Machiya

An ode to Kyoto-style home cooking, Machiya is from the duo behind Kanada-Ya and offers a short range of carefully rendered dishes divided into izakaya, yashoku and washoku sections. From the snack-centric izakaya options, the tsukene arrives as six dense minced chicken balls on skewers, with a Burford Brown egg yolk for dipping. The yoshoku dishes offer Western spins on Japanese standards, such as chicken stock-braised rice with truffle ketchup or Australian Wagyu beef katsu. The latter is an extravagance on such a low-priced menu, as is the washoku section’s unajyu rice bowl. The unajyu’s a rewarding splurge however, topped with a layer of sticky-sweet morsels of grilled eel. The star of the desserts is the genmaicha mille crepe cake, precisely constructed from layers of green tea-flavoured crepes. The long drinks list impresses (sakés, shochu, Old World wines and spirits), but that’s because a gloomy drinks lounge lies beneath. The bar serves a small selection of flavour-packed cocktails, further proving that Machiya’s a good thing in a small package.