00:07 John Daub: So we're back in Arakicho. There's David, I'm John, and we're going to eat yakiniku. Why don't we take a look where we're going. Arakicho, just to reiterate what we've been doing for the first two live streams, is a gourmet town. It's a secret gourmet town because not a lot of people know about this place.

00:35 John Daub: One thing David wanted to show me before we walk over to the restaurant is Toka Benizaru [?], one of the famous ramen restaurants in the area. It's got a difficult name: Toka Benizaru. I write about it on the Tokyo Japan website. There's a good article with photos and descriptions. You can see it's pretty famous. They're open now, but this isn't where we're going, although this looks so good. There's only five seats. It's really narrow, but that's what Japan's about, right? Putting restaurants wherever they have some space.

01:26 David: Wait, is that it right there? It says Nonki. You said this place is called Nonki, right?

01:30 John Daub: Yeah, they've got two branches in the same location, so we're going to the other one, the hidden Nonki. Because we must stick with the theme of secret. As soon as this turns green—but we say ao in Japanese, and ao means blue. Check out the lizards on your right. There's another ramen shop. The one behind us is the most famous. Anyway, let's cross. We're now going to eat yakiniku down the street in Araki-cho, Shinjuku's secret gourmet town. This street heads down to Yasukuni-dori, one of the main streets that crosses Tokyo.

02:34 John Daub: This is Nonki. Speed limit, 30 km/h. Don't eat too fast. 29 in Japanese is niku, and niku means meat. So that works really good. This is horumon-yaki. Wagyu, kurowagyu—this is the Japanese black. Wow, the black-haired Wagyu beef, which is what I've been eating a lot of. In another Only in Japan episode, we went and met the cow before we ate it. So if you're a vegetarian, you can keep watching, but be warned. We're eating meat. It's time to enter Nonki.

03:57 John Daub: Konnichiwa. We've come before all the customers, as not to bother them. Have a seat. Always have to think about seating arrangements. Boy, girl, boy, girl, but it's hard with two boys. Welcome to Nonki—rhymes with donkey. This is called a shibori, a hot wet towel to clean your hands. Right away, I can see they love beef here. You can see some of the murals of beef lovers. They have an English menu, but they speak Japanese.

05:24 David: Let's take a look at the English menu. And let's see what you would see if they didn't have the English menu. This is the a la carte. They have right on the front wagyu meat. Sliced wagyu beef. Lean beef, which is red—more red than marbling. Fresh offal. Offal—stomach, liver, heart, and skirt. And the Adam's apple. Pork breast is high on my list. Special wagyu beef tongue.

06:02 John Daub: So we're going to have a nice yakiniku meal. That's the thumbnail, by the way. Look at the colors—lots of different pinks, whites, and reds. The Japanese menu has a blueprint of all the parts of the cow you're going to be eating. In Japan, we say don't waste anything. Really, we're cooking everything.

06:46 David: David's been here before. He knows what's going on. I'm a first-timer at Nonki. So we're going for the lean beef. Wagyu, which they're going to grill slowly for us.

07:00 John Daub: Kyushu. I just want a beer actually.

08:00 David: Are you going for the sour? I'm going for the sour.

08:04 John Daub: Sour man. Interesting drink. Did you get to show the cow map? I know where the liver is, the heart, and the Adam's apple. Tan and hatsu and orute—that's the Adam's apple. I want to know what I'm eating before I eat it. This is the pig's breast. Liver, harami—that's the skirt. Diaphragm. I like harami, it's pretty good. That's aburatsuki hormone—hormone with fat. This is the upper cut of the mino, which is the stomach. The riddle is what's known in English as sweetbread or pancreas.

09:26 John Daub: Right now we're oiling the grill. The beer is here. One raw and lemon sour. Cheers to all of you out there. See how much lemon there is. That's a lot of lemon. It's 500 yen but you can get a refill for 300 yen. Half price alcoholic beverages—that's genius. Do they refill the beer at half price? Nope. We're getting little lightning flashes of fire from the coals. But we don't actually grill the Wagyu. We're going to grill the horumon-yaki ourselves.

11:02 David: Oh wait, do you want to do it? This is a thing of beauty. Meat! Harami. Nice.

11:35 John Daub: Yum yum, give me some. Wow. I've never had—you know what, I did a show on NHK about hormone for Tokyo Eye in Shinbashi. I ate a lot of pig's breast, and it's not that bad grilled. But I wouldn't want to eat it raw. So basically we're going to make sure this is cooked well. What's the first thing to go on the grill? This is the pig breast. You're going to grill it? Put it where the charcoal is—you want to make sure this thing is cooked well. Pig's breast. It's a family show. But actually it is very tasty and we're eating it with salt. There's condiments here—spicy and salt. I'm more of a salt guy. Put some salt here.

13:11 David: Do you want to try this one for you too?

13:14 John Daub: So some salt. I hear it sizzling. Wow, I'm getting hungry. Flip. So I'm going to move this camera to the wide angle lens now. I want to share with you the actual ambiance of the restaurant as we grill.

13:52 David: No wait, you got more stuff to show us. That looks so good. What is this? This is Japanese black beef. It's about 10kg. I can't eat it all. I'll give you one choice. Choose one. Today we're going to have a beautiful candlelight lamp and a piece of the butt. Tenderloin, rump, ichibo—which is the buttocks. The rump is the most popular one.

14:47 John Daub: What do you guys think? Let's get 100 likes. Choose one. Alex Noel says middle, Steven says top, John says top, Roddy says bottom. The bottom one is Australian—that disqualifies it. Middle middle middle. Naka. I got the rump. He's happy about this choice. Sorry we went middle. The top was the butt. Top is the bottom—if you know what I mean.

16:06 David: The very uncomfortable feeling of a wide angle lens. Because you're stuck in this phone.

16:26 John Daub: Oh wow. He put the whole chunk of meat. That's a massive chunk—about 180 to 200 grams. Your butcher o-hai is ready. Oh my pig's boobs are good. That's so beautiful. I'm gonna serve you. Serve me my pig's breast. I can smell it. Wow that's really cool. Look, it's getting there.

17:06 David: Oh wow.

17:11 John Daub: So I'm gonna share with you this feeling in beautiful wide angles. I have a wide angle lens and it's clean this time. Bear with me just for a minute as we go through the painful feeling of wide angle lens. You gotta get to the center. It's not so beautiful but it's not too bad either. What do you think guys, should we go wide or stay? That lens is too blurry. Technical difficulties. Alright, we're gonna have to just keep it the way it is. That was unscheduled programming. Taking it off the gimbal and we're going gimbal-less. The reason why is because this is our third live stream of the day and you need a battery charge.

19:15 David: Pig opi. I really hate mine sorry. Oh you hate yours. Here we go, that's what it looks like. Basically a piece of meat. Chewy. It's soft, nothing wrong with breast. Mmm it's good. Very good. What are you going with next? Liver.

19:42 John Daub: Oh this has been in sesame oil I think. Mmm. So do you still remember what every piece is? If there was a quiz I would have said meat. The only one I can't identify is the stomach and the sweetbread. Now the hormone is curious—we don't eat this in the United States or other countries. In Europe it's not so common. What he's just given me is the sauce—it's not soy sauce, it's different taste, although soy based. Sauce is good, a little sweet.

21:09 David: How long does it take? About 30 to 40 minutes.

21:13 John Daub: Wow. So this up here gets grilled for about 30 minutes. And while that's taking place we're gonna be eating the hormone, which is what we have on the plate here. We have different body parts of the cow. In Japan nothing goes to waste—everything is eaten. And this is gonna take about 30 minutes.

22:01 David: Liver. Liver I hardly know her. So this liver is just about finished.

22:13 John Daub: Hey can we put on the piece? What's that? I'm not sure, let's go with this. Adam's apple? I'd like to know what I'm eating. Questions don't ask questions—answers food. Cheers. I like going to yakiniku. There's something about guys hanging out around a fire. That's some sort of primal instinct. This goes back to the days of cavemen where we would hunt and then eat meat around a campfire. I don't eat a lot of meat, I'll be honest. In Japan meat is more or less an ingredient and enhancement to the taste of traditional Japanese cuisine. However, yakiniku is special—it's not something you can eat every day.

23:30 David: How often do you eat yakiniku?

23:34 John Daub: Yeah it looks pretty done. Which one do you want? I know you're hungry. Did we find out what this was? The way to crack the system. You went for the orute. We're lost. But the aburatsuki hormone—that's the unidentified guts. It's just some guts. This one here is the liver—reba. And the first bit was the breast. This is just entrails. Let's go for it. It's good. It's full of nitrates. Very good.

25:14 David: Arakicho is a gourmet town. Is there any particular reason why you picked this restaurant?

25:17 John Daub: Yeah. I was going to suggest checking out the walls behind us. Earlier they really love beef. So there's some anime, some manga images on the walls. A lot of famous people have come here—they sign the walls. If you've heard of the movie Your Name, Makoto Shinkai's been here. And one of the co-directors of the latest Shin Godzilla movie—he signed the wall, drawn the tail of Godzilla. All the walls have signatures of famous people that have come here. It's a well-known place.

27:00 David: I'll serve you this piece.

27:03 John Daub: And if it's been served to me I will eat it with a little bit of salt. This is the aburatsuki hormone. Ah good with the shiro tare. Okay I'm going to have mine too. Oh that's good. If it's on my plate move your fingers. I'll cook some more but if you choose a piece then you can go and check out the walls.

27:40 David: You're going to cook. So let's go with this. This looks questionably good. It's in some sort of oil—sesame oil I think.

27:58 John Daub: Would you guys eat this? I would, yeah I am. So now that it's on the fire I'm going to go take a look around the restaurant. As David was saying, on the walls famous people come here and sign. Although Arakicho is a secret area it seems well known with famous people. Back here in this room it's just covered. That's from Godzilla. Godzilla's tail—it's from the new Godzilla movie done by the producer or director. This room typically people sit in the yakiniku room—four people, grill in the middle, smoke sucked out through this tube. This one is slightly creepy—a vampire biting into a piece of meat. And again more signatures by celebrities. That must be a manga artist. And then there's Cobra. Alright David is right now cooking so I don't want to be too long. Looking back this is where we're sitting. This place starts getting full in about 30 minutes. This is a stack of lemons. And sake up here. And he's going to town. And it's looking really good to that peak point—this is the main course.

31:15 David: Is that the Adam's apple? No the Adam's apple is actually cooking right now. But this is Adam's apple. Yeah that's right.

31:23 John Daub: Why is it all funky looking? It's the throat of the cow. Mmm. When you take that out you can't say anything, right? Put its little brother on the grill. It's going for a good cause—my hunger.

31:49 David: So the Adam's apples look almost done. Yeah that looks like I can eat them a little raw. I don't mind.

31:56 John Daub: That's the Adam's apple you just put on the left. These are the sweetbread—rido or the pancreas.

32:02 David: The pancreas.

32:05 John Daub: I've heard of pancreatic stuff but never just pancreas. Adam's apple sounds interesting. I prefer cow's heel. There's some parts I haven't heard of before. I've eaten a lot of different parts that aren't even on this menu. I've eaten the tail. Have you ever eaten the tail? I haven't. I've eaten the ears. Anything goes good with sauce. There's no end to what you cannot eat if you just dip it in the right sauce. Everything has its own sauce.

32:50 David: Big piece or small piece?

32:52 John Daub: Big.

32:56 David: Done, right? Yeah. I just like you to be happy with what I serve you.

33:04 John Daub: I'll have this piece here. Which one is better, salt or sauce?

33:12 David: Sauce is better.

33:34 John Daub: Okay. Oh! All right. He's wrapping it for more cook. Okay, about 10 minutes. He's going to open it up again and we're going to have the meat of a lifetime. I like the system. Oh this is really creamy. It's a really unique meat that we just ate here. Each piece is unique. It's very interesting because these are different parts of the cow. We're so used to eating just regular beef cuts. But when you're eating different parts we've never eaten before, it takes on a totally different flavor. Every piece has a different texture and mouthfeel. How's this throat doing?

34:59 David: Oh my God. It's really tough. The Adam's apple. It is. A little bit, you know.

35:07 John Daub: Oh wow. I've never seen anything like this before. I've seen a lot of weird stuff but this is... It looks like seafood, really. Some sea urchin. Or eringi mushrooms. JT says Adam's apple seems like delicious tendons. AJ says it looks like sea urchin. Christian just writes, bizarre. I'm with you there. Well it might make sense if we have one more drink.

36:06 David: Who wants the big piece?

36:07 John Daub: Rock paper scissors. Junk en punch. I win the small piece. All right, I'll take the big piece. Thank you. And this is probably the most bizarre-looking piece of meat. It's certainly char-grilled. It's hard. Ah! It's... samgyeopsal [?]. It's hard. I've never had anything like this. Have you ever had anything like this? No, right? At the count of three. Is this shio or tare? Shio, with salt. You did tare—big mistake.

37:29 David: Many times.

37:30 John Daub: Alright, here we go. One, two, three and eat it. Wow. This is the price that we see, huh? I haven't finished digesting, like chewing it. It's bony. Like nankotsu. It tastes like cartilage. How many times are you supposed to chew it? Big size is quite big. Small size is three or four times. Good. I had a big piece—he said chew it well. And for his slice maybe three or four times. You chewed it like a hundred. It doesn't have much taste. It's just the texture. Mouthfeel.

39:19 David: The taste? Well it's kind of bland. Slightly oily. Mostly crunchy. The dipping in the salt brings out the taste of what little there is. But it's mostly tasteless. It's bland. I'm still crunching. I swallowed half and I'm crunching half—there's something in the middle I'm still chewing on. I would literally pull it out and show it to you, but I reserved that just for my wife. Poor wife. She knew what she was getting into.

40:04 John Daub: All right, we're getting close to the end. We got three more. And by the time we're done we're going to be ready for the next one. What is this? Hanami [?]. Like the tongue, a little lower down. Typically they play music in the restaurant but we've turned it off because we know we'll get in trouble with copyright. Another reason we came early—David and I asked in advance to film. Normally you would not film in a restaurant—you have to ask permission. I'm still chewing. You're breaking the rules. Oh my gosh. You totally destroyed this live stream. But that looks really good. Oh wow. Oh yeah. Yes please.

41:21 David: Yes. Oh and you're serving it on a platter. Look at this. David this is wonderful. Don't make sure those don't burn. This is wonderful. Look at that. And on the left you have wasabi mustard. Sugoi mame ga haitta—chili mustard. And Korean miso. This is a real treat. Oh that looks like not only a lot of meat, beautiful looking meat. And he's putting some salt on it. Beautiful touch.

42:12 John Daub: Yeah. Good job. Two points on a scale of ten? I would give that a ten. Me like. What kind of meat is that? Halami [?], I think that was tongue. Snake money? Oh no! That's halami and tongue.

42:52 David: This must be the heart.

42:54 John Daub: Last bit here I think. Check it out—proof that it's finished. Nice. And the heart is cooking. And here comes the next one. This David really is nice. This is really beautiful and it took about 30 minutes to cook it. We've been on the live stream for 43 minutes and I have to be honest—this is really really wagyu. It looks good and it's also soft and tender. It tastes amazing. I'm going to be smiling like that woman on the poster. Alright I'm going to document this for the record. While we barbecue the heart and the other body parts—by the way this is yours. Are you sure? I ate one already.

44:07 David: Yeah.

44:10 John Daub: Are you dead? Is this salt or sauce?

44:14 David: Sauce. Tongue salt.

44:20 John Daub: You just do the opposite of what David does and you'll be fine. So you ate it with sauce right? Oh no I don't remember. This is tongue and you eat it with salt. Looks good. I can't go wrong with a lot of tongue. A very good consistency—it's tender soft, has a meaty taste, really nice. The salt is good, brings out the flavor just a little bit. I want to get to this wagyu real quick so let's get rid of these body parts. I don't know why it sounds wrong. Context. Let's get rid of the proof and then we'll move to—I'm just wondering about this, so this is the stomach.

45:21 David: Yeah, the mino.

45:22 John Daub: I hope we're cooking enough. I know stomach—that looks, I'm taking the small piece because I ate the big tongue. You sure? Alright. You think it's done? Looks done. Whoops. Oh this one looks like tare. Wait wait, what do you want to put? I'm going to do the opposite—what are you going to do?

45:52 David: I'll do salt.

45:53 John Daub: Are you going salt then I'm going tare. Do the opposite of what David does and you're good. Thank you Gretchen, I'm glad you're doing better—I'm eating the stomach for you Gretchen. Can you stomach this? Oh yeah and I like the coals to it—that gives a little bit of coal taste like yakitori, slight charcoal taste. I think your heart is done.

46:53 David: Alright sounds strange when you say it like that.

47:04 John Daub: Alright the heart is getting closer. My heart is on fire, my heart burns for you. No really my heart burns for you—my heart is burning seriously. I think it's done seriously.

47:28 David: You just want to get to the wagyu.

47:31 John Daub: Don't you? Or do you want to savor your heart? Have a heart. Tare because you would do shio right?

47:46 David: Tare.

47:58 John Daub: Very hearty. Hearty meat, very plump. Very nice. It's cooked perfectly actually. Thank you. Good job. I'm being serious.

48:23 David: Drum roll please. It's time for the Wagyu.

48:33 John Daub: How dare we wait this long? Alright how are you gonna eat yours? I'm gonna try this funky mustard. No go ahead. Alright put this here. So this is a piece of wagyu—somewhat lean but marbling on it. I put some mustard on it and this is an interesting mustard with chili sauce. Now we're gonna... You're gonna try this out here. It looks really good. Okay here we go. This is for all of you who wish we were there. Wow. This is so good. And what I like about the mustard is the chili is not overpowering. Awesome wagyu taste but the mustard seeds when you bite it they have a little punch. Every time you punch it releases some flavor which adds a new dimension to the wagyu. I really can't—it's good right? Wow. Japanese beef is the best, true story.

50:15 David: But you know what we're not done. There's more. They call this katamari which means love. Lots and lots of meat.

50:27 John Daub: What are you gonna do next? Oh same here. I'm gonna now try it with a little bit of the Korean miso. Well I'm not gonna eat—I'm always gonna put a little bit more sauce. For me I'm wild, I eat a lot of sauce. This does look absolutely beautiful. I love the coloring, the deepness of this Korean miso on top of this wagyu which is just a little bit rare—you can see the pinkness. So we're gonna get a lot of flavor. Hit that like button because it's about to get a little meaty around here. Me like a lot. That is very good. It's pure pleasure. Just can't resist. Do it. Yeah let's try this green stuff. Wasabi. I thought it was avocado—no it's honey mustard. I had quite a lot before but I think I risk a little bit on this piece of meat. No risk no reward dude. Gonna lay it on the line. Does that bring back memories of the game you lost like an hour ago—the Japanese Russian roulette where you ate wasabi bread? Not a happy moment. It's different with meat though. The balance here is just right—this is really beautiful.

52:36 John Daub: I love the fact that they took a big piece of meat and slow cooked it over 30 minutes. One of the reasons yakiniku restaurants slice beef thin is because it grills quickly so you can continuously put in your mouth. When you have a big piece like 180-200 grams you have to slow cook it or else you ruin it. What they did was absolutely perfect—just seared around the outside and left the middle red enough. This one didn't have a lot of fat—not a lot of marbling. Because this restaurant's name is Akami to Horumon-yaki Nonki—so Nonki for short. Akami literally means red meat or lean meat with wasabi. They're specialized in lean meat not fatty meat—so good for health-conscious people. They don't want fatty marbled beef, they can go here to the red meat. Oh I want that fat marbled beef too. Stop with just the red—go for the white, the pink. I don't judge, I just eat everything. Wow this is quite a meal. And it's actually quite close to the ryokan—it took us less than five minutes to get here.

54:14 David: Yeah very close.

54:19 John Daub: You keep talking I'll keep eating. Okay that's how we work. I want to eat too. What if we mix the sauce—a slight amount of mustard because I was greedy with the sauce, we're running out. Alright a little bit of mustard and soy sauce and a little bit of wasabi equals a lot of smile. It's a secret recipe to the secret gourmet town of Arakicho. Just eat in silence and watch your facial expressions. Oh man. I like that mustard. The big seed mustard because each seed has... It's like ikura. When you chew into it it explodes with mustard goodness. Nothing's more satisfying than yakiniku and beef and a beer. Or a sour. Remember it's only 300 yen for a refill. You've only got four pieces left. Some are bigger than others. Disappear very quickly. But I'm being a gentleman and a scholar. I'll give you the bigger pieces. Alright. I'm holding it by the mustache. Oh. It's still good. Forfeited your face. It's going in the same place, the bottom of my stomach.

56:42 John Daub: And for those of you who are not meat eaters or vegetarians, we're going to visit another place that doesn't have any meat at all. Meat is forbidden. And yet we ourselves as humans are just walking pieces of meat. Very ironic. Dead pieces of meat bud. So we'll have the other side of the coin later on. Only three pieces left, but maybe soon only two. Very very very good. That's it. Oh man. And people are starting to come in so we're going to have to wrap it up. We have two pieces of meat. We're going to do rock paper scissors. Which one is bigger? I think they're the same. Me being a gentleman and a scholar? I'll take the one on the left. The one closer to me. Easier to get with the chopsticks. Good point. And this here is the final piece of meat. No passport necessary to get through my customs. Literally all you need to be is edible, preferably with the last piece of mustard wrapped in Korean miso. Oh my gosh this is going to test my chopstick skills because I'm picking up mustard seed individually. Alright party foul. There you go. Alright punch the button. Three two one. Do it again. Teamwork. Oh man. There we go. That was a lot of meat. That my friends was the Nonki experience. Or the full name Akami to Horumon-yaki Nonki. That's a mouthful. Thanks for joining us on this live stream. I'm giving you the last 20 seconds of looking at an empty plate of meat. The meat was there and now it's here. Thank you for joining us. We're going to live stream again in about an hour and a half. I'll put the link in the description. See you then. Bye. Thanks for joining us. Bye-bye.