Shin Okinawa Izakaya
Photo: courtesy of the restaurant
The island of Okinawa, in Japan's southern Ryukyu chain, is actually closer to China than it is to Japan. Which does much to explain the cooking of Okinawa, which is Japanese by default, but Chinese and Southeast Asian by proximity. It's a cuisine that seems to go in and out of focus as you try to get a handle on it – a shape-shifter of a cuisine, that assumes the form of whatever style of cooking is at hand. It's wondrous – but befuddling.
And, far as I can tell, it's also rarer than proverbial hen's teeth in these parts. Amidst our plentiful plethora of Japanese eateries, the only place to specialize in the rarefied cooking of Okinawa is a groovy little pod mall hang called Shin Okinawa Izakaya. And even at Shin Okinawa, they hedge their bets. There are two menus – one of Japanese dishes, the other of dishes from Okinawa. The Japanese menu looks fine – but been there, done that. It's the Okinawan menu that drew me in. And even though it was in English, some subtitles wouldn't have hurt.
The cooking of the islands is variously referred to as Okinawan (which is just one island), and Ryukyuan (which is the whole 600-mile-long island chain). Whatever you call it, it's definitely…different. At a quick glance, you'll notice a taste for shredded pig's ear (it's called mimiga, an ingredient far more Chinese than Japanese), along with the Southeast Asian staple of green papayas, the Chinese bitter melon, seaweed flavored with aloe vera and stir-frys called both champlu and mbushi. The cuisine is also big on the towel gourd (luffa), and our old friend the sweet potato. The very first dish on the Okinawan menu is a salad of bitter melon, ham and cream cheese in a plum dressing. As Dorothy might say, "Toto, I don't think we're in Kyoto anymore."
Fortunately, the servers at Shin Okinawa are anxious to help with ordering, for they recognize that even for those of us who have a penchant for Asian cooking, the menu can be a bit, well, foreign. After pointing out that there was a special on cold beer (if I recall correctly, the first beer was $1, down from the $5 normally charged – how could I resist?), my server suggested that I get the Thai-style green curry, which is marked on the specials menu with the words "Waitress Recommended." Portions tend to be small, but that's actually a good thing, for there's a lot to taste.
There's a saying that on Okinawa, the cuisine "begins with pig and ends with pig." At Shin, there's a stir-fry made with Spam and vegetables and a stir-fry made with pork and tofu. There's grilled pork sausage, grilled pork spareribs and grilled pork leg, not to mention stewed variations. And this is particularly porky pork – the pork belly in particular (called raftei) has an aroma that fills the air for some distance around. It's like sitting in a balloon filled with pork.
Of course, since Okinawa is an island, there's plenty of competition on the menu from seafood. A great way to begin a meal is with the sunui usachi, a paper-thin variety of seaweed marinated in rice vinegar: it makes your tastebuds pop to attention. If you have a taste for little fish, there's always the suku garasu – a dish of crunchy baby fish, pickled in salt, then served over Okinawan tofu, which has a greater solidity than regulation tofu. (Reportedly, more tofu is eaten on Okinawa than anywhere else in Japan. The tofu is, for the most part, sold dry rather than in water, which gives it its distinctive flavor and texture.)
It's probably important to order a plate of hiraya-chi – Okinawan-style pancakes, which remind me of the kimchee pancakes so popular in Korean cooking (at $6 per order, how can you go wrong?). And if you want to get deep into the cooking of Okinawa, be sure to get one of the several black rice dishes. It comes plain; mixed with ground beef, lettuce and tomatoes (a rice BLT?); or fried with the ingredients of the day.
For dessert, there are several fruit sorbets, a deep-fried sweet potato bal, a coffee parfait and Okinawan donuts, which look a lot like beignets. Oddly, the Okinawan tangerine that shows up on the flavored-beer list doesn't appear on the dessert menu; a glass of tangerine juice makes a wonderful dessert all the same.
– Merrill Shindler