Magok One Grove eel restaurant with an outdoor entrance: Kikukawa

What kind of restaurant is Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa at Magok One Grove?

Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa is a Japanese eel-over-rice restaurant on the first floor of Building A in Magok One Grove. It's an actual restaurant with branches operating in Osaka, Fukuoka and other cities in Japan, so you can get a taste of the real thing here!

Lately with the cooler weather coming and going, it feels like the season for eating out and getting some fresh air has arrived! I'd had my eye on a restaurant while walking around recently — the exterior looked so neat and upscale that I really wanted to visit at least once!

How to find the entrance: outside Building A, following the signs

Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa is located on the first floor of Building A in Magok One Grove. The entrance is outside the store, so if you're looking for it from inside the building,

find this signage located in Building A and go out the door — that's where the entrance is!

Inside Kikukawa: the open kitchen, seating and private room

I thought the interior of Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa was extremely clean. The interior design matched the tidy Japanese style, and it felt great to eat in such a classy atmosphere!

One reassuring detail was the cleanliness — you can see into the kitchen from inside the store, and the food was clearly being prepared hygienically! Good news for anyone who's particular about that kind of thing!

There's also a room available for private use, which would be great for important meetings or occasions! Reservations are required for the room!

They also run various promotions! Corkage is free if you order a course, so keep that in mind!

The menu at Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa One Grove Branch

The menu is packed with a wide range of Japanese dishes! From various eel rice bowls to mentaiko (marinated pollock roe) meals, sashimi, uni-don, tempura, and more upscale Japanese dishes filled the pages!

They also offer kaiseki full course meals, so there are options for important occasions, special-day meals with a partner, and more — worth coming here on a meaningful day.

They also sell takeout, so if you'd rather eat at home, that's an option too. I'd had such delicious hitsumabushi in Nagoya that I was craving it, so that's what I ordered!

How the hitsumabushi tastes, with two-thirds of a large freshwater eel

As soon as the hitsumabushi at Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa arrived, the delicious smell of the eel wafted right up to my nose! The color looked amazing too. The eel filled about two-thirds of the bowl, and because they use large freshwater eel, the portion was generous!

The eel was slightly chewy, the sauce was sweet and delicious, and the seasoning had soaked in well! True to its Japanese roots, the flavor was so clean and refined that it went down easily, and I think it's a dish anyone, young or old, could enjoy!

Three ways to eat hitsumabushi at Kikukawa

There are three total ways to eat hitsumabushi.

• First, try it as is, to taste the eel's natural flavor
• Second, try it with scallions, seaweed, and wasabi
• Third, add scallions, seaweed, wasabi, and dashi broth

You can eat it however suits your taste, but since I actually love ochazuke (rice soaked in tea or broth), I kept going back to the third way!

Eating it ochazuke-style with seaweed, scallions, wasabi and dashi broth warmed me up from the inside, felt light on the stomach, and was so clean and delicious!

Is Kikukawa in Magok One Grove worth a visit?

Today I reviewed Unagi Yondaime Kikukawa, a place in Magok One Grove serving up delicious, refined Japanese food! The atmosphere is clean and the food is tasty and tidy, so it would be great for an important occasion or a special day! Come visit once and spend good time with good people on a good day!