KUKAN IZAKAYA
You thought you’d never find out...
I've always found Northbridge to be a postcode of contradictions. On the one hand, it's Perth's little version of King's Cross; home of the coward punch, gangs of ratty youths, and drunk revellers wearing little more than the remnants of a kebab. On the other, it's also a cultural hub; there's wine bars, restaurants, the State Theatre, antiques, a good bookshop, and some great places to get ice-cream. But most strikingly, as anyone who's set foot north of the bridge will tell you, it's bursting at the seams with Asian restaurants. This prospect is both exciting and incredibly frustrating.
Why frustrating? Well, I suffer (along with, I suspect, a decent proportion of Western Australians) from a distinct inability to evaluate an Asian restaurant in the way I might evaluate a European, Australian or American restaurant. Let me be clear – I'm only talking about a face value evaluation - the sort you do in the space of sixty seconds whilst looking at the exteriors and through the windows of a place. This is because, with Western restaurants, we are preconditioned to think that the nicer a place looks, the better the food. The dimmer the lights, the larger the space, the more waistcoated the waiters – the better meal you're going to have. With Asian restaurants, I feel, often the opposite is true. If the place looks like a dingy hole in the wall, it probably cranks out some of the best udon, or ramen, or satay, or curry, in town. I have become so certain in this conviction that I've started to view Asian restaurants that look nice as positively suspicious. Which gives rise to the frustration – how do you know, when there's so many options, which spots are good-dingy, and which spots are just dingy-dingy? Now, I'm not saying I'm the kind of person who thinks that teriyaki chicken is a real thing in Japan, but I still struggle with determining the authenticity and quality of Northbridge's array of far-eastern eateries.
Kukan Izakaya, a new Japanese venue situated on Francis Street just opposite Frisk Small Bar, is unassuming from the outside. There's little to set it apart from the restaurant next door, or down the street. Inside it's all warm wooden panelling – if it wasn't for the decorative sake bottles and other Japanese trinkets, you'd be forgiven for thinking you'd stepped into the sauna at a largish ski chalet. The dining room isn't huge, but bigger groups are comfortably accommodated and there looks to be an undercover area out back which we didn't really explore on account of temperatures on the night of our visit approaching sub-arctic levels.
“…EACH BITE BECOMING A TEXTURE AND FLAVOUR BOMB”
The menu is the typical laminated affair, replete with enticing pictures of various dishes. There's many facets to the offering – sushi and sashimi, cold dishes, house specialties, hot dishes, udon, salads and sides. There's a lot going on but it doesn't feel as overwhelming as other Japanese or Chinese venues where you could eat there every day of the year and never have the same thing twice. We started simply, with a bowl of truffle edamame ($10). What a howler. The soft, slippery edamame were served warm, generously coated with truffle salt; which left your lips zinging with deep, savoury truffle flavours long after your teeth had coaxed the tender, sweet beans from their green encasements. Truffle salt – hooray!
Next up was cured kingfish ($20), served with a potent citrus and ginger dressing and topped with gochujang and a sliver of green chili. Gochujang is a Korean chili condiment which incorporates glutinous sticky rice as a sweetening agent and to balance against powerful heat. Its inclusion atop the fresh, slippery kingfish contrasted with the sharpness of the dressing; each bite becoming a texture and flavour bomb.
“…THE SALTY, SWEET, SOUR MISO SAUCE WAS MOREISH AS HELL.”
Kukan Ssam, a house speciality of pork belly served with various condiments – a miso-like paste, finely sliced spring onion, raw pickles – was okay. The meat was cooked fine – there just wasn't a lot going on in the flavour department, especially when compared with a bowl of miso eggplant ($12) that was outrageously good. I'm basically at the point where I can say with certainty that the word 'miso' can be read as 'extremely delicious' – I've never had it and not been very pleased with the situation. This dish; chewy chunks of roasted eggplant liberally coated with the salty, sweet, sour miso sauce was moreish as hell. A plate of veg tempura ($11) was also perfectly serviceable. You know the drill - chunks of assorted veg (we received mushrooms, pumpkin, broccoli, cauliflower, capsicum) battered up in airy tempura, deep fried and served with a vinegary dipping sauce. It was a generous serve for the price and no aspect of the dish was a let-down.
“…NO ASPECT OF THE DISH WAS A LET DOWN”
At Kukan, there's a short sake menu, with helpful tasting notes to guide inexperienced drinkers. We took advantage of this and ordered an unfiltered sweet and sour sake, which was served with proper little sake cups. There's the usual Japanese beers and a couple of unremarkable red and white wines if you can't help but have the cultural sensitivities of an electric toothbrush.
Kukan is good. And it’s not even dingy, unless you think après ski is particularly déclassé. There’s a few genuine hits on the menu, and maybe even some little twists that will catch you off-guard. The only excuse you had for not going is that you didn’t really know about it. Except now you do.