on the "Ancient Goat Leisure Street" (also known as Guyang Lu) is a little rough around the edges. It has a shop-worn feel about it, and the management likes to assault the ears with an endless loop of terrible reggae renditions of smarmy pop songs. That doesn't really matter, though. This place does most of its business when its clientele are seeing double and speaking loud enough to drown out the infernal music. The place, after all, is open until about 6am. Fortunately, Kushi An doesn't take advantage of its customers' impaired state. Much of what's on offer here is quite good, and the selection is staggering. Let's take a look at some of the finer points. What I love about Japanese cuisine is the hands-off approach. I know. I say this a lot, but good fresh ingredients don't really need much tweaking. Take this grilled okra for example. That's it. What you see is what you get. I'm guessing the chef gives these a quick blanch to soften them up a touch. Then he leaves them on the grill just long enough to blacken and crisp around the edges. After that, a quick sprinkle of sea salt to put the flavors into sharp focus. On the side you get a small dish of soy sauce with a daub of spicy mustard in the middle. That self same simplicity is enough for this as well. A grilled head of sea bream. I know it isn't much to look at, and there are many among us who don't like the idea that our food can look back up at us, but this is just delicious. The skin, charred to a perfect crisp, cracks open under the weight of your chopsticks to reveal sweet, tender cheek and collar meat. They serve it with a mound of minced daikon that you can put in small bowl of ponzu for dipping. If you don't dig on bream, they do salmon and amberjack heads as well. Another thing I like about this place is the presentation. In particular, I'm a sucker for things on fire. Fondue, bananas Foster, crepes Suzette, when you order this kind of stuff it's like having a miniature KISS concert at your table. This little grilled whelk is pretty cool, too. The mollusk inside has been extracted, chopped up and shoved back into the shell with a gingko nut, some snow peas and a dashi broth. It's like a miniature seafood hot pot. The restaurant offers plenty of opportunities to veer off the eaten path, too. Here is one option. This is what whale meat looks like. The Japanese call this particular cut unesu. It comes from the belly, and, just as with a pig, a whale's belly meat can be salted, cured and made into bacon. That's what this is. The chef here doesn't even cook this stuff. He just removes it from the packaging and fans it out on the plate for you, like so. I'm new to whale, so I couldn't tell you if this is the good stuff or not, but it tastes about like you'd expect — a little beefy, a little fishy, a little smoky, very salty, excessively fatty. It comes with a lump of wasabi and little bit of yuzu kosho, minced pepper and yuzu, a Japanese citrus fruit similar to a grapefruit. These condiments help to cut through the meat's richness. So I guess the burning question is: "Is it right to eat whale?" I don't know. Unless you're a vegan, I don't find a lot of the ethical arguments against eating it terribly convincing. Many of us feel some close kinship with these animals. We like to assign all of these anthropomorphic qualities to them, because they're warm-blooded and relatively intelligent. But guess what: bluefin tuna can regulate their body temperature too, and they're endangered, to boot. The octopus has been known to exhibit some impressive problem-solving skills. One of them was even able to predict World Cup matches (R.I.P., Paul). Both are, without a doubt, remarkable creatures, yet few of us ever feel any pangs of remorse when dining on them in a sushi bar. The conservation argument is certainly valid. The Japanese have, to say the least, ruffled the feathers of many environmental activists by skirting around a commercial whaling ban through the use of "research whaling" vessels. And if they're hunting endangered species, rightfully so. But, not all species of whale are endangered. Plenty of populations are in rude health, and if whaling can be done sustainably, how is it any worse than fishing? But Kushi An's chef was unable to tell me what type of whale I was served; it simply wasn't printed on the package. So I have no way of knowing whether I contributed to the eradication of a species or not. If I did, then shame on me, I guess. But I suppose if I wanted to cut through all of the environmental, cultural and ethical ambiguity I could simply ponder this one fact: Whales tend to be lousy with mercury and other really scary toxins. So, all of that said, I'm not sure I can recommend the whale at Kushi An, or anywhere else for that matter, with a clear conscience. So instead, permit me to recommend violating a slightly less-fraught food taboo. This is sakuraniku. Literally translated "cherry blossom meat", it's named as such for its pinkish-red hue. But really it's just a euphemism for horse meat. It's also known as basashi, which literally means "horse sashimi". It bears a striking resemblance to Wagyu beef. I would never have expected the meat of something as lithe as a horse to be so densely marbled. Nor would I have expected it to be so meltingly tender when raw. It's really quite delicious — distinctively sweet, not gamey in the least and all of that fat gives it this deliciously unctuous mouthfeel. The Japanese value these qualities in the horse, as well, so much so that they even make ice cream with it; I'm not kidding. I think I'll stick to the condiments provided, however — a little minced ginger and soy sauce. They also do some fair job at tofu. This is a classic presentation that you'll find in izakayas all over and is one of the most popular dishes here. It comes to the table with a bowl full of light soy sauce, minced ginger, chopped spring onions, sesame seeds and soy sauce. For some final filler, be sure to order this. It's a bowl of their tencha rice (茶泡饭, cha pao fan in Chinese). It's a light tea-tinged soup steeped with rice and strips of toasted nori. A few scoops of cod roe give the soup a distinctively delicate salinity. *** Like most izakayas, Kushi An is best enjoyed in groups. I went in a party of two and ended up spending about 550rmb, but that's because horse and whale aren't cheap. Very small portions of both were over 100rmb. There are, however, plenty of reasonably priced options, and if you stick with the standard stuff, you could easily walk out for 150rmb per person, before alcohol. For a listing of Kushi An click here