Friday night, 9pm. The sweet scent of charcoal smoke, seared meat and good conversation drifts into the warm Soho air. The kitchen printer spits out another order, a monotone digital rattle followed by a whine as paper is ejected like an off-white tongue.
Black-clad chefs gather food from blissfully cold reach-in fridges, skewers are deftly balanced on 500-degree grills with the delicacy and precision of someone who’s done it a thousand times before.
The main floor of the dining room is buzzing; young, hip twentysomethings cradling glasses of sake in one corner, statuesque tributes to Marilyn Monroe and Lauren Bacall in another. Puzzled out-of-towners looking for a quick protein fix before Hairspray ponder the menu, wondering why there’s no sushi; the clue is in the huge row of charcoal grills.
And, just like every night, hordes of Japanese salarymen work their way through bottles of shōchū, a fiery vodka-like concoction that raises the spirits and the volume.
The weekend starts here.