Garlic Mania

A natural place to begin a meal here is the house speciality: Ultimate Garlic Toast Otsuka AHO Bread. Built on a proprietary baguette spread with fermented butter and Aomori-grown garlic, each crisp bite yields a rich soak of melted butter and fragrant garlic aroma. It remains crisp and easy to eat without tasting greasy, making for an appealing starter.

For a direct taste of the garlic's natural sweetness and texture, the whole deep-fried Takko garlic bulb is a focal point. Fried until the cloves turn tender and fluffy, it can be touched with a bit of the accompanying house spicy miso to bring out the naturally high sugar content of the crop. Another distinctive speciality is the King of Soups, a mushroom cream soup scented with truffle and baked under a pastry dome that diners crack through into the broth below.

For a substantial dinner, meat plates and pastas offer plenty of variety. Options include garlic butter chicken steak pan-seared and coated in butter sauce, rib steak finished with Japanese-style garlic sauce, and Red-Fried Spaghetti featuring spicy chorizo and tomato garlic sauce—dishes that share well over beer or wine.

To finish the meal, staff prepare stone-cooked garlic rice directly at the table, pressing it against the bowl to form a crisp, fragrant crust. The textural crunch of browned rice paired with hot garlic rice rounds out the dinner. Fitted with red-checked tablecloths alongside counter and table seating, the dining room keeps the evening relaxed and unpretentious.