as a more upscale restaurant and is clearly marketed in such a way to cater to the affluent inner-Boston suburbs.

FuGakYu is one of the largest Japanese restaurants in New England. Upon entry of the restaurant, you're greeted by a garden-like waiting area. FuGakYu is set up like a large Japanese house with two floors that include a sushi bar, cocktail bar, and a number of dining rooms, each with their own personality. Some are common dining areas while others are bamboo-enclosed booths or screened tatami rooms. Depending on where you're seated, you can have a totally different dining experience.

I always like to do a little research about new restaurants I'm going to try, and based on what I had read on the internet, the reviews about FuGakYu were mixed. Some were eager to praise FuGakYu's merits, touting it as one of the best Japanese restaurants in Boston with the freshest, highest quality sushi in the area. Others, however, questioned whether management had become complacent ever since the restaurant hit it big, complaining that service was inconsistent and rude and that food quality had slipped since its early days. I found lots of good things about FuGakYu but numerous complaints as well, so I wasn't sure what to think. Regardless, I wanted to find out for myself.

Chu-toro Carpaccio

This chu-toro dish immediately caught my eye on the menu. I had never eaten toro before and had always wanted to try it. Supposedly, toro is the fattiest, most luxurious, most prized part of the tuna. In this dish, slices of toro were lightly seared and then marinated in a soy-ponzu-olive oil sauce. On top of the fish came some pickled slivers of onion. Because of the way they were prepared, the onions lost their sharp, raw flavor and were surprisngly sweet and mild. They paired well with the fish, and everything was quite tasty. However, I'm still interested to try high-quality toro in its pure, uncooked form.

There were also two tuna carpaccio dishes on the menu - one was this chu-toro dish and the other was a kajiki-toro dish, which had the exact same preparation but was less expensive. Apparently, the fish used in the chu-toro was of higher quality, but I'm somewhat suspicious - I noticed some silverish grains running throughout the flesh, which usually isn't indicative of premium grade fish. I could be wrong though. Regardless, I was pleased with the appetizer.

Unagi

Given FuGakYu's stellar reputation for sushi, we ordered a plate of unagi to try. I love unagi - eel is the item of choice at sushi bars for me, so I enjoyed it. However, in all honesty, I've had better unagi at other sushi restaurants. Although it had the tasty familiar flavor I always enjoy when eating unagi, the meat seemed a tad dry. Granted, if you want to evalute a restaurant's sushi, you shouldn't order a cooked sushi item like unagi - that's why we ordered the chu-toro carpaccio. I'd have to say that unagi at Minado is my favorite so far - unagi there is always tender and plump with a mild teriyaki-soy sauce.

Chicken Catsu Curry

Sarah and I shared everything for the night, including the mains. We decided to order the chicken catsu curry for one of the mains. Pieces of chicken were lightly breaded and deep-fried. Although it isn't pictured, a curry sauce was also provided, which could be spooned on top of the chicken. The curry was dark, spicy, and a little heavy but tasty regardless.

Braised Boneless Duck with Spicy Sauce

The second main was this duck dish. The duck supposedly came with a "spicy" sauce but it didn't seem spicy at all. The duck meat was fairly tender and easy to eat, but the dish's overall flavor was a little lackluster. I would have liked if the sauce was a little bolder, but I suppose it was good in the sense that it did not overwhelm the meat and allowed the natural flavor of the duck meat to shine.

Dessert Tasting Platter

For dessert, we shared this dessert tasting platter, which included three different items. I don't remember their exact names, but from left to right in the picture were an orange-flavored cake, an almond and cream cake, and a mango truffle. I thought the desserts were beautiful and presented quite nicely. They were light and surprisingly easy to eat, especially after a large meal. Sarah liked the orange-flavored one the best, but the mango truffle was my favorite.

Overall, I really liked my dining experience at FuGakYu. Based on all the complaints, I was really concerned about the quality of service we would recieve, but we were assigned a decent waitress and the kitchen got the dishes to our table without much wait. Although I was pleased overall, I wouldn't exactly call FuGakYu a traditional Japanese restaurant, especially when most of the ownership and management is Chinese... Also, with such an extensive menu, it's hard to believe they can maintain a high standard for all their dishes. With appetizers ranging as high as $22, I wouldn't rate FuGakYu highly in terms of value, but it's a definitely a nice place to go to for a special occassion once in a while.

The Fireplace

When I was still back on winter break in January, my mom took me out for dinner at The Fireplace located in Washington Square in Brookline. The Fireplace opened a couple of years ago, and we had passed it a number of times traveling on Beacon St. commuting to and from the city. Some of my relatives had dined there a few times, but my family hadn’t so we decided to give it a try.

The Fireplace serves New American cuisine with a decidedly New England flare. The menu emphasizes wood-smoked and rotisserie dishes that incorporate ingredients from the local area. This translates into offerings like seafood chowder, spit-roasted chicken, and grilled meats.

The Fireplace is a moderately sized restaurant. It’s not tiny but it’s not large either, which is probably what the restaurant is aiming for. Anything too big would deprive the restaurant of that intimate, warm feeling that you associate with a New England home on a cold winter night. The thing is, you’re not eating at home at this restaurant. The Fireplace clearly positions itself as a more upscale place with white tablecloths and linens. My mom found it odd that the waiters were dressed in jeans, but I suppose it goes along with the restaurant’s whole concept of serving more upscale cuisine while maintaining a homey, warm atmosphere.

Roasted duck leg and pan-seared duck sausage with tagliatelle & tomato cream sauce

My cousin Amanda apparently liked this dish a lot when she visited The Fireplace, so I decided to give it a try. I was happy with my choice, and I could see why she enjoyed it. The duck was presented two ways – one way as a leg and the other in sausage form. Both were quite tasty and rich and paired nicely with the soft tagliatelle. From the description of the dish, I was expecting more of a tomato cream sauce but it turned out to be a little on the top of the dish, used more for design. The actual sauce was a dark brown broth, presumably made from pan drippings after searing and roasting the duck. Though light, it was quite flavorful and soaked into and enriched the pasta.

TheFireplace signature spit-roasted half chicken with mashed potatoes & sage brown butter

My mom ordered this dish, and she didn’t seem very pleased with it. It was touted as one of the restaurant’s signature dishes, so it seemed like a sure-fire, can’t-miss dish. Well, my mom found it pretty plain and ordinary. In fact, the Cheesecake Factory serves a similar dish that’s a lot tastier, larger, and for less money. She let me try some, and it did seem pretty bland. She also got pretty angry because the dish didn’t include the chicken wing, which is her favorite part. We complained but according to the waitress, that’s how the restaurant serves the dish. Perhaps not enough patrons like the wing, so they just exclude it. My mom’s theory is that the kitchen might roast individual chicken parts on slow nights rather than roasting whole chickens to cut costs. The optimist in me wants to think otherwise, but the businessman and cynic in me wants to agree with her…

Despite some of the weaknesses, the restaurant was pretty good and seems to be pretty successful. There’s an interesting story behind The Fireplace and how it came to be, and as a business major with a strangely passionate interest in food, I could perhaps learn a thing or two from the restaurant’s creator. Jim Solomon, chef/owner of The Fireplace, actually began his career in financial services, working for Citibank and Goldman Sachs. He left Wall Street to pursue his interest in food, eventually venturing into the management side of the restaurant industry as a Pizzeria Uno’s franchisee. He left Uno’s to then pursue his MBA followed by a degree from the Culinary Institute of America. He worked under a number of chefs like Todd English, Thomas Keller, and Paul Prudhomme before finally opening his own restaurant, The Fireplace.

I’ve always been interested in food, and I think it would pretty cool to own my own restaurant someday (even though there are tons of better ways to make money than in the restaurant industry). However, as a senior in college about to graduate in just over month with a finance degree, a career in the restaurant industry seems unlikely. However, if there’s anything to learn from Solomon’s story, it’s never too late to change course, chase a dream, and make it happen – successfully.