An out-of-body sublime A5 wagyu meal
You want to know how to get people to order perfectly marbled, A5 wagyu cuts from your deli? Serve them a five-course menu featuring said wagyu, cooked by a master Japanese chef and his team, right in downtown Makati.
That’s how One World Deli got us a few weeks back — with a carefully shared online invite that led us to Poblacion where PYC Food Corp. curator Vicky Lauchengco was holding a Satsuma Fukunaga A5 Tasting Menu in One World Café.
Satsuma Fukunaga is a Shizuoka farm that’s grown from one Black Angus cow to a herd of 2,000, with a longer growing period (33 months compared to 20-29). All this (bless those cows) means less-fatty, more evenly marbled cuts. In fact, they’ve won Grand Champion awards at Yokohama Meat Fair, National Meat Business Cooperation Competition, Marbled Beef Cooperative Competition, National Meat Business Cooperative Competition, and Honorary Award at National Beef and Meat Co-initiative Competition.
Yes, that’s a lot of awards. But to prove to food-jaded writers that your beef is among the best in Japan, you’ve got to go a little further.
Chef Ryo set about plating the Fukunaga Wagyu Tataki with Eggplant and the Fukunaga Wagyu Sushi side by side, as we were poured one of three special sakes for this pairing menu: Schichiken Yama No Kasumi Sparkling Sake, a light and sweet sparkling wine with hints of rice hovering over it.
A5 wagyu rump (ichibo) was used for the rolled beef and eggplant, and a short rib (sankaku bara) cut was laid out on rice for the slice of sushi. A nice opening dish, savory and plump.
We wanted more.
Next we tried chef Ryo’s Simmered Fukunaga Wagyu (striploin) with seasonal vegetable and dashi soup, which he kept simmering for a while as I chatted with Pepper Teehankee and Yvette Fernandez about past Japanese meals, as one does. It had been a few rainy nights in Metro Manila, so this soup, when it arrived, was a comforting, slurpable joy. You expect beef in an infused broth like dashi, but to encounter that soft layer of wagyu was like meeting an old friend.
It was paired with a drier, more prominent sake — a Schichiken Furinbizan Junmai — which also went nicely with the next dish, the Fukunagu Wagyu Cutlet (using A5 rump). The cutlet, coated in dried bread, egg and flour, was simple enough; but the wagyu flavor is enhanced when you dip the chunks in succulent, specially made bleu cheese and horseradish dressings. Rump to a higher level, indeed.
Lauchengco noted that chef Ryo was only in town for this special A5 event, and was heading back to Fukunaga’s kitchens the next day. She praised their farm’s specially raised wagyu. “Their barns shelter cows better, they’re fanned, sprayed all over.” The evenness of the marbling makes Fukunaga beef less fatty, with higher melting levels while cooking, and more flavor. “It’s very balanced, every part is good,” adding “You won’t get a headache from eating too much wagyu,” as one sometimes can from the buttery-rich beef.
Midway through the meal, we see a One World Deli ordering menu circulating. Sure enough, guests begin to sign up for kilo and gram cuts of Wagyu Tenderloin, Ribeye, Striploin, down to Chuck Rib, Brisket and Shank to take home to their own home freezers.
The ploy worked beautifully.
But the best was about to come, as chef Ryo hovered over the sizzling pans, which we knew would be one of his signature dishes.
First, though, a miso as a palate cleanser. This tends to umami your palate, and it’s served with sukiyaki and uni on rice: after the freshly bathed sukiyaki, the uni emerges from the rice and egg — a bit of the sea, the underside flavor.
And then we were ready for a simply out-of-body sublime Wagyu Ribeye plated with truffle salt, fresh wasabi and green melon papaya.
When you take a slice of the glistening Fukunaga beef and rub it across the truffle salt and papaya and put it in your mouth, there’s a sensory luxury there, culminating in a serene bath of flavors, like a particular private onsen you will always remember.
This is paired with a Hakkaisan Snow-Aged Sake 3 Years, which truly opened up its fluffy rice abundance and combined masterfully with the ribeye.
We were very grateful for JJ Yulo’s invite and to Lauchengco for bringing A5 Satsuma Fukunaga to Metro Manila, and now to your own kitchens for the next wagyu experience.
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Contact One World Deli at 0927-4780868 to order. Visit Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/OneWorldDeli/) and oneworlddeli.com.
