Yesterday I had lunch at Sanraku, a Japanese restaurant inside the Metreon on 4th and Mission St. Sanraku is a hidden restaurant… way in the back of the Metreon near the food court (not in the food court tho).
I had Shrimp Tempura Maki, Hamachi and Yellowtail Sashimi and Chicken Donburi with egg.
The shrimp tempura maki was pretty good. The only issue I had with it was that the shrimp tempura wasn’t freshly cooked — either they pre-cooked the pieces to use in the maki or they didn’t fry it long enough because the tempura had no crunch… (but the finely sliced pieces of cucumber did). It was interesting to me to have cucumber in the shrimp tempura maki – most places either do a simple shrimp tempura with nothing else or sometimes with avocado, but I’ve never really seen the basic shrimp tempura maki with both avo and cucumber.. Anyhow I was very impressed with how fine the pieces of cucumber were sliced.
Above is the sashimi. It was super fresh, nice and chilled and just melted in your mouth.
I really liked the chicken donburi at Sanraku. Not only were there very fresh ingredients (onion, pepper, green beans) but the chicken was also nice breast meat and was juicy and tender. I’ve had bad chicken donburi at places that use gross rubbery dark meat and I have to say that Sanraku really does a good job with this dish.
For those of you who have never had this dish, there is rice underneath these sauteed veggies and meat (and egg). On top of the rice is a sweet donburi sauce and it is traditionally covered on top with a fried egg (in my case it was scrambled and wasn’t included with the dish). Anyhow, it was really good, and I definitely suggest getting it with a nice fried egg on top – totally rules.
Thank you Sanraku for a great lunch!
Sanraku
101 4th St
Inside Metreon
(between Howard St & Minna St)
San Francisco, CA 94103
(415) 369-6166
www.sanraku.com