Dining · Japanese · Kanazawa
Sushi Kibatani
A Toyama-born chef who learned Edomae sushi in Tokyo now cuts almost nothing but Hokuriku fish at his nine-seat counter in Kanazawa.
Tsukiji, Funabashi, Ginza
Mitsuhiro Kibatani was born in Toyama in 1973 and came to sushi through fish. After a spell as an office worker he took a job with a fish dealer at Tsukiji, then trained at Yoshiura in Funabashi, run by a former apprentice of Sukiyabashi Jiro, and at Sushi Aoki in Ginza.
Before opening his own counter he worked in Toyama as a travelling sushi chef, cooking for private events, and he says that time taught him what it means to have a shop of his own. He opened Sushi Kibatani in April 2016 in Hikosomachi, a quiet older district of Kanazawa near the Asano River.
Tokyo technique, Hokuriku fish
The method comes from Tokyo; the fish does not. Nearly everything at the counter is from Hokuriku, through ports including Himi, Shinminato, Wajima and Kanazawa, and Kibatani has said he goes to the Himi fish market every morning. The tuna comes from Himi as well.
The Edomae work shows in the details. Kohada is cured to suit the weather and each day’s fish, other fish are sometimes lightly matured, and anago is simmered in dashi and finished on the grill. The rice is cooked in an iron pot from organic grain grown by priests in Wajima, and seasoned with red vinegar and rice vinegar.
Small dishes come before the nigiri. Sweet shrimp arrives in a creamy konowata sauce, made from sea cucumber innards, on Kutani porcelain; in season there may be steamed abalone or grilled nodoguro.
Nine seats
There are nine seats at the counter and a private room for four at the back. Two months after the opening, the food critic Masuhiro Yamamoto singled out the anago nigiri, finished with a light brush of tsume. The restaurant received one Michelin star in the 2021 Michelin Guide Hokuriku.
Sources: Hitosara; TableAll; Serai; Last Minute Japan
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