Bongout Noh

Excellent food and wine selection at this wine bar/restaurant in Shibuya's Miyamasuzaka area.

Seen through floor-to-ceiling glass from the street below, Bongout Noh looks like a simple, well-appointed wine bar. Once inside, though, you become aware of the cozy and warmly lit restaurant space that occupies the rear of the place.

Turn left for the wine bar and you are greeted by a long, curved bar and one or more smiling female bartenders. The staff are always dressed professionally in white button-up shirt and black vest, and likely to hold certifications in wine, cheese or scotch. There are around 20 wines by the glass each day, with a menu that changes weekly. Prices range from 600 yen for quaffable French plonk like Little John, up to 1800 for that's week's premium wine, usually something exotic or hard to come by. You can pay as you go or run a tab, and if you come alone chances are good you'll find yourself chatting to the person next to you. The bar food menu offers a variety of tapas-style and other dishes, and you can order from the full restaurant menu as well if you like. The food is prepared and presented with care, and the quality consistently first-rate.

Turn right and you'll climb a couple of quick stairs into a casually-dressed, cozy dining room. The furniture and fixtures suggest more a cafe than a mid-priced French/fusion restaurant, but when the food comes all such ambiguity disappears. The menu tends toward modern French and relies heavily on Japanese ingredients, particularly fish. The wine selection is especially good (perhaps not surprising considering the wine bar at the other end of the room), with predominantly French wines from places other than Bordeaux and Burgundy. The small but wide-open kitchen means you can watch the 3-4 cooks practice their craft and—if seated at the counter facing the kitchen—even learn a few tricks.

Bongout Noh is easily one of the best restaurants around Miyamasu-zaka, particularly if you enjoy good wine, and is a local favorite of your reviewer.