Despite having lived in the area for a while, I had no idea that Ocha-ya Kosen, a little Kyoto Ryori restaurant, was here. Located one street across from the US Army's Hardy Barracks, and almost directly underneath the Roppongi Tunnel, Ocha-ya Kosen is one of those Japanese "hole in the wall" restaurants that we all hope to stumble on to every now and then.
If you're looking for the place, look for the lighted sign. It's about the only lighted sign on the street, so it's relatively easy to find.
Inside, the restaurant feels a bit like a small maze. Everyone sits in private rooms. Ours was at the end of a short walkway, next to the street and a garden.
Here's what a private room looks like. Very cozy. The table, or kotatsu, is heated from the bottom up so your feet stay very very warm. You have to take off your shoes at the entrance of course.
Here's the first course - a box with nine small dishes. It's very good, I especially liked the shrimp and tofu dishes. This is their speciality and what they're best known for. All of their course menus come with this box. The course we chose was the least expensive one at 5500 yen.
Here's the explanation of what is in each of the 9 cups in the box above. I'm not 100% sure what they all are, but all tasted great.
The next course was a scallop ball. It was a fish ball stuffed with scallops in a clear broth. VERY good - one of the best courses all night.
The next course is for sharing - very thinly sliced hirame sashimi with green onions. Hirame is a flounder, and it's sliced like fugu would be. Very very good as well. Crunchy.
The next course is a stewed fish - buri or yellow tail - with daikon and tofu. The dish was great and the fish wasn't fishy at all.
The next course is a daikon, tofu, and green onion topped with miso sauce. The miso was a bit salty, but otherwise the dish was good.
The final course is crab rice - in case you weren't full yet. It also comes with miso soup, with a lid that was suctioned-on to the bowl due to the steam. The rice is pretty good, but you can't really taste the crab. There was a LOT of rice though, we had enough for 3rds - they give you the entire huge rice bowl to scoop it yourself.
Dessert tasted like apple sauce jellow topped with coconut cream. Doesn't get much better than this.
Ended up having lunch at the lobby lounge of the Ritz Carlton. Today was a great day to be 45 stories above Tokyo - the skies were as clear as they get!
The US Embassy housing compound is in the middle, along with other notable buildings like Ark Mori Hills. You can see clear to Chiba if you look closely.
It was so clear today that you could see past Haneda, all the way to the far side of Tokyo Bay - Chiba - and past. We could see Yokohama. You have to go into the restaurant "45" to see that side of the view though. Of course, Fuji was super clear, except for some clouds near the summit.
I didn't have time to snap a lot of pictures today, but I had the Linguine Carbonara (3000 yen) and it was the best carbonara I've had in Japan. Very creamy, and real bacon (think McDonald's Canadian Bacon style thick chunks). Above, we ordered the fries or "fried potato" on the side. It's not on the menu, but you can definitely just order it and they'll make it. I have no idea how much this cost. 
We came to the restaurant at about 7 PM and as always it is a pleasure to return to Nero as they have a personal touch to it. When we arrived we were greeted with a handshake by Sebatstien, one of the owners of Nero, and we were led into the bar in order to have an aperitif before sitting down. We visited the restaurant in the middle of ONS week (one of the largest oil & gas conferences/exhibitions in the world) and this has some negative side effects of course. I was hoping to go for the 7 course dinner but instead I found out that they "only" had a 5 course dinner and the prices had been adjusted up :-( But what can you do...it is the same all over town during this week.
Anyway, we went into the bar to have an aperitif before dinner and I asked if I could get some sparkling Italian wine and to my big surprise Sebastien had to inform me that they didn't have any. So I went down on my list and asked for a Kir Royal and once again Sebastien had to inform me that he couldn't serve it as they were out of Creme de Cassis. I can accept the fact that they don't have creme de cassis at an Italian restaurant but it seems a bit strange when they don't have some Italian sparkling wine. But Sebastien saved the day by suggesting that we go for an Americano - no, not the coffee but the drink made from Campari, Cinzano Rosso and club soda. It was a tiny little drink at least when it was 100 kroner (18$) per glass.
Soon we were ready to get seated and we got our first dish pretty fast. Well, it turned out that it was not the first dish but just an appetizer from the kitchen: some olives, ham and some sort of bread. We also got our first wine of the evening...and Italian sparkling type wine that reminded me of a a rosé wine. It was good with the first appetizer and the following dishes. The second appetizer from the kitchen was a pea soup served with caviar (big style) and some fish. Eating large fish eggs is always a bit of an experience...it is a strange sensation to feel the eggs pop in your mouth :-)
We finally came to the first real dish of the evening...the wonderful, rich and creamy lobster soup served with crab on top. This has become a signature dish of Restaurant Nero and it is delicious indeed :-) Next we moved over to another starter: a huge ravioli served with chicken pieces, foie gras and apples. I have to admit that I enjoy fois gras in limited amounts and this was just right :-) Next in line was the first "main" course and the fish of the evening was the turbot served with black caviar on top and served on a bed of vegetables. Again a nice dish and the fish was perfectly prepared. As a resting dish before the main meal we got a tiny little dark berry shake :-)
I'm a bit ashamed to say that I'm not quite sure what meat we had for the main meal but I think it was lamb (I guess that is what happens when you don't take notes when you are eating). But what I do remember is that we all thought it was nice and it was served with Brunello wine on the side :-) To round of the evening we got the tiramisu served with dark, dark chocolate and vanilla ice cream on the side :-) 
Sebastien claims that this was made after his mothers recipe and it was very, very tasty and the dark chocolate ice cream was very rich :-) We also got a sweet dessert shot after this to round of the entire meal. In the end we ordered some coffee and my colleagues wanted cognac but to our surprise they did not have any cognac at all...just grappa. This is a bit strange as Norwegian love their cognac after a good meal :-) But I was even more surprised to see that the waitress had no idea what I was talking about when I asked for a limoncello. The bill this evening was about 6100 kroner (1125$) which is more expensive than the previous times I have been there.
This was another great meal at Restaurant Nero but as you might read out of my review this time there are a couple of issues that they need to look into. First of all you have the ONS issue where you "pay more and get less" in my opinion but I guess there is not much to do about that when the whole city adjusts to this mode. But it seems a bit strange not having Italian sparkling wine as aperitifs, 
not having cognac on the menu along with the coffee (Norwegians love their cognac) and the waitress that had no clue whatsoever what limoncello was. And even if we got a bit better wine we didn't get very much of it...this was however a blessing in disguise as we were going to work the next morning :-) Maybe I'm just being picky....it was a very nice meal and Restaurant Nero is still highly recommended in my opinion. Sorry for the quality of the images by the way. They were all taken with my cell phone. You can find more info about the restaurant on the homepage http://restaurant-nero.no/
In the end of August 2008 Nikki and I went into town to grab something to eat before we went to a concert. We decided to try something new and we ended up going to Pizzeria Al Forno located at Skagen in Stavanger. It was during ONS (a big oil conference) so when we came there we had to wait for a couple of minutes as we didn’t have a reservation but at least we got a table. We got the table close to the entrance door and it was constantly open so it was a good thing there were blankets on the chairs so that we could keep warm
The menu is quite extensive and I was thrilled to see that they had risotto, gnocchi, pizza etc on the menu. The wine selection on the other hand was very sad…only like 3-4 red wines that you could get by the bottle (or half a bottle) and only one kind by the glass. Anyway, I ordered the gnocchi con carne for starter, Calzone con pesto e pollo for main and Nikki went for lasagne. One positive thing with the menu was that it was possible to order small portions of the pasta dishes for half the price.
The restaurant is located in the very middle of town so the location ideal. As the restaurant was full it took quite a bit of time to get the food. I was actually impressed to see that the main waiter managed to keep up to speed with all the new guest, people ordering food etc. But I did at least get the wine pretty fast. But I never did get to see what wine it was as the waitress ran of as soon as she had poured it into my glass :-)
When the food was served I was very disappointed. The gnocchi that I had ordered was not gnocchi but dry pasta shaped to resemble gnocchi. Come on guys, you know and I know that this is not gnocchi so why write it on the menu? The dish itself was not bad once I got over the disappointment and it contained real meat and not just minced meat. Nikkis lasagne was drowning in cheese so they had been pretty generous with it. As Nikki is lactose intolerant I got to steal most of the cheese. The lasagne was OK but not the best I have tasted (but not the worst either).
This summer I went to Tuscany and Florence and I enjoyed the food, wine and scenery there (check out the trip report on http://gardkarlsen.com/florence_italy_travelogue.htm ). When we got home the annual food festival had started in Stavanger and I was thrilled to see that there was a new stand called Restaurant Nero there. I asked them where they were located and the daily manager Cato Ødemark had to admit that they had not opened yet but they would soon. And finally in the beginning of October 2007 the new restaurant opened in the same place where the good restaurant Cartellet once was located.
As I’m a sucker for good food and a sucker for Italian food it didn’t take long before I got to try out this restaurant. So in the middle of October I was ready to check it out and I came there a bit early and I got a tour of the place by Cato Ødemark himself. I was the first one there and it did take long before I got a Kir Royale to start with and freshly made grissini…still warm from the oven it was delicious :-) The restaurant is not that big and I think we are only talking about 40-50 seats at the moment. Cato says that even without any advertising, people still seem to be finding the way to the restaurant so they are satisfied with the opening weeks.
I never did get to try Cartellet so I’m not sure how it looked back then but Cato explained that they had kept the original layout and the facilities looks quite stylish with a combination of brick walls, old rock foundation, red tiles on the floor, stylish art and last but not least….some funky looking furniture made in Italy of course. Inside the restaurant there is also a small cooler and the idea is to sell Italian products like pecorino, sausages etc but according to Cato they have just been to busy to prioritize this part so far.
This dinner was a company dinner and it didn’t take long before the rest of the guest arrived and we decided to go for a 4 course menu. But we all got to order aperitifs to start with and we also got a plate of snacks…grissini wrapped in parma ham, olives from Puglia, aged parmesan cheese, Italian sausages etc. When we sat down at the table we got a complimentary snack/starter and the most interesting thing on the plate was the panna cotta with mashed cauliflower and fried onion. I thought that panna cotta was only used for dessert :-) Other things on the plate were the classic mozzarella and tomato, prune in parma ham and shrimp.
The first primi was salmon in two different ways served with fennel and citrus fruits. Again it was a pretty exciting combination. I don’t think I have been served salmon this way before but it was both refreshing and delicious. The next primi was the classical risotto alla Milanese…risotto with saffron. The risotto was as it should be and this is one of my favourites. On the side we got parmesan cheese and once again I have to admit that I have never had that before. It was weird to eat the cold ice cream and still taste the distinctive taste of parmesan cheese. It worked very well with the risotto and it is fun to see that Nero tried to re-invent the different classical dishes :-)
We were seated in the “chambre séparée” (I think that what it is called when you are separated from the rest of the restaurant) and as there is room for about 14 in there we had some space to ourselves and we had a direct view to the stylish blue lights in the wine “cellar”. The wine selection seemed to be a bit limited at the moment but according to Cato they are still working on installing the cooling system in the wine cellar and after that they will fill it up with good Italian wine :-)
Before we got the main meal of the evening we got a crushed ice and apple “sorbet” to freshen up the pallet. Our main dish this evening was a tenderloin I think served with fois gras and polenta. The combination of the meat and the fois gras was great and the polenta was piping hot so it was clearly fresh out of the oven. The fois gras it always interesting....it is great in smaller portions. I’m sorry to say that I can’t really give details about the wine selection this evening as we just asked the waiter to recommend new wines for each course. It is a pretty international staff at Nero: Cato is Norwegian, his partner Sebastien is from Italy, our waitress was from Poland etc. Our waitress seemed to be a bit nervous by the way and she was having a bit of trouble opening some of the wines, she seemed a bit nervous when introducing the meals etc. But all in all she did a good job.
To round of the evening we had a chocolate fondant with rosemary ice cream on the side if I’m not mistaken. The taste was great but I would have enjoyed having the muffin even softer in the middle. And together with the dessert we had a delicious sweet red wine.
We had a lovely evening at Nero this night and I certainly hope to go there again soon. The food was delicious; we got great service, the wine good etc. The restaurant is stylish and it seems to be a nice place both for a business dinner and for a romantic date.
Akropolis is the only Greek restaurant in Stavanger to my knowledge and is has been around for quite some time. Nikki and I went to visit the place on a Sunday afternoon in the beginning of August 2007. to test out their Sunday buffet table. I think you can get the buffet table until about 6 PM. We did not have a problem getting a table when we went there but it can be pretty busy at times so it might be a good idea to book a table in advance. One of the advantages with the buffet table is that you don't have to wait...it is just a matter of digging in :-) 
The selection in the buffet includes a very good Greek salad with feta cheese on the side so that you can get the right ratio between salad and cheese :-) Apart from that you can also get lamb chops, great sausages with lots of herbs and garlic, potatoes, rice, regular and boring hot dogs and french fries for the kids, onion rings, meat balls, proper pieces of chicken meat, moussaka, bread, olives, soup, etc. All in all I would say that the selection is pretty good.
There is not really that much more to say about the place. It will ccst you 149 kroner (about 25 USD) for the buffet and that is really cheap if you compare it with regular restaurant prices here in Norway. 
The only problem with the buffet is that you get tempted to take at least one portion too much and you end up leaving the place pretty stuffed :-) But if you are able to limit yourself this is a pretty good place for a Sunday dinner. You will find Akropolis at Sølvberggata not to far from the library and cinema in Stavanger. The restaurant has a homepage http://www.akropolis-stavanger.com/ but at the moment it does not really contain any useful information.
