Antique Izakaya Bar "Kagiya"

The izakaya bar "Kagiya," being said to have been built in a town of Edo (old Tokyo) in 1856, now exists in Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum in Koganei City, Tokyo. The exterior and interior of the building of this izakaya represents their restored states as of the time of around 1970.

Usually, this building is an exhibited item of the museum and you can't sit in this izakaya bar for foods or drinks, but they opened it especially on March 21 and 22 of this year. So, we went there on 21, and ordered and drank some sake at the counter in this bar.

I felt as if I were drinking in an izakaya bar 40 years ago. This was an interesting experience.

The photo below shows a kan-doko (sake warmer). This sake warmer holds some water in it, which is placed on the gas stove. When the water inside becomes hot, you can put bottles filled with sake in this sake warmer to warm the sake. This sake warmer has six places to hold sake bottles, but this bar uses only up to four places at a time. If all the six places are occupied by sake bottle, the temperature of the water inside cannot be maintained at a good level for warming sake.


The warmed sake at this izakaya bar was very nice. The sake is reputed Sakura-Masamune from Nada, Kobe Prefecture.