Kaiseki Sakura $250 (3*) serves some of the best (maybe THE best) Japanese haute cuisine in Toronto.

Chef/owner Daisuke Izutsu’s artistry in the kitchen stands out on a street not lauded for its food or service. His modern Zen-like dining room seems inspired by a Kyoto spring day when the cherry blossoms (sakura) are just beginning to bud. The pale green walls and rich cherry tables offset sleek tufted black banquettes and chrome and black dining chairs. Single blush-pink orchids help soften immaculate table settings and attentive and gracious servers mean diners never want for anything. They start by setting down warm lemony towels for cleansing, offer guidance through the menu and present every dish in such a relaxed and gentle way it’s almost hypnotic.

Patrons can either order a la carte or the omakase menu which comes with either five, six or seven courses—add two freebies with the amuse bouche and dessert and you can be up to nine in total. Paring with sake, shochu and specially designed sake cocktails is another option. A martini glass first appears with thin soba noodles coloured pale pink from shiso, the Japanese herb imparting a mild mint-like flavour to the wasabi-spiked broth. Two pieces of tender conch add textural interest.

Other winners include a savoury panna cotta-like sesame flavoured tofu custard. It arrives in a small lidded-bowl, unveiled at the table; a succulent piece of pink crab garnishes the piping hot custard, its silken texture and mild flavour enhanced by a thin miso glaze. Daily sashimi plates are gorgeous to look at with scoobie-doos of daikon and purple beni tade leaves; a personal grater for fresh wasabi and choice of different soy and dipping sauces help elevate standards like cubes of red tuna and grouper while novel choices like hora (an eel like fish with a honeycomb texture) and raw (and unfortunately slimy) button shrimp intrigue the palate.

The nine-item grilled plate served on black square stoneware looks like an elaborate dessert display; a small pony glass holds sweet green melon, topped with a cherry-size Japanese mountain peach. A perfect palate cleanser after an array of items like a miso-marinated egg yolk on a stick—its translucency and cheesecake texture mind boggling. As is a tiny tofu popsicle, apparently frozen, dried, pasted with red miso then grilled. A juicier piece of soybean curd does not exist. Though a quail kebab, spiced mildly with Japanese pepper is also exceptionally moist.

The prize for tender and delicious goes to the house specialty, boiled beef tongue in miso sauce—as the menu downplays a dish of masterful work. Izutsu could go head to head with any French grandmother and her bourguignon recipe. His features two other-worldly pieces of beef marooned in the centre of a large white bowl surrounded by a rich red miso sauce, so nuanced and layered with flavour the two slices of Thuet baguette that it’s served with can’t begin to sop up all the delicious elixir.

Unfortunately the meal loses momentum with chazuke, a grilled rice ball and strips of nori that we douse with our individual vessels of green tea. Its flavour, complexity and presentation can’t compete with previous dishes. Nor does the dessert sampling of a mushy tamale-like steamed red bean cake and a not-sweet-enough sesame ice cream. Though topping the latter with the third offering—a small glass of chopped pear and black cane syrup could stand on its own.

Drink menu favours sake over wine three to one.

• 556 Church St. (at Wellsley)
• 416.923.1010