REVIEW: The Conrad Hotel – Tokyo

 stayed in a lot of hotels through my years of travelling and some hotels become your staple go-to’s, some you never want to go back and others you tip your hat too. 

Food : Four restaurants, two lounges and room service. The choices are endless. Paying an extra amount to have breakfast included is a great idea. Plus, there are no breakfast places in Tokyo. Unless you’re looking for brunch, only on weekends or a sushi breakast. The locals say it’s because no one wakes up early enough for breakfast, so make sure you get a breakfast package at the hotel you stay at.

We enjoyed breakfast in the executive lounge and the Cerise restaurant, where you have a wide variety of foods to choose from. American breakfast, japanese and even some mexican, which I had the pleasure of trying. Never would’ve thought I’d try a mexican breakfast in Tokyo.

I discovered on the second day of having breakfast at the Cerise restaurant that you’re able to take your hot drinks to go. This is great if you’re short of time and need to start your day but want to also enjoy your tea.

Room service options are great! You can pretty much order food from all the restaurants in the hotel and the only disclaimer is time. I believe most of the best items on the room service menu you have to order before 10 pm. One evening, I was craving a nice CLT avocado sandwich. I hesitantly called room service to check if they could make me this sandwich because it wasn’t in the room service book. When they said yes and delivered, I was smiling ear to ear! As a social media specialist, I was giddy when I saw the butter in the form of the Twitter bird. I know, it’s probably just a bird. However, social media nerds alike, would understand and also see a “Twitter” bird instead.

Don’t leave the Conrad in Tokyo without making reservations at the Kazahana restaurant for a private sushi bar experience like no other. The master sushi chefs are world class. A bar of about 6 seats, you’ll enjoy an intimate dining experience, where you watch the master sushi chefs create your order right before your eyes at a perfect pace, so it’s all fresh. As soon as you finish one order, they give you a few minutes break to clear your taste buds with some tea and then start making the next order. Don’t be shy to ask questions about the fish or the process. It adds to the whole experience of learning about what you’re eating.

The wasabi isn’t like the wasabi we have here in Toronto at restaurants. It’s made into a paste, fresh, right before your eyes. Ground from the wasabi root, to your plate. The flavour was SO much better then the tube or overly green stuff we get here. Same texture, better zing!

The master chef goes every morning to the fish market to get everything he needs at the restaurant. You can tell he’s passionate about what he does, because he even lives near the Tsukiji Fish Market. The Tsukiji Fish Market is world’s largest, busiest fish market. If you go around 5 am you can catch a tuna fish auction and even sit at one of the sushi counters there for a sushi breakfast. The highlight of this experience was when we ordered prawns and the process they went through to get to our plate. As soon as I saw them alive, I have to admit I didn’t want it any more, but the reality of eating fresh is just that. The chefs here even made a delicacy out of the prawn legs. They were deep fried and presented to us when we finished eating, as an in between snack before the next order. Visually it was hard to eat, but tasted pretty good.

There are some orders the chefs would make in between us figuring out what else we wanted to order. At one point, the master sushi chef, started to put together an octopus order. Upon asking some questions about the process and the octopus, he prepared an order on the house for us. It was a very distinctive flavour, definitely not for everyone and didn’t taste like the calamari we get at home. However, that was really kind of him to sample it to us.

Rooms:

We had the King City room booked for 3 days on the 37th floor, right beside the Executive Lounge and then the 4th day we were suppose to move to another hotel but loved our time at Conrad so much that we decided to stay there and had our items moved to the 38th floor in a King City room. The King City room has a king size bed, panoramic views of Ginza and the Shiodome area, amazing bathroom and some cute surprises.

Staff:

Everyone at the Conrad hotel were exceptionally nice and very accommodating. Nunzio, a manager at the Cerise restaurant was very nice to us and I had the pleasure of speaking to him about his experience in Japan, since he is originally from Italy.

Other Amenities:

• MIZUKI spa
• Fitness center

Tips:

• The hotel is located near the JR Shinbashi station. If you have a JR pass this will make travelling from cities and stations on the JR line very easy.
• You enter the Conrad Hotel entrance on the ground floor but the hotel lobby is on the 28th floor.
• Afternoon tea service 3-5 pm in the Executive Lounge
• Bath room mirror is great for selfies 😉