Ideally, shabu-shabu is communal, served to hungry friends hovering over a pot, fighting for space in order to cook their foods one by one. Here on upper Sahara, though, where Swish is located, shabu-shabu is eaten at a counter stool. Diners sit in front of their small kettles, heating their tidbits on individual gas burners. It's a tad difficult to share in this format, but not impossible. Still, this is a delicious, authentic experience that I can't wait to repeat.
There are essentially two choices here, shabu-shabu and sukiyaki, which varies in that it is more like food simmering in a sauce, and, generally speaking, based on sliced beef.
I can also recommend the small side dishes available as options. Edamame are boiled green soybeans you pop from their shells, a terrific beer dish. Spinach sesame salad is the heartiest side, thanks to a rich sesame paste the seared greens are marinated in. And let us not forget the dreaded kimchee, stinky fermented cabbage in chili paste, a staple of Japan's neighbor, Korea. All three dishes are done expertly.
Once you are seated, your Japanese-speaking waitress will take your order, turn on the flame and fill your kettle with the appropriate broth. You have two choices here, healthy or hungry, which differ only in terms of the portion size. I'm a hungry type, but I ordered the healthy size and found that it was more than sufficient for my appetites.
The shabu-shabu can be had based on prime rib eye, the triply expensive Kobe classic beef from Japan, seafood, mushrooms or all vegetarian. The mushroom party looked so tempting, stocked with shiitake, enoki, shimeji, oyster, king oyster, wood ear and white mushrooms that I almost gave in to it. Instead, I opted for the seafood combo, a generous platter of yellowtail, tuna, scallops, shrimp and sea bass.
The waitress placed the platter in front of me and placed a few of the accompaniments into my flavorful seafood broth. On the side platters, there were a few mushrooms, some sliced green onion, cubes of tofu, konnyaku (jellied yam noodles) and udon, thick wheat-flour noodles, all there to be eaten with the seafood.
After that, it's up to you. You swish the delicacies around in the broth, determining the degree of doneness, and then dip them into one of the two dipping sauces, a ponzu or a thick sesame paste. On request, the server will bring shichimi ("seven peppers," a Japanese condiment), layu (hot chili oil) or wasabi, green horseradish paste that you squeeze out of a tube like toothpaste. Resistance is futile.
Sukiyaki is something else again. I became addicted to this dish at a place called Tokyo Sukiyaki on Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, where the dish was served in a hot iron skillet covered with a rustic wooden cover.
In that restaurant, it was already prepared, but here, you make it yourself. It's fun to watch the meat shrivel and the sauce reduce until it is intense enough for one spoonful to flavor an entire bowl of rice. I wouldn't dream of a sukiyaki without beef, but here, you have the same options as with the shabu-shabu, and even one more, white-meat chicken.
The broth is soy-based, and in addition to the ingredients mentioned above, you have the option of minced garlic, not very Japanese but very good, and a raw egg that will poach slowly in the broth. The prime rib eye is thinly shaved and bright red, which is an indicator of its freshness when frozen. (It's impossible to slice thawed beef this thin.)
The beef cooks in seconds, but if you leave it in, more of its flavors are absorbed into the broth. Both the shabu-shabu, incidentally, are served with bottomless bowls of beautifully steamed short-grained Japanese rice. With either dish, you'll eat your fill.
Japanese beer, such as Asahi or Kirin, makes the perfect libation for these dishes, but you can also have sake, hot or cold, or cloyingly sweet Japanese plum wine. Swish makes one of its own desserts, too, a steamed cheesecake with a fluffy texture. I've never been huge on mochi ice cream, little ice cream balls coated with sticky rice the texture of an ear lobe when unfrozen, but then, I'm only nostalgic for what kept me warm in Japan, I guess.