{"id":9879,"date":"2025-06-22T06:00:30","date_gmt":"2025-06-22T11:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/?p=9879"},"modified":"2025-06-18T19:54:59","modified_gmt":"2025-06-19T00:54:59","slug":"9879","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/?p=9879","title":{"rendered":"Izakaya Kuroyama"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"IzakayaIf you can get past the constant, smoky smell from the grill, you will be treated to some excellent Japanese bar food at Izakaya Kuroyama<\/a> on State Street.<\/p>\n

Even with the front door open, the smokiness was prevalent. Fortunately, the food comes out quickly, so you don’t have to stay longer than necessary.<\/p>\n

For example, the fried rice was brought to my table within a couple of minutes of ordering it. The dish was tasty, with a wonderful fried flavor and loaded with cabbage, onion, carrots and scallions. I chose beef, and it was tender and flavorful (I can use those adjectives to describe many of the items here).<\/p>\n

Much of the smokiness was likely caused by the skewers, a staple of the izakaya. Your choices include bacon-wrapped tomato ($4) and shiitake ($4). I got the wagyu ($9), which was so incredibly delicious, and the unagi ($11), which was fall-apart tender.<\/p>\n

Another staple is the takoyaki ($8 for six). I found them to have a perfect balance of crispiness on the outside and soft and gooey on the inside.<\/p>\n

New to me was the saba ($12).\u00a0The grilled blue mackerel was flaky and glazed similarly to the unagi, making it quite enjoyable.<\/p>\n

The other appetizers I ordered were the kurobuta sausage ($8 for two), which was reminiscent of Chinese sausage but more plump, and the okonomiyaki ($13), a flavorful bacon pancake that was loaded with so many toppings (including tuna, carrots, shrimp and various sauces) that it was hard to hold and messy to eat.<\/p>\n

I regret choosing the tan-shichu ($8). This beef tongue soup was oddly sweet and thus ruined the otherwise enjoyable beef tongue and radish.<\/p>\n

\"IzakayaAmong the entrees, I tried the Hakata tonkotsu ramen ($17). The broth was soothing, and the pork belly was tender, but the noodles were a little too al dente. You also can find chicken ramen ($16) and seafood udon ($18) on the menu.<\/p>\n

Both the oyakodon ($15) and gyudon ($15) rice bowls (the former with chicken, the latter with beef) were hearty and savory. They were topped with an over-easy egg, onions, pickled radishes and scallions, which provided a lot of tastes and textures.<\/p>\n

Izakaya Kuroyama is open for dinner and late-night every day.<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

See more photos in our Izakaya Kuroyama Flickr album<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you can get past the constant, smoky smell from the grill, you will be treated to some excellent Japanese bar food at Izakaya Kuroyama on State Street.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9884,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[16,81],"class_list":["post-9879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-restaurant-reviews","tag-downtown","tag-japanese"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9879"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9879\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9896,"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9879\/revisions\/9896"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eatdrinkmadison.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}