Nodaiwa Azabu Iikura Honten

5th-generation Kanejiro Kanemoto keeps alive the family culinary legacy. Having started helping out at the restaurant as a boy, he has devoted himself to unagi for over 80 years. While hewing closely to Edo grilling styles, he doesn’t forget to add a twist of his own. Unseasoned broiled unagi dressed with caviar is an inspiration from his days wandering from restaurant to restaurant in Paris. Still working the kitchen today, Kanemoto is a master craftsman who has devoted his life to the grill.

• A restaurant that treats eel as ‘a delicacy for the people’: one-star craft, but rooted in the everyday Tokyo tradition of unagi.
• Two distinct styles, one house: shirayaki is grilled without sauce, kabayaki is dipped and broiled, both built on steaming to shed excess fat.
• A living legacy, not a museum: the fifth-generation head chef is still at the grill and has pushed new ideas, including caviar-topped shirayaki and packaged products that took the restaurant beyond the dining room.

Ingredient stars

• Freshwater eel (unagi): the single focus, handled with precise steaming and grilling.
• Soy sauce, mirin: the core building blocks of the house sauce, tuned over generations.
• Rice: the foundation for unaju, built to carry the sauce and fat without collapsing.
• Sansho: a classic finishing note for eel over rice.

Format

• One-star unagi specialist, classic Edo-style craft in Minato City.
• Two principal preparations are highlighted, shirayaki (grilled without sauce) and kabayaki (dipped in sauce and broiled).

Technique

• The eel is steamed to drip out excess fat before grilling, a key step in the restaurant’s texture and aroma.
• Sauce work is treated as a living tradition, with the soy sauce and mirin balance shifting over generations as tastes change.

What to order

• Unaju, grilled eel over rice, is the anchor dish.
• Seasonal sourcing can include wild-caught eel.