Chokkun Izakaya 居酒屋ちょっくん — Restaurant in Yamanouchi

My wife and I experienced a most magical dinner last night at Chokkun Izakaya. We had arrived there quite inadvertently, as I had forgotten that most of the reviews of this very highly rated Izakaya mentioned that there is no menu, the Chef cooks whatever HE likes, and that you won't have any idea what you're paying until the proprietress decides at the end of the night. It's a small Izakaya (Japanese pub) with only 6 seats at the bar, and 4 small traditional horigotatsu dining tables. The hosts are the 70 year young somewhat long haired Chef and his wife, a reasonably well English speaking much younger charming hostess/proprietress (his wife). She keeps the food and spirit alive (and when he's not in the kitchen, he does too). After seating us, she asked what we would like to drink, and we explained that we don't really drink alcohol and we were here actually for dinner. She explained that they don't serve dinner, only drinks and snacks, but do have several non-alcohlic drink, and that the Chef will choose our snacks. Then the complexity of my personal arbitrary dietary restrictions came to the forefront, with my fears that he may prepare something outside of my bounds - if its from the sea its not for me, I wont eat many Japanese delicacies such as horse meat, and I'm safe eating vegetarian, but I dislike seaweed (if it's from the sea it's not for me). What other reviews don't make clear is that, YES, the Chef decides what you will eat, but whatever he prepares will be in line with your own dietary restrictions. And so the proprietress proceeded to ask if I eat eggs and dairy? I volunteered rice, and she explained that it's not a "snack" that they serve. I ordered apple juice and my wife ordered ginger ale. Our "snack" turned out to be a multicourse 5/5 star vegetarian dinner (egg and vegetable minced omelette, incredible tasting enormous fried tofu but soft on the inside, enormous vegetable hot pot with a separate citrus based dipping sauce, and fresh cheese and cucumber plate) - not a "snack"! Plus 3 glasses of the most incredible fresh 100 % juice from the apples that Nagano prefecture is renowned for, and 2 glasses of Japanese ginger ale. All totaled, our bill was 5,000 yen (cost unknown until we were set to leave). And I haven't even touched yet on the intimate atmosphere, and the warmth of the the proprietors and their establishment, as they weave an unimaginable culinary experience, conversation and guests...

We were here for Izakaya dinner. We sat down and Touru, the owner asked us what we wanted to drink. You need not see the menu simply because there isn't one. And there is no price list. We asked for hot sake and it came in a Japanese sake flask. He saunters into the kitchen behind the wall and starts his preparation. He cooks the items one at a time. We can see him behind the curtained window. His day will usually be good, I presume. He is a jolly man, drinking sake while he works and smokes behind the counter while he chats with you. We were then served fried saba, a bowl of mixed veg and tofu soup, chicken karage, a humongous pot of udon soup. I think it's best not to say you are hungry cos you'll end up with the same humongous pot of noodle soup. The couple beside us must have known cos theirs was a more modest pot. At the end of the very nice and more-than-ample meal we asked for the bill. He pondered a little and responded, "Is 3000 yen okay?" We thought it was okay. We enjoyed our dinner and got worried about how to work the calories off....

Had one of the best evenings we’ve ever had here! The highlight was the hosts themselves even though I could not find a fault with anything. The music playing in the background and the husband and wife (who speaks brilliant English) who ran the place laughing and chatting with us the entire time and no rush at all to finish with us drinking shots with the chef!

No menu and served absolutely amazing food that the single chef prepared in the kitchen! He’s so amazingly talented making incredible tuna fillet, soup with octopus, yam, tofu and onsen egg, fried battered chicken and yakisoba. Each dish was amazing and more than happy to keep cooking if we wanted more (which we did because it was all amazing)! The drinks were delicious we enjoyed sake and their homemade plum wine!

Will absolutely be back if we are ever in the area again! This is an absolute must for anyone visiting Shibu and definitely recommend arriving early if you are in a big group as it...