City Miyama, St Paul's

Mr Oil and Mr Vinegar have made one of their occasional forays out of Shepherd Market – this time travelling to Miyama in the St Paul’s area of the City, for some raw fish and teppanyaki.

MrV: I told you not to book the teppanyaki bar. We had to sit elbow to elbow with office workers again.
MrO: I like the teppanyaki bar. It is informal and I enjoy watching the food being cooked in front of us.
MrV: And listening to the dreary conversations of fund managers? And having to smell them? Ugh. I prefer the restaurant downstairs, or the little private rooms.
MrO: I didn’t smell anything unpleasant. In fact, the smells were delicious as usual. I used to know a Japanese restaurateur who said that the food at City Miyama was the best he’d had outside Tokyo.
MrV: So that’s why you’ve been dragging me back here for the past 20 years – on the word of some Japanese bloke, rather than your own conviction.
MrO: I wonder if we ought to experiment from time to time in our choice of dishes.
MrV: Why? We’ve found the combination that works. What if they give us one of those poisonous fish that kills you if you look at it the wrong way?
MrO: Fugu
MrV: Same to you.
MrO: Fugu is the name of the blowfish with the deadly poison. I doubt they sell that at Miyama. But I know what you mean. I never tire of soft shell crab, followed by sashimi, followed by teppanyaki beef or salmon.
MrV: I never tire of the sake -- flasks and flasks of it.
MrO: Do you know, I think we may be the most long-standing customers here. We’ve sat and watched quite a few chefs cook in front of us.
MrV: Wonder where they all disappeared to? Apparently teppanyaki chefs have a very high rate of lung cancer, as they stand breathing in carcinogens off the griddle all day.
MrO: I hope that chap who used to cook when we first came here hasn’t become ill. He was classically trained and ran the whole restaurant as far as I could tell. Had the most impeccable manners.
MrV: He was the best of the lot in my view. These youngsters we get now don’t have the same elegance.
MrO: I didn’t notice it affecting your enjoyment of your lunch – and part of mine, for that matter.
MrV: You shouldn’t have been eating so slowly. Talking too much, as usual.
MrO: Anyway, you eat more now than you ever did, regardless of who is doing the cooking. And you drink more of the sake, too.
MrV: I need sustenance after the long journey from Shepherd Market. Why do we come all this way when Miyama has a perfectly good sister restaurant in Mayfair?
MrO: Memories, perhaps.

Mr Oil and Mr Vinegar enjoyed three courses accompanied by two flasks of saki each at a cost of approximately £120.

City Miyama, 17 Godliman Street, London EC4V 5BD Tel +44 (0) 207 489 1937
www.miyama.co.uk

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