Birthday Girl

My kids have long since lost interest in birthday parties, so one of our birthday traditions is now taking them to the restaurant of their choice to celebrate.  My younger daughter, my baby, turned 16 this year.  Her choice of restaurant this year was Kyoto. We've gone to the one downtown, which is near Philippe's office, a few times.  The food is wonderful, but we've had issues with the service.  This time we went to the location across the river (see link above).  We went in the afternoon, so there weren't many people there and there was only one server, but the service was still much better then the other location!



For an appetizer, we got the pork dumplings, gyoza, which were quite tasty.



All our meals came with a starter soup with bean sprout salad.  My kids normally skip the starter soups, but not here!  We all really enjoy it.  I also got a pot of green tea.



Philippe always orders his favorite, the gyu don.



My older daughter ordered the chirashi, which she absolutely loves.  This is one of those dishes she finds herself craving!  Personally, I don't have the courage to eat raw fish, but she loves it.

The teapot in the background is what they use for tabletop soy sauce pitchers.



Meanwhile, the birthday girl and I both ordered the Bento Box D - this is our dish that we crave!  Their tempura vegetables and seafood are fantastic and comes with a wonderful dipping sauce, the beef and chicken moist and tender, the salad is fresh and crisp, and the pickled radish (?) adds just the right amount of tang.  Also comes with a bowl of white rice.  Delicious!



And here's the birthday girl herself!!

Happy Birthday, Sweetheart!