yokohama yakitori koubou / clairemont – san diego, ca

My co-worker David really wanted us all to try yakitori at this one spot that he really loved and arranged this outing to Yokohama Yakitori Koubou for us. It’s a Japanese place filled with delicious grilled things on a stick! Meat on a stick – doesn’t that sound awesome?

I’m that one person that always asks for a fork. Chopsticks and I just don’t really get along very well. I’m sure this is because I haven’t ever practiced, but the last thing I want to deal with it trying to learn how to get the food into my mouth. I want to eat without the frustration!

Here’s photos of the current menu: Menu Page 1 | Menu Page 2 | Menu Page 3

Everyone ordered a few sticks o’ food. David and his wife, Allison, said they usually also order a side of miso soup and rice along with their grilled sticks o’ food. I followed this example since just eating grilled meats alone didn’t seem like enough food for the belly.

[miso soup]

Miso soup alone will set you back $1 and the rice and miso soup combo is $2.50. I liked the miso soup here. I haven’t had miso a ton of times in my life, but the broth has a nice flavor.

[torisenbei – deep fried chicken crackers – $6]

Two of these were ordered for the table. They were quite insisted upon for good reason – they are freaking delicious! It’s this really thin and super crunchy chicken. A little Google research told me it’s either very thinly sliced chicken, or chicken skin. I lean a little towards the thinly sliced chicken since they were so big and variously sized and didn’t quite have the chicken skin taste – but awfully close. It could be skin, I’m not sure – all I know is that it was totally delicious and probably terrible for you. But who cares!

These chicken crackers had a wonderful, crisp, crunch without being oily or super greasy. Almost like crackling. Well seasoned and delicious – I would always order this. No matter what. So so good!

Here’s a photo of a few skewers of meat (plus my mushrooms). I don’t remember what everything was, I only remember my own order (which is further on down). The grilled sticks o’ meat are all piled together on the same platter for everyone to grab their own stick.

Here’s some more grilled meats. I think the items in the foreground are beef tongue, but I’m just guessing.

[chicken skin – $2]

This is one of my items – grilled chicken skin! There’s quite a bit of it all folded down on this stick. I ended up de-skewering it into my bowl of rice.

[bowl of grilled food on sticks, over rice]

In addition to the chicken skin (on the left), I also got the Beef Rib ($3.99) and Shiitake Mushroom ($2).

The chicken skin had a nice flavor – it was seasoned and had a little touch of sauce on it. Cooking it on the grill made it very tender and juicy with a ever so slight crunch on the outer edges.

The beef rib was cooked to medium rare (yay!) and was extremely tender. Very well cooked, the grilled just brought out so much flavor in the meat. Very good!

The mushrooms were just straight grilled with no seasonings or sauce or anything. They were fine but I felt kind of cheated for only getting two mushrooms. They just tasted dry and charred from the time spent on the grill. Kind of disappointing on the mushroom front.

[april specials]

They had another menu with some special items for April and I forgot to order one of these! David chimed in after we were mostly finished though and ordered three of the pork ginger skewers.

[ginger pork skewers – $2.99 each]

The pork ginger skewers had little dabs of ginger on the outside of the pork with a good helping of green onion on top. The pork was super tender and tasty with that little kick of ginger that just brightened the flavor of the meat. So glad we ordered this! This is one of my favorites from the night.

This little sign was next to where I sat and posted in key locations around the restaurant.

Of course I had to try it. Strawberry pie? And ice cream? Sign me up!

Lauren stepped up and helped me eat it, too. And she used chopsticks!

I ended up cutting pieces for her (even the ice cream) so it was easier for her to grab things. My fork skillz came in handy, yo.

This strawberry “pie” was basically wonton wrappers stuffed with a cream (sort of cream cheese-like) filling with some strawberry sauce on top. The strawberries tasted like they had been frozen and turned into a mush of something that sort of resembled a sauce. The “pie” was a bit doughy and seemed kind of undercooked. The whole thing just seemed like an afterthought and a half-hearted attempt at dessert. It needs to go back to the drawing board if you ask me.

At least the ice cream was good…

So besides dessert, where Lauren and I’s antics in eating the thing were entertainment for all at the table, the meal was very delicious. Happy to try new things, especially things that are recommended and enjoyed! Will definitely be back to try out their other offerings, though probably skipping any more of that “dessert”…

Yokohama Yakitori Koubou
3904 Convoy St.
San Diego, CA 92111
(858) 277-8822