Ryuji Tries His Homemade "Magic Sauce" at Ushikoi: A Drinking Video Eating Yakiniku with Koyuki Sugasawa

It has apparently been several years since the two last did a drinking video together. In the past, the ideas mostly came from Koyuki's side, but this time it's Ryuji's pitch. According to Ryuji, Ushikoi is a yakiniku restaurant frequented by many celebrities, and there's even a photo of boxing champion Inoue inside. Ryuji collaborated with the restaurant on a sauce, and he'll be setting up a booth with Ushikoi at the Odaiba Meat Festival, serving a menu that uses that sauce.

Koyuki says she came simply because "I get to eat delicious meat," and declares she'll judge the sauce with no holding back. Ryuji jokes back, "If you say it's bad, we'll cut it," and Koyuki responds, "Then I'll post on X that it got cut." With that exchange, the shoot begins.

Ryuji introduces Ushikoi as a "yakiniku place that makes you drink," with lots of side dishes to go with drinks. Nearly all the meat is lean, and the "Peace Beef" is especially good, he says. Among yakiniku chains with multiple locations, Ryuji rates it as one of the quite delicious ones.

The first dish is potato salad. The egg yolk on top seems to have been marinated in soy sauce, and both of them notice it's no ordinary egg. The salad is packed with chunks of beef tongue, which Koyuki describes like this: "I thought it would just have a few big pieces tossed in, but the tongue is really mixed in, used almost like bacon, so there's tongue in every bite." Ryuji speculates that they may be grilling the end pieces of the tongue and adding them.

The thick-cut premium tongue that follows is surprisingly thick, even to the two of them. Ryuji says it's probably a pretty good cut, explaining that the part near the root of the tongue is considered tender, well-marbled and delicious. Since it's fatty, Ryuji says it tastes better if you cook it so some of the fat renders off, and he eats it with lemon. The juices bubble up, and the two praise its tenderness and the well-seasoned saltiness. Koyuki remarks that the umami is strong, yet you can clearly taste the meat.

The Peace Beef that Ryuji had been recommending is grilled for them by the manager. The restaurant's recommended doneness is medium-rare; you place negi-shio (salted green onion) on the grilled meat, wrap it up, and dip it in sesame oil.

Koyuki says, "When you're in the mood for yakiniku, maybe this is what you actually want," and is surprised that although it's marbled, the fat isn't heavy at all. Ryuji also says you can really taste the meat, and since it's seasoned with salt it doesn't sit heavy on the stomach, citing this as the reason the restaurant has so many fans. Koyuki, while saying she's not sure the comparison fits, describes the meat as "like really good tuna," and Ryuji agrees.

As for the crunchy white cut served after that, both of them praise it for having no gaminess at all. According to the restaurant, it's cleaned with a special preparation process.

The thing that left the strongest impression on the two of them that day was the liver. Koyuki loves liver so much that when she goes out for yakiniku, partway through she eats nothing but liver and mino (tripe). Ryuji says that if you grill enough for a big group all at once, you miss the moment when it's most delicious, so it's better to grill only what you're about to eat.

Koyuki is very much a rare-meat person and says she's never gotten sick from meat or oysters, to which Ryuji laughs, "You've got a strong stomach." They eat the liver with negi-shio and sesame oil as well.

Ryuji reflects that the beef tongue and the Peace Beef were all delicious, but the liver was a shock. Liver can't be eaten rare unless it's fresh, and even when cooked, liver that smells off will smell off no matter what. Ryuji's verdict is that liver this good is hard to come by.

At this point, Ryuji's collaboration sauce is brought out. Ryuji explains that it's an all-purpose sauce designed to go with anything. According to the restaurant staff, when all of them tried it, it was so delicious that they took it upon themselves to name it the "Magic Sauce."

The staff tried it with all sorts of meat, including Peace Beef, kalbi and harami (skirt steak), but recommended the combination with yaki-suki (yaki-shabu) of sirloin as the best.

As for what's in the sauce, Ryuji explains that it has a slightly Korean-style flavor with gochujang, garlic and various other ingredients, with a strong sesame accent. He adds that it contains plenty of grated onion, so when it mixes with the fat from the meat, you get sweetness from the vegetables rather than from sugar. This was his explanation in response to Koyuki saying, "I could tell it was fruity."

Before the sauce, they were served a tongue stew that looked and tasted like chashu, and the two dubbed it "tongue chashu." It's tender, and because the fat is from tongue, it isn't heavy.

The sauce's first partner was harami. Dipping the thick, well-seasoned harami in the Magic Sauce, Koyuki described it as "surprisingly light," saying it tastes somewhere between salt and a sauce, isn't sweet, and is the kind of thing that goes well with drinks.

Next came the staff-recommended sirloin yaki-shabu. The meat used for yukhoe is grilled rare and eaten dipped in the sauce. Ryuji prefaced his comments with "I had no intention of praising it at all," then praised it as a sauce whose flavor changes depending on the meat. Koyuki said it might go better with thinly sliced meat that has a bit of fat, while noting that some people would probably like it with harami, and that she herself rather likes the harami combination because she can eat it lightly.

In between, there was also a moment where Koyuki teased Ryuji for phrases like "sore na" ("for real") and "daijoubu so?" ("you good?"), saying, "What year of Twitter are you living in?" and "That's slang that was popular online ages ago."

The next dish, premium kalbi, looked like a steak. According to Ryuji, a menu item using this meat will be served at the meat festival. It's best to soak it well in the sauce, and apparently the longer it soaks, the better it tastes. The meat is so tender it falls apart when you pick it up with chopsticks.

Koyuki says, "It looked like the kind of meat we'd never eat, but that's not the case at all," surprised that it's light despite being kalbi. Ryuji guessed it wasn't heavy because the marbling is fine, but when he asked the manager why, the answer was "because it's fresh."

Ryuji feels this meat and the sauce are the ideal combination. The yaki-shabu was delicious too, but that one is for people eating it with rice, and if you're drinking, this is the one, he says.

Here the two talk about how, with yakiniku, the real main event from the middle onward is "seconds time." It's the stage where you order what you want to eat again, and that decides your first dish the next time you visit—a feeling Koyuki and Ryuji share.

Ryuji says that the last time he came to this restaurant, he ate nothing but negi-shio. He also introduces the method of mixing salt into sesame oil, recommending sesame oil and salt for people who don't like the miso-like taste of sauce.

The premium lean meat looked even more marbled than the kalbi, but when they ate it, it wasn't greasy. Ryuji says the quality of the fat must be good. Koyuki said, "Everything's so good that I just want to eat however I like," and cut the meat in half to eat it. Ryuji responded, "I thought I came here to do PR, but whatever. It's a party." Ryuji told the manager that the refreshing feeling when you eat it is amazing compared to the impression the marbling gives when it's raw.

When they asked for more recommendations, the manager suggested lean meat "even redder than this." What came out was thin-sliced meat with little fat, grilled rare on both sides and eaten with grated daikon and ponzu. The two say it's nice that, since it's thin, you can tell right away how done it is. Koyuki said it was close to the Peace Beef, just a bit fattier.

Ryuji ate it with his own sauce and said, "This might be the most delicious." It feels as though the sauce fills in what the lean meat is lacking, he says.

Next was hatsu (heart). Koyuki had never eaten heart at a yakiniku restaurant. Ryuji says this restaurant's heart is extremely fresh and nearly as delicious as the liver, and that anyone who found the liver delicious should definitely try the heart too.

The manager next grilled meat shaped into a heart. The idea is "it's Ushikoi [koi means love], so a heart," and since there's a dedicated grill person, they'll grill it for you even on a regular visit. It's finished by pouring the sauce that's underneath over the top.

After first eating it as is and praising its strong beef aroma, Ryuji said, "I'm convinced. It's my sauce," and dipped it in the Magic Sauce. Koyuki said, "This is the most delicious," and suggested that the many cuts scored into the meat probably help the sauce cling to it.

Here Koyuki summed up her thoughts on the sauce. With light meat, it lets you eat it lightly; with fatty meat, it brings out more sweetness. Paired with meat that isn't especially fatty, like harami, it shows its depth as a sauce. It's quite versatile—that was Koyuki's verdict. Ryuji replied, "You're talking a lot," and Koyuki laughed, "When it's good, I can't help talking."

Next came the aorta, known as "korikori." Ryuji loves offal, so he was surprised this restaurant had korikori. Since it's a tough cut, it won't taste good unless it's scored, and Ryuji praised it, saying you can sense the care that goes into finishing the prep properly.

After eating it, the two said "More, more," and ordered three additional servings, calling the seasoning perfect. Ryuji says this is the one for people who drink.

To close, they were served naengmyeon cold noodles, a stone-grilled dish, and a rice bowl piled with green onion. The cold noodles had delicious noodles, a well-developed broth and plenty of chunks of meat. They found themselves wanting vinegar, but said it was delicious even without it.

Ryuji described the stone-grilled dish as "the kind of thing kids love," and Koyuki said it was sweet and delicious. The final green onion bowl was a large mound of green onion topped with meat and sauce, with a light, slightly ponzu-like taste.

At the end of the video, Ryuji said that Ushikoi's regular menu can be enjoyed as is, but he'd like people to enjoy it with his sauce too. He then pointed out that the drinks are good and there are plenty of side dishes, and invited viewers to come to the Odaiba Meat Festival, where the menu using this sauce will be served. The two are apparently going to keep drinking after this, and the video ends with Ryuji saying that from here on it'll just be insider chatter.