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| Review Article from The Patriot Ledger |  |
TASTE & TELL: Takara in Canton: Good sushi, without the pretension
By JEN WAGNER
The Patriot Ledger
I was prepared to be disappointed. Boy, the outside of this restaurant is ugly. There are pretty brick storefronts and then there's Takara in Canton. It looks like a seedy bar where you go to chug Pabst Blue Ribbon.
But once you step inside and take in the artfully faux painted walls, a bamboo hut-like sushi bar, a soothing waterfall and Japanese screens, you see it: Takara is cute. And it's comfortable - casual enough to wear jeans, nice enough to take a date.
Sushi menus can be daunting, and this one is no different. --- There are nearly 200 items on the menu - from appetizers to salad to soup to sushi to house specials to teriyaki. So, before my head blew off with too many choices, I decided to stick to what I came here for: raw fish. Tuna, salmon, yellowtail and tempura sushi were all in our order. There was really no art to - it: We made sure we had a variety and put on our adventure hats. What arrived at our table, however, was Picasso on a platter that looked like sea glass. As we ate, we must have said 10 times, ''This is my favorite ... no, wait. ...''
The variety of sauces and combos of vegetables with the raw fish was amazing. Each bite was a lovely surprise.
The most beautiful dish we ordered was probably our least favorite: the raw tuna appetizer on a potato pancake with a spicy mayo sauce. It was good, but the potato overpowered the tuna. I have my eye on the fried soft-shell crab with ponzu sauce appetizer for next time.
We ate well that night, perhaps too well, but only spent $60. I imagine we could go there and not get appetizers or dessert (deep-fried ice cream still amazes me; I'm like a cat watching tennis on TV) and spend only $40. And I can't wait to try a lunch special - plenty of sushi combos for under $10, as well as miso soup.
Bonus No. 1 at Takara: It's not pretentious - and that's a relief.
Perhaps sushi is no longer trendy in the Boston area and is simply recognized for being tasty.
Bonus No. 2 at Takara: it's BYO. You don't have to worry they might not have the drink you want. Just bring it. Spend the extra money on extra sushi. Or go ahead and order something non-sushi. I'll admit it: I did, and the crab, scallion and scallop pancakes were awesome.
Takara, 592 Washington St., Canton, 781-821-8822. Open Monday through Saturday from 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. for lunch. Open Monday through Thursday 5 to 10 p.m. for dinner, and Friday through Sunday, 5 to 10 p.m. for dinner. On-street parking. Handicapped-accessible. Major credit cards accepted.
The weekly restaurant review, ''Taste & Tell,'' is written after anonymous visits to area restaurants by Patriot Ledger food critics.
Copyright 2006 The Patriot Ledger Transmitted Wednesday, September 13, 2006.
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| Review Article from Boston Globe |  |
Chinese brothers do Japanese proud
By Bella English
Blessings on the sushi god for bringing Takara to the suburbs south of Boston -- and on the reader from Sharon who alerted me to it. This two-year-old Japanese restaurant in Canton more than doubled its space recently, and now boasts 55 seats along with a sleek sushi bar where a pair of chefs turn out edible art. The staff is constantly experimenting with specials; on a recent night it was a tuna papaya appetizer ($8). It's really a meal in itself, and a healthy, gorgeous one. The sushi chef took a couple of cucumbers, carved them into scallop-edged flowerpots, then filled them with chunks of raw tuna and papaya, drizzled with a light mayonnaise-papaya juice-soy sauce. There's a heap of crunchy seaweed salad and some roe, which adds a salty note that nicely offsets the sweet dressing.
An equally good bet is another appetizer special, aptly named tuna heaven ($7), consisting of two potato cakes, ethereally soft on the inside, fried crisp and topped with a sweet, spicy raw tuna.
The restaurant is owned by Jackie Zheng, who is Chinese; his brother Jerry is behind the sushi bar. Both men have cooked in Asian restaurants, Jackie in New York and New Jersey. "I like Japanese food. Doing sushi right is like an art," Jackie says, asked why he opted to open a Japanese place, as opposed to Chinese. Besides, he adds, there are "so many Chinese restaurants out there."
The storefront restaurant is immaculate, with the tables and bar made of blond wood. It's a quiet place with a gurgling fish pond, but we could do without the cloying muzak. There are ceiling fans and Asian decorative accents throughout. Behind the bar, the chefs are bent over their work, deftly turning out square and rectangular plates of the freshest sushi. Zheng goes to the fish market in South Boston almost daily to see what's just arrived. If you want the basic sushi, get the sushi regular ($13.50), which comes with miso soup and includes seven pieces of sushi and five California rolls.
But there's more than sushi here. Try the ten don ($12), a meal in a bowl. Two jumbo shrimp tempura, butterflied and lightly battered, join zucchini, sweet potato, and taro tempura. It's all served over a delicious rice that contains shredded onion, carrot, and zucchini, along with mushrooms and a bit of scrambled egg white.
We've been to those corny hibachi places where you watch as the chefs flip the food in the air, juggle their knives, and nearly cut off their fingers. Here, we're spared the spectacle. The hibachi dishes are prepared at a tenppanyaki grill, but it's out of sight, behind the sushi bar. What arrives at the table is the finished product: a large platter of chicken ($14.25) with a light teriyaki flavor, and fresh zucchini, carrots, mushrooms, and broccoli. The dish is healthy and colorful, but a bit bland. It's served with miso soup, salad, and rice.
The bi bim bab dishes here are excellent; the basic bi bim bab ($9.25) consists of strips of marinated beef, stir-fried along with a medley of vegetables, topped with a hard-fried egg and served with rice; the chili sauce that accompanies it is wonderfully fiery. You can also order the dish with tofu, tuna, or salmon. We did not love the tenzaru ($11.95): the cold buckwheat noodles were bland and an unappetizing grayish color.
Takara does not have a liquor license, so you're on your own. We love BYOB places, mainly because of the huge markup on alcohol at restaurants. When you bring your own, you can bring better stuff at a much better price.
There's a casual vibe to Takara, and Zheng sets the tone. He seats people and hovers just the appropriate amount. My 12-year-old son, who wouldn't touch sushi with a 10-foot pole, came in, lugging a pizza box from a couple of doors away. Zheng looked at him and told him he'd have to pay a fee: "One piece of pizza."
But my son was happy to have dessert at Takara: fried ice cream ($4.50). Choose from green tea, red bean, or ginger ice cream, which is rolled in batter and deep-fried, served with whipped cream. It's a tactile and culinary treat.
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| Review Article from Boston Herald |
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Takara Sushi bar cooks up savory dishes in Canton
WHY COOK TONIGHT?
by A.C. Stevens
Downtown Canton isn't exactly what you'd call a dining mecca, but with the recent opening of Takara, it's got something to lure local residents after sundown. But only a handful or residents at a time. This tiny, spare room has about a half dozen tables and a mini-sushi bar, so there's seating for about 18 customers.
But it's worth trying to be one of those customers, or ordering takeout, because this is a little jewel, a nice cut above your run-of-the-mill sushi bar. It's not the outr?"gourmet" sushi that's lately burst on the scene - just typical items, fresh, well-prepared and nicely presented.
Gyoza dumplings ($4.25), fried and crescent-shaped, were delicate, hot and crips, with a pretty garnish of carrots and broccoli. A tempura combo appetizer ($6.50) brought two shrimp and five vegetables, such as green pepper, broccoli and eggplant - a good assortment for the price. All were lightly battered and crisply fried, though perhaps not quite as hot in temperature as we might have liked.
A sushi deluxe entree ($15.95) also is a good value: 10 pieces of sushi an a California roll, nicely arrayed in a large dish shaped like half a boat. There's nothing terribly exotic in the assortment - a couple of tuna, a couple of salmon, one shrimp, a fish roe- but it's cool, fresh and clean-tasting, and the fish is cut into manageable bites. The rice was a tad crumbly, but nicely seasoned with vinegar.
The evening was cold and rainy, so spicy undo ($10.50) - thick noodles in a pot of hot broth - looked like an enticing choice. It proved to be one of those perfect-for-the-moment choices: a big, brimming bowl of chewy noodles, vegetables and seafood, spicy and salty and sinus-clearing. Our cheerful waiter doled it out between two bowls, and the soup's many treasures - tender squid, shrimp, crisp, colorful carrots and broccoli, and more - were revealed as he did so.
Takara hasn't been open long, and it was empty when we arrived. By the time we left, a small but lively crowd had gathered, and takeout business was brisk. If they haven't already, locals should soon discover this tiny find in their midst.
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| Review Article from Boston Magazine |
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Tipping the Scales
The friendly staff at Canton's Takara almost outshines the quality of the restaurant's sushi. Almost.
By Alexandra Hall
A pristine Japanese spot with no shortage of personality. Takara Japanese Restaurant in Canton has emerged as another of the superlative little dining spots that continue to open in the suburbs. Owner Jacky and his brother, sushi chef Jerry Zheng, welcome guests at the front of the house with a constant stream of jokes and keep them just as entertained at the sushi bar at the rear of the restaurant.
There, be on the lookout for experimental daily specials - creative little zingers such as sauteed potato cakes piled with sweet maguro. the cooked menu focuses on Japanese (commendably juicy, mild chicken and meats off the teppanyaki grill) and Korean (the incendiary salmon bi bim bab is a spicy toss of rich fish, veggies, rice and chile) cuisine. But the sushi is the real star. Only the fish swimming in the restaurant's tiny indoor pond is fresher.
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