LA Part 3 – Dinner at Haru-Ulala

Haru-Ulala was another one of those places that I read about through chowhound.com. i rarely eat in japanese restaurants since I think it's usually overpriced. but lately i have been developing more of an interest in seeing how different Asian cultures cook "home-style" food. what interests me about home-style food is that it tends to be low-maintenance and acts as comfort food rather as opposed to food that looks so fantastic that it feels like a crime to eat it. mmm-yoso's blog on a japanese restaurant that serves food izakaya -style has gotten me interested in trying japanese food cooked home style. so since i was given full discretion on deciding where to go for dinner -- i picked Haru-Ulala. the restaurant is located on 368 E 2nd St. in little tokyo, LA.

the first thing we tried was the grilled shiso peppers. i was really curious about this pepper because of an LA Times article I read. the pepper was supposed to be sweet and sometimes spicy depending on which pepper you happened to pick. the writer of the article obviously loved the pepper for its subtle sweetness and heat, so I had to try it myself. the shiso peppers came grilled with bonito on top. if you like roasted red peppers, you probably would like these peppers. it did have a sweet nature to it, just like red pepper and the pepper was really soft from the grilling process. i was lucky enough not to pick up a spicy pepper (apparently the spiciness of the pepper depends on which one you picked!) so i really enjoyed these peppers. we also ordered the grilled shiitake mushrooms. the texture was a bit like eating grilled portabella mushroom. but overall, i didn't find the taste to be particularly memorable, which is generally typical of shiitake mushrooms.

we loved the next two dishes we ordered, the fried oyster and the soft shell-crab! the fried oyster was rolled in panko (a type of bread crumb found in japanese cuisine) and fried. we squeezed the lemon over the fried oysters, and then bit into it. the oysters were delicious, the panko crust was crisp and the oyster practically melted in our mouths. the soft shell crab was also delicious -- it was crispy, had the right texture and was not too salty or oily. we loved both of those dishes so much, that we had second orders of the same thing! we ordered two more dishes, the scallops sauteed in butter and the sardine with roe. although they were both pretty good, the sardine was way too salty. the scallops were rather unmemorable, it had a nice texture but i had sweeter scallops before.

after all the entrees, i realized that we haven't had starch yet. it just didn't feel like a complete meal without rice! (no atkins diet for me!) so the waiter recommended a salmon rice soup. although this dish took awhile to arrive, (i had mine first and the two other rice bowls arrived almost fifteen minutes later!) the rice soup definitely hit the spot and satisfied my carb cravings. the rice came with a clear light seaweed soup. there was enough rice to fill me up and the grains were firm and not mushy like leftover rice. and the salmon was perfect, not too salty but not too bland either.

overall, i really liked this place a lot. it did get a bit noisy as it got later in the evening, and i was really glad that we started eating dinner at 5pm. i hope and i will try to see if i can find other ikazaya places like this in san diego. i learned from this experience that the japanese cuisine does not consist of just great sushi, but can also be a great comfort food as well!!