Friday Evening at Benkei

Tonight we eat out at a Japanese restaurant called Benkei in Den Haag.

The main entrance of Benkei

I actually walk passed here quite often during the day (when the restaurant is closed) and I never thought of it as a restaurant but I thought it is a Japanese art gallery. Only tonight it comes to my realization that this is the restaurant that Johannes mentioned quite regularly.

The interior of Benkei

Almost all the table has a tepanyaki, that basically means the Dutch's idea of Japanese food is still largely associated with tepanyaki. It was not very busy, we were probably the 3rd couple when we walked in. The restaurant is nicely decorated, not too overwhelmed with the Japanese decoration and they played classical piano music instead of Japanese music, which to me is a great relief...

My O-Cha and the appertizer on the house

Marinated egg plant

The marinated egg plant is very tasty, taste of spring/summer, light and refreshing, both of us were thinking hard what sort of ingredients were used in the sauce...

Johannes ordered a la carte from the menu

The tofu cold dish with soup (served lukewarm) is really excellent. He also ordered 2 tuna sushi, some sort of tempura (which is rather dissappointing) and chicken yakitori. The yakitori is not grilled by pan fried, the meat is great especially the crispy chicken skin, but still not as good as what Jahannes could already made at home :)

Clear fish soup

As for me, I ordered a unagi (eel) bento set, it comes with a choice of soup (miso or clear fish soup). I opt for the clear fish soup as we already have miso soup quite regularly at home. The soup is nothing special, a bit salty but the presentation is nice.

My Unagi bento box

Much to my surprise the eel is quite a big portion. I had some green salad, 2 slice of rolled egg and some marinated seaweed as side dishes.

Unagi/eel zoom in

The eel is very tasty as well, but I have tasted a better version else where...

The owner of the restaurant, he was busy cleaning up the tepanyak surface.

Benkei is celebrating the 12 years anniversary on 25th Jun and the tepanyaki menu will be 50% off the price that day. Also in line with the celebration during the one month follows the anniversary, some of the dishes will be on offer for 12 euro only... go there and have true taste of Japanese food...