Coffeehouse Becomes Sake Bar

choi

Ligaya Mishan, As East Meets West, Coffeehouse Becomes Sake Bar; Hi-Collar's comfort foods turn into Japanese snacks at night. New York Times, May 24, 2017.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/ ... ese-restaurant.html

Note:
(a) "the brass countertop at Hi-Collar in the East Village, a Japanese coffeehouse by day, sake bar by night.  A small grill called a shichirin has been swiftly assembled on a crimson tray, with a metal grid laid over what looks like a flowerpot. Beside it is a shallow metal dish heaped with stiff translucent strips and pointed shards the size of a great white's teeth.  This is dried stingray fin, to be delivered to the flame" to be grilled
(i) The brass countertop" is just a countertop covered with brass. Search images.google.com with the term.
(ii) shichirin   七輪
("Charcoal is chiefly used for the fuel of shichirin * * * The shape is mainly cylindrical, square, or rectangular"/  mistakenly called hibachi in North America [in Japan a hibachi was used in old Japan to hold burning charcoal to heat the room, not for cooking] )

One theory of the name 七輪 is there are seven holes at the base ("7つの空気穴（輪）").
(iii) Dried stingray/skate fin is "eihire" in Japanese.  See (b).
(iv) Serena, Japan: Eihire. Food Touring, May 14, 2015
https://food-touring.com/2015/05/14/japan-eihire/

the first two paragraphs:

"My sister and I had dinner with a friend at a izakaya [居酒屋; providing alcohol and simple hot meal similar to a pub], where she introduced us to eihire yaki (エイヒレ焼き), a favorite and popular item among locals.

"Eihire (エイヒレ) is commonly known as stingray fin, but it could also refer to skate fin (the two are similar species). Yaki (焼き) means to grill [actually, any cooking method]. Eihire yaki means either grilled (dried) stingray or skate fin.

(b) Japanese-English dictionary:
* eihire
   ^ ei  エイ 《海鷂魚; 鱝(oK); 鱏(oK)》 (n): "ray (fish); stingray"  (The "ei" is a long vowel of "e.")
  ^ hire 鰭 【ひれ】 (n): "fin (eg of a fish)"
* an  庵(P); 菴 【あん】 (n): "hermitage; retreat"
* ankimo あん肝; 鮟肝 【あんきも】 (n): "monkfish liver; goosefish liver"  (The "kimo" is Japanese pronunciation for 肝.)
* zuke 漬け 【づけ】 (suf[fix]): "pickled (something)"

choi

(c) "Hi-Collar opened in 2013. It is part of the quiet empire run by Bon Yagi, a native of Japan who started out in the 1980s with an East Village diner frequented by Keith Haring and Andy Warhol. His restaurants, mostly clustered around East Ninth and 10th Streets (known as Little Tokyo), include Cha-An Teahouse, the noodle-shop stalwart Sobaya and Otafuku, a purveyor of octopus balls and gooey pancakes asquirm with bonito flakes."
(i) Bon YAGI  (1948- ' "Bon" is the name he adopted after coming to US; his birth name is 八木 秀峰)
(ii) Keith Haring
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Haring
(iii) Cha-An Teahouse  茶菴
www.chaanteahouse.com/wp/

See (b) for the definition.
(iv) Sobaya  蕎麦屋
www.sobaya-nyc.com/wp/

(A "sobaya" 蕎麦屋 in Japanese is a generic term.)
(v)
(A) Otafuku x Medetai
http://www.otafukuny.com/
("Otafuku, the Goddess of Mirth, is our symbol not only because she looks like one awesome lady but also because she brings happiness into people’s lives")
(B) おかめ
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/おかめ
("日本の面（仮面）の一つである。丸顔、鼻が低く丸く、頭が小さく、額は広く、頬が丸く豊かに張り出した（頬高）特徴をもつ女性の仮面であり、同様の特徴を持つ女性の顔についてもそう呼ぶ。お亀、阿亀（おかめ）とも書き、お多福、阿多福（おたふく） * * * この滑稽な面の起源は、日本神話の女性、日本最古の踊り子であるアメノウズメであるとされる")

my translation: a kind of mask in Japan. Round face, low and round nose, small head, big forehead, round cheeks that protrudes are the characteristics that a female mask has. The name also applies to women of the same facial features [but considered derogatory, according to Jim Breen's Japanese dictionary]. Written in kanji as お亀、阿亀 [because 'kame' is Japanese pronunciation for 亀] お多福、阿多福 [these two terms are pronounced 'otafuku']. Origin of this funny face is a woman in Japan mythology, who is also the earliest female dancer, named Amenouzume.

* Ame-no-Uzume-no-Mikoto
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ame-no-Uzume-no-Mikoto

choi

(d)
(i) "the beloved manga series 'Haikara-san ga Toru' chronicled the adventures of a Jazz Age 'Miss Modern,' who resisted an arranged marriage."

Haikara-san ga Tōru  はいからさんが通る
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haikara-san_ga_Tōru
(1975-1977; The title can be literally translated into English as Here Comes Miss Modern, Here Comes Miss High-Collar")

The High-Collar in the manga is the protagonist: 17-year-old schoolgirl.  The verb 通る here means "go far."
(ii) "a long bar under Tiffany-esque lamps, facing a wall of shoji screens, with Japanese matchboxes lined up precariously along its ledge. At noon, when Hi-Collar is in kissaten (coffeehouse) mode, all is bustling and bright."
(A) Tiffany lamp
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiffany_lamp
(designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany)
(B) kissaten  喫茶店
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kissaten
(a Japanese-style tearoom that is also a coffee shop; serve(s) sweets, tea, coffee, sandwiches, spaghetti, and other light refreshments, as well as curry rice or set meals at lunchtime)

(e) "Come early for katsu sando, a deep-fried Berkshire pork cutlet, prickly with panko パン粉 [pan is French for 'bread'], sandwiched between slices of shokupan 食パン [pan = bread] (Pullman-style bread enriched with milk)."
(i) tonkatsu  豚カツ
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonkatsu
(pork cutlet; or simply katsu [from the first syllable of "cutlet"/ Tonkatsu is also popular as a sandwich filling (katsu sando) )
(ii) Pullman loaf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_loaf

choi

(f) "I might have clapped my hands when omurice arrived, looking like a piece of sushi writ large: a pallet of fried rice, stained rust-red from ketchup, under an omelet like a mighty cloud come to rest. The omelet was so creamy that with a touch it split in two and spilled its insides. On top was a sausage, incarnadine, with gaping slits, that would have been too salty if it hadn't also been nearly too sweet — which is to say, just right."

omurice
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omurice

(g) "After dark, the menu turns away from the West. * * * sake, poured by a young man with an imperious rockabilly pompadour.  The dishes are designed as interludes between sips: creamy torchons of ankimo [see (b)] (monkfish liver) * * * Takowasa ['tako' is octopus in Japanese; wasa is shortened from wasabi, for fear that Americans can not handle so many syllables], raw octopus chopped with wasabi, manages to be wobbly and crunchy at once, and the burn goes all the way up between the eyes. * * * bouncy triangles of hanpen (fish cakes) * * * Then came a bowl of yaki-onigiri chazuke, grilled rice balls submerged in dashi broth but still tasting of char."
(i) rockabilly (n; etymology): "popular music marked by features of rock and country music"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rockabilly

* Search images.google.com with (rockabilly pompadour).
(ii) For torchon, see foie gras
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foie_gras
("au torchon ('in a towel'), a whole lobe of foie is molded, wrapped in a towel and slow-cooked in a bain-marie")

A photo of the dish has the caption: "A Moulard duck foie gras torchon with pickled pear."
(iii) The "hanpen" 半片 is fish meat ground to paste, solidified in a triangular mold -- to be grilled or lightly fried.
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8D%8A%E7%89%87
(the top photo shows uncooked hanpen)
(iv) chazuke
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chazuke
(from tsuke submerge)

It is not "submerge."  See (b).