Ignore the apartment building facade and follow the aroma of sizzling fat on hot charcoal. Bar seats offer the best view of chef and co-owner Ken Ibuki and his team cooking robatayaki.

Tables allow hushed debates about how many chickens it takes to make a skewer of testicles. There’s more where that came from:heart,liver,tail and crisp-chewy chicken skin. The latter may involve a wait,but patience is rewarded. Kill time with another round of miso-infused Old Fashioneds. Or chicken meatballs designed for dunking into a wobbly onsen egg dressed with soy sauce.

Pick a sake by squinting at the X-Y axis of a flavour chart – or see if co-owner Kelvin Low can swing you an off-menu suggestion. There are only two desserts,but who cares when you’ve just had sashimi of tuna belly flown in from Tokyo’s Toyosu market?

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Melbourne’s Northern Suburbs

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