Herrine Ro: If you left me here,
just alone, for five minutes,
I would polish this off, easy.
Hi, guys. It's Herrine.
So, today, we are in front of Otaku Katsu.
It is a new restaurant specializing
in Japanese fast-casual comfort food.
It opened up about a month ago,
and the place is already packed.
I am so excited to try this place out
because katsu sandos are one of my favorite foods,
and I wanna see what all this fuss is about,
so let's go in.
Key to Japanese comfort food is the tamago sando,
a light egg-salad sandwich found in convenience stores
throughout the country.
Now, an egg-salad sandwich might not seem like something
worth queuing up for, but trust me,
when done right, it's the best thing you'll eat.
Originally made in Japan,
these sandos took Los Angeles by storm last year,
and now it's finally New York's turn
to dish out the goods.
Otaku Katsu opened this September in Lower Manhattan
by Dimitri and Christine,
who met working in the restaurant industry
and quickly realized their shared love of Japanese food.
Christine Argao-Voutsinas: Well, first we just talked about
getting drinks, and then eventually
we both found that we love, love, love to eat
and explore different cuisines,
but we found especially
a lot of affection for Japanese cuisine.
Herrine: After multiple trips to Japan together
and many late nights at Japanese izakayas,
the couple decided to venture out on their own.
Christine: So, "sando" is "sandwich" in Japanese,
and what's really important is the ingredients.
So, using the traditional Japanese white bread,
which is called shokupan,
along with good old classic Kewpie mayo,
cooking those eggs to, not so hard-boiled,
but just shy of, and then arranging it on your shokupan,
that nice, bright, lively yolk,
which is so important to the presentation.
And, of course, cutting off the crusts
you have your classic tamago sando.
Dimitri Voutsinas So, every day, I'm going through 15 dozen
eggs just for that one sandwich.
Herrine: Everything that I love about my childhood
is on this plate.
I grew up eating Calbee seaweed potato chips,
and one of my favorite meals, growing up,
that my mom made me was her egg salad.
And this is just another elevation of that,
because they actually put in half whole eggs,
so that when you cut it, you see these beautiful
whole pieces of egg.
That bread is plush, man.
OK, so obviously I'm gonna say
that my mom's egg-salad sandwich is better,
but this is close.
Oh, my God, if you've never had milk bread,
Japanese milk bread, you are completely missing out.
They are the perfect base for a sandwich
because they're so plush and so airy
and still kind of, like, creamy.
It just pairs perfectly with the egg sando.
A little pro tip, get a seaweed chip.
[crunches]
That's the way to do it.
Another restaurant favorite is the katsu sando,
which chef Dimitri makes with a full chicken breast
instead of a thinner cutlet, like you'd see in Japan.
It's covered in store-bought panko and then deep-fried.
The milk bread is char-grilled and doused
with imported katsu sauce and a red cabbage coleslaw.
I love the grill marks on this bread.
What's better than regular milk bread?
Grilled milk bread.
I'm a sauce girl.
I like more of this tonkatsu sauce.
I actually quite like how they use the chicken breast as is,
instead of pounding it down really thinly,
because I feel like it retains a lot more juiciness
and it doesn't take away from the crunchy breading.
Solid sandwich.
Otaku Katsu also offers something a little less traditional.
The BEC katsu starts with a soft-boiled duck egg,
which is coated in a bacon and Gruyère béchamel sauce,
breaded in panko, and deep-fried.
This looks like a dish that my mom would prepare for me
for lunch, but just a restaurant version of it.
My mom would never perfectly boil a duck egg,
no shade.
It looks like a Scotch egg.
It's crunchy.
If you left me here, just alone, for five minutes,
I would polish this off, easy.
This is the best part.
All the runny egg yolk has seeped through the rice.
The residual oil, it's all down here in this bottom.
Customer: Today, I ordered the BEC.
It's a little bit like a Japanese Scotched egg.
This katsu was totally different because it's a duck egg.
Totally a different taste, and it was really fantastic.
Herrine: With a tiny storefront
even by New York standards,
Dimitri and Christine are dedicated
to keeping the food focused on comfort classics.
Christine: We're working with 300 square feet, total.
Dimitri: I have to keep the menu tight and small,
so we had to pick and choose what we put on there.
Very curated menu.
How we decided was,
what would we want to eat every day
and not get sick of?
And it has a little mix of everything,
'cause that's comfort food.
That's exactly what it is.
Producer: What do you love? Herrine: Mayonnaise.
Mayonnaise and me?