JAMON

This is going to be the strangest Sir Hinchalot restaurant review in years because I am going to rave about a miniscule but brilliant restaurant and I am not going to tell you where it is.

It reminds me of a previous life when as a restaurant reviewer in Sydney I raved on about a primitive but popular Italian restaurant in Sydney called No Names. It truly was. A cheap and tasty an incredibly popular spag bol restaurant in Darlinghurst with no name and no phone number.

The restaurant that has sparked my love affair is called Jamon. A Japanese sushi and sashimi bar about the size of a large shoe box. It’s sort of in the Prahran - South Yarra region.

The best location clue I can give is that the other night I went to the opening of a new nightclub called Boutique. It’s where the old Continental Café used to be.

A couple of us ducked out of the crush on opening night and found this little piece of Tokyo.

I guess you could say we found it by occident.

And it is so good I have been back several times since.

It is quaint. It is romantic. If more than ten people were there it would be a crowd. And the whole thing is run, conducted, whatever, by a non-Japanese foodie called Charles who obviously loves what he does and loves it when people appreciate what he does.

It is the perfect place for real sushi lovers to perch at the food watch a maestro at work, appreciate the freshness of the food and the skill of the presentation and sip a bit of saki while enjoying the Nippon ride.

I tell you if Ned Kelly were here he would say: “Sushi’s life”.

You don’t only eat raw salmon. You get fed tid bits from the salmon belly or the salmon tail.

There is a refreshing starter of cucumber cubes with a dressing and sesame seeds. There’s pickled vegetables and quail eggs.

I love oysters -- and I usually like them raw, not dressed up, with no accoutrements except some fresh lime juice.

How about a raw oyster on a slim slice of Japanese nashi pear? It is magic.

There’s chunky, made in front of you, California or Nori rolls, and plenty of fresh fish including octypus and deep sea tuna.

If you want a hot dish – and I doubt you will – they have some chicken or pork dumplings and huge bowls of miso soup.

The saki flows and the wine list consists of a few bottles of red and white hanging on the wall of the matchbox size restaurant.

And through it all you watch a maestro at work right in front of you. He’s clever… serving everybody.. and you don’t mind waiting as the person on the next stool scores a gem.

He dolls it out: a little bit for you—a little bit for the other guy. It builds a mood of tranquillity and complacency.

And snippets and samples keep coming your way as you deal with a cook who loves what he is doing and loves it when you love what he is serving.

One thing that I was introduced to here the other night brought back memories of the Sunday roast as a kid. We used to have roast pork and fight over the crackling. These days we know it is just crisped fat and skin and bad for you but we still love it on rare occasions.

Well at this Japanese hole in the wall he serves, and it was my first time, crispy fish skin.

Can you imagine that. Crispy slivers of fatless fish skin, especially salmon. It is awesome. Beats pork crackling 10-1.

I challenge you to find this place. If you do you have found Aladdin’s sushi cave.

And don’t tell them I sent you.