TAN – Kyoto Breakfast to Purify Your Body and Soul

A traditional Japanese breakfast that makes you feel as if your mind and body have been cleansed and filled with gratitude.

Breakfast at TAN, along the Shirakawa River in Sanjo, Kyoto.

Even if you have indulged in Kyoto’s gastronomy to its fullest the night before, you still will feel light in the morning and have a healthy appetite.

This is perhaps the best thing about Japanese cuisine, which is easier to understand than thinking in your head.

TAN is located just a short distance from the bustling city centre of Kyoto.
It has a friendly welcoming atmosphere, yet still gives a dignified impression.

This makes sense when you hear that the restaurant is produced by KODAIJI WAKUDEN – one of the Kyoto’s most famous Kaiseki restaurants.
The interior was done by Nakamura Sotoji Komuten, who is renowned as Japan’s best Sukiya-style architecture contractor, and the calligraphy on the restaurant’s signboard is by Ichikawa Ennosuke IV, a leading Kabuki actor.
The restaurant shares the same passion as WAKUDEN in its attention to ingredients and care for the diners.

Breakfast is served in two timed sessions, at 8am and 9am.
When I arrived on time, feeling refreshed by the sound of the cool streams of the Shirakawa and the bright green of the willow trees.

I was shown to a seat at one of the large tables.

Hot Hoji tea was served shortly afterwards, and then dishes were served in turn.

The Shiraae (tofu paste with sesame) ’s aroma seems to dance in the air.
Vegetables that cooked to remain the firmness, with a flavour that rises as you bite them.
The Moromi has good deep depth.
Trout was grilled delicately, with a hint of elegant Ryotei style.
Lightly flavoured Tsukemono (pickles) dishes.
Egg and miso soup.

All were deliciously discreet in Kyoto way, and traditional Japanese breakfast with a modern lightness that celebrated on top of that.

However, what overwhelmingly knocked me out was the freshly cooked white rice.

Just in the middle of the meal, the rice finished cooked, the lid of the Donabe pot is opened and the steam is seen rising from the shiny black clay vessel up close.
At this point, I thought, “Oh, right. That’s why the starting times are fixed”.

The glossy rice in the bowl is smooth to the touch, almost like bone china.
There is no sticky texture at all, but when you put it in your mouth and bite into it, a sweet, rich, full-bodied flavours fill your mouth.
The beautiful aroma lingers on gradually.
I had no effort to pick out every last grain with chopsticks as the rice was sitting neat and steady.

The rice is said to come from their own farm in Ichinono, Kumihama Cho, Kyotango – the north of Kyoto.

The rice is grown without pesticides or chemical fertilisers, and “starts with soil preparation, seedling making, rice planting, weeding by hand, mowing, harvesting, threshing, hulling and drying, inspection and milling. The entire process is carried out by our own staff” explained in their web page.

These detail is not for the sake of the listing notes, but is connected to the taste and transferred to their true taste.

I would even like to visit again just for this bowl of rice.

The morning time that satisfy both mind and body is carried over to after meal.
You can sit upstairs and enjoy a self-service morning coffee.

From the moment you walk up the stairs, you have an excitement that there’s something wonderful up there.
And then, as if to exceed those expectations, a sight jumps into your eyes.

You look out of the painting like a view from the open window, a sound of the gentle stream of the river surrounds you.