The chicken or the egg? It's all moot at Ennju

DW and I were due for an editor/catch-up lunch and met up at Ennju, my long-time standby for decent, inexpensive Japanese takeout. Usually I just grab a salad or a few pre-packaged rolls or onigiri, but this time I opted for the oyakodon, an egg and chicken dish over rice whose name has always amused me: It means "parent and child donburi." (Kind of sick, no?)

My dish came with a choice of soups, and I went with the hot and sour, which I loaded up with the kelp and scallions that were probably meant to go with the miso soup on offer. A clear, sour-spicy broth with flecks of cabbage and a mysterious oily red sheen, the hot and sour could have been renamed "instant kimchi-ramen soup" (again, this is not a bad thing). The slightly sweet oyakodon was simple and comforting, and came in hefty portion—I only got through about a third of it, and the rest lasted me for two more meals afterwards.

A month or so ago Ennju was forced to bump up its prices (no doubt to keep pace with rising food costs). It's still reasonable though, and at 9 pm they slash all their pre-packaged meals 50 percent. But if you're going to take advantage of this, note that people tend to start hanging out in the place ten or fifteen minutes earlier to grab the good stuff, so it might be wise to time things accordingly.