Happy Hour, Happy To Make New Friends

[zenigatcha]

There's been a constant in the bar today: two people in the kitchen. There was a conversation elsewhere, earlier -- a little bit of pastry talk, a bit of booze talk, comparisons of pub culture... and here we are, leading to the all-day camp out in the kitchen between:

One, a six foot ox of a man with a shoulder to waist ratio reminiscent of a Dorito, working with...

Two, a much smaller woman, her head crowned with bright red hair.

Over the day, there have been conversation highlights that drift from the kitchen, along with laughter and the general warmth of camaraderie. Early on it's teasing.

"You can't smoke while you cook!" Rae's laughter is scandalized but contagious. "Nobody wants their food spiced by ash, let alone the pastries!"

"I don't get ash in my food!" Zenigata sounds vaguely indignant, but he yields to Rae's request with little fuss. "Fine, fine, I'll smoke out in the bar."


As time goes by it turns into friendly jabbing.


"Ah, you're so good in the kitchen!" Zengiata's tone is honest and warm, full of real affection. "You'll make someone a wonderful wife!"

"You'd be a great wife, too," Rae's more wry, a smirk in her tone. "You even look good in the apron."


By the end, they're far more familiar than they were when they began.


"Sunshine-chan," says the grown-ass middle aged man, "the oven dinged. Where do you want the baking sheet?"

"I've set up the cooling racks over here!" Rae responds without missing a beat.



In the end the happy hour approaches and it is loaded with food, drink, and sweets upon sweets. There is bar-top grill so you can take your skewers of eggplant and yakitori and little covered dishes of fried tofu aand gyoza, bowls filled with renkon chips with amazu ready to pour. As things go missing, more comes out from the kitchen or gets prepped and cooked right there on the bar's open coals grill.

Zenigata has written one menu in his bold, stark lettering. Rae's is far more graceful, but they both have very different lists.

Happy Hour IZAKAYA MENU:

Izakaya Small Plates:
Blistered Edamame
Edamame tossed with garlic and blistered, then covered with flaky seas salt.
Spinach with Sesame Dressing
Fast boiled spinach, tossed with sesame dressing
Renkon Chips with Amazu Sauce
Deep fried slices of lotus root, served with Amazu sauce.
Agedashi Tofu with Tsuyu Broth
Deep fried tofu, served in a dashi fish stock broth, with bonito fish flakes, scallions and nori. Vegetarian version available.
Gyoza
Pan fried dumplings, with pork or vegetable fillings. Served with dipping sauce.
Grilled Miso Glazed Eggplant
Coal-grilled Japanese Eggplant with a miso glaze.
Chicken + Scallion Yakitori, with Shishito Peppers and Oyster Mushroom Skewers
Marinated chicken and scallion skewers, grilled over open coals. Vegetarian skewers available with shishito peppers and oyster mushrooms.


Dessert:
Bocchan Dango
Three Color Dango flavored with red bean paste, egg and green tea.
Ikinari Dango
Mochi-wrapped sweet potato dumplings
Ichigo Daifuku
Strawberry Dumplings
Castella Cake
Honey Sponge Cake
Melon Pan
Sweetbread with thin crispy cookie crust
Dorayaki
Honey pancakes with red bean paste filling.


Drinks:
Japanese Whiskey Sampler
Pick 3: Nikka Coffee Grain, Yamazaki 12, Hibiki 17, Iwai Tradition, Suntory Whiskey Toki, Akashi Single Malt
Highball Mizuwari
Suntory Whiskey Toki and soda water.
Local Old Fashioned
Nikka Japanese Whiskey blend, White Sugar, Angostura Bitters, Orange peel garnish.
Yuzu Chuhai
Club soda, Tori Kai Shochu, Simple Syrup, Yuzu juice, Korean Citron Tea, ice cubes, lime garnish.
Umeshu - Straight, On the Rocks
Plum wine, served on the rocks, or with a plum in glass.
Lychee Sake.
Hiro Junmai Ginjo Sake, simple syrup, lychee juice, whole lychee

Comments

[oldmancreed]

"A Higball Mizuwari."

[zenigatcha]

Being a six-foot tall man in Japan means you often feel very tall. Europe's averages-- until you hit the Scands and the English -- aren't much taller. Zenigata is pretty used to feeling like a big guy.

Then Creed shows up. But he doesn't blink, just grins, sleeves rolled up past his biceps and his hands quick to measure and pour.

"There you are," he says.

[sunbaked_baker]

Sunshine watches the order being given and fulfilled with mild curiosity. She has seen some mountainous men among her regulars, and sometimes among the remnants of Mel's motorcycle gang, but none held a candle to this man. His shadows are interesting, but difficult to read, even if his hands bring Other to mind pretty readily.

And yet, the 5'6" baker in bright colors is there with an easy, friendly smile. "Anything to eat with that? There's plenty to choose from, both savory and sweet."

[oldmancreed]

Well, hello, Red. Creed's demeanor changes just a little to be more attentive. He even smiles.

"Some of that dorayaki wouldn't go amiss."

[sunbaked_baker]

"Can do," she replies with a slight chuckle, not missing the altered demeanor. When she turns to fetch the dorayaki, her left arm can be seen to be scarred down a good deal of its length, by what seem to have been teeth. But it isn't like her sleeveless top hides many of her collection of scars. If she's self-conscious about them, it seems to have been outweighed by the desire to keep cool while tending the bar.

"Here you go," she adds as she comes back, bearing a small plate with three of the filled honey pancakes.

[oldmancreed]

"Thanks, Red," he practically purrs. Then a large, clawed hand reaches for the glass given to him earlier.

The scars are noticed and approved of. He likes a survivor. Zenigata is finally remembered and Creed gives him a slight nod. The drink is pretty good.

[zenigatcha]

Zenigata gives his own slight nod in response as he turns skewers over the coal grill. Like Sunshine, he has a patch work of scars-- including a line from a bullet graze over one cheekbone -- but his are definitely from working law enforcement rather then being ravished by something with very big teeth.

Not that he doesn't have those (that one place with it's goddamned dobermans, his ass and thighs will remember that forever) but they're just not visible.

"First time with Japanese fare?" he asks, as he flips over a double skewer of shishito peppers.

[oldmancreed]

"No."

It's a polite as he gets, which is mostly due to Rae's presence.

"Been there a few times."

[sunbaked_baker]

"Seems I'm the one who's been missing out all this time," Rae grins, wry. "The recipes are still new to me, though I'm sure this isn't a one-time thing. My regulars back home are always up for trying something new."

[space_puffin]

Porgs cannot read.

However porgs know food when they smell it.

Though this is quite different food and so he's carefully examining everything... by shoving his face into the dishes.

[zenigatcha]

"Oi! Oi! Don't do that! Thief! Scoundrel!" Zenigata, loud and big man that he is, gets from his place at the bar to where the little porg-thief has started to get into the dishes, reaching out with his giant, hairy hands. "You want something, ask nicely!"

...he hopes it's not somebody's pet. Worse, a patron with sentience! Because he's going to try and shoo it, and if worse comes to worse, pick it up.

[space_puffin]

"QURRK!!" Puffy flaps his wings and starts scolding Zenigata. ... Right before stepping into the Bocchan Dango. Which causes him to squawk even more.

[zenigatcha]

Trying to pull dishes away as fast as he can, Zenigata picks up the (now ruined) plate of dango with Puffy on it.

"No! Bad-- bird? Thing? Puppy?" The fuck is this, even. But then he turns his head and calls, "Sunshine-chan! We have a pest!"

At least, he thinks it's a pest.

[sunbaked_baker]

"A pest?" Further down the bar, Sunshine turns from putting away cleaned glasses, and blinks in surprise. "A porg!"

"If it's any like the ones I've encountered, it's looking for food," she adds, coming over to see what's been damaged. "And I have no idea if dango is okay for porgs to have. " Who knows about bird-puppy-things?

[space_puffin]

Food?

YES!

FOOD!!!

Puffy chirruped hopefully at Sunshine. While still standing in the Bocchan Dango.

He also adds a massive wibble.

[zenigatcha]

"It went digging about the tofu," Zenigata grumbles, holding the plate before him now. At least the thing isn't screaming and flapping it's...ears? Arms?

"Best ask Bar what it's safe to feed," he continues, holding the plate in one hand while he slowly moves the other to catch the little thing and hold it to his chest. He just wants to get the dango plate away, and maybe keep it from running amok.

Besides, he's wrassled worse. Much worse.

[sunbaked_baker]

"Thaaat's a good idea," Rae chuckles, fluttering her fingers at the porg to try and keep its attention while Zenigata seeks to catch it.

"Bar, sorry to bother you during happy hour - could we get a small plate of whatever this porg might like best to eat?"

[yinyangwizard]

Could that be...is that...my goodness, it is! Seimei turns away from the Bar to pretend to read the bulletin board, so he can have an emotion without Zenigata seeing it.

(He will have to remember to be careful about fooling around with his Japanese tarot card deck in the main bar in future, since Lupin and Jigen feature on one of the cards in the suit of Coins.)

When he has sufficiently composed himself, he heads over to a free seat at the bar and calls, "Excuse me, bartender!"

[zenigatcha]

Zenigata was rotating skewers over the grill when he hears the call, and it takes him a moment to remember that yes, bartender is what he is today. But he grins broadly, and comes over. He's ditched his suit coat, but remains classy in a waistcoat, tie, button down and matching slacks. (The suit coat is hung up over there; his gun is safely stored in his room in a lockbox.)

"Hello!" His already high-wattage smile goes up a couple hundred more when he sees a countryman. Oh, thank God, not a fucking Westerner. Or alien. The aliens were at least new, but he's terribly homesick and any even vaguely familiar face is a beacon these days. "What can I get you?"

[yinyangwizard]

“I would like the spinach with sesame dressing, the agedashi tofu with vegetarian broth, and a Local Old Fashioned, please.”

To a fellow countryman speaking the same language, Seimei’s Kansai accent is evident, and a particularly discerning ear might even localize him to Kyoto.

[zenigatcha]

The small plates are presented quickly -- the spinach is made fairly quickly since it involved only a 30 second boil to make sure the stems remain firm but the leaves wilt, and the tsuyu vegetable broth is simmering on the stove.

When he starts to make the local old fashioned, he says, "You sound like you're from Kyoto, sir! I'm Zenigata Koichi, from Chiyoda." Kanda-Myojin, the ancestral beat of Zenigata Heiji, is found there, of course.

[yinyangwizard]

"Ah! So I live near the old Imperial Palace and you live near the new one."

(The old old Imperial palace, the home of Heian-era emperors and seat of Imperial government, the one Seimei is most familiar with, is long gone.)

[zenigatcha]

"Yes, I -- do. Did. I live primarily in Lyon, France now, due to work," Zenigata says as he starts to curl and orange rind for the local old fashioned. Then he slides it across the bar. "I try to get home at least once a year, but it can prove difficult. I miss it a great deal when I'm away, though."

[yinyangwizard]

"France is a lovely country, but it is not home." Seimei lifts his chopsticks and tries a bit of the spinach. It is steamed to perfection, and he nods approvingly as he chews and swallows. "What is it that made you live halfway around the world from Chiyoda?"

(Of course, Seimei knows, but he gives no sign of it.)

[zenigatcha]

"I work for Interpol," Zenigata says, turning rueful and wry. "It takes me all over the world, but -- ah, like that old movie, 'There's No Place Like Home!' Lyon has it's charm, but..."

He shrugs once. It's just not home. Still, these days he thinks in French instead of Japanese. Lyon's had it's affect on him.