Fantastic Italian and Colombian Food!

Happy New Year, everyone!
I hope you had a wonderful winter break with your family and friends. Mrs. Ibaraki Eats and I did the usual Japanese-style New Year's break. We lounged around her hometown of Naka City in her parents' kotasu, watching TV and eating mikan. We eventually ended up going out a few times around the area. My wife's uncle and aunt live in Hitachiota. We went by to say our greetings and Happy New Year's. On our way back to her parents' house, my wife stopped the car at a red light and said, "Wait. Isn't Raul close by?" I replied with an enthusiastic yes and checked if they were open. Fortunately for us, they were open for lunch. My wife then headed for Raul, and we made it just in time before the last order.

Italian Restaurant Raul

Italian Restaurant Raul is located in the Nakatoshikazucho area of Hitachiota. It is quite a drive to get there. I am not sure if you can get there by bus, since I didn't see any bus stops. As far as trains go, there are no train stations in sight. The restaurant is situated in the midst of a vast expanse of rice fields. I recommend either driving or biking there if you want to get some exercise and work up an appetite.
When we drove up to Raul, we first thought we were driving up to a huge house until we saw the Italian and Colombian flags. The parking area is between a house, the restaurant, and what I think is a storage shack. My wife parked our car near the entrance and checked out the place. I already liked the feel of the restaurant from the outside. I couldn't wait to check out the inside. I moved the outside sliding plastic doors, and we headed inside.

Inside

Raul has an inside dining area and an outside dining area. That plastic sheeting surrounds the outside dining area, which I opened to get inside the restaurant. Since it is winter, that sheeting helps trap the heat inside. Unfortunately, the outside dining area was closed on this particular day. We were seated inside the restaurant in a nice, cozy corner.
The inside of the restaurant had an excellent vibe to it. The music was a mix of Spanish music with some early 90s hits. There was a projector showing different parts of Italy and pictures all around the walls of the owner's different adventures around Italy and the world. The restaurant had a very exciting but also relaxed atmosphere.
My wife grabbed the menu and checked out what was available for lunch.

The Menu

As I stated before, we went to Raul during lunch time, so we were given the lunch menu. The lunch menu is a lunch course. You can either choose a pasta course or a pizza course. All the pasta and pizza options are in English and Japanese. The other items on the menu are also in Japanese and English.
With the course menu, you get: one drink, the appetizer for the day, and pizza or pasta. The other side dishes include a Colombian dish, which changes every month, an Italian dish, and dessert.
My wife decided to get the weekly special pasta, and I decided on the weekly special pizza.

Andes Potato

Andes potatoes are potatoes that come from the Andes Mountains that are in South America. This is the Colombian dish of the month at Raul, when we visited, and it looked amazing. The potatoes came with a basil dipping sauce. It looked fantastic, and we couldn't wait to dig in. One word of warning: don't just pop one of these potatoes in your mouth after it is served. I did that, and my mouth was not ready for how piping hot the potatoes were. They were delicious but still way too hot. I am not a young man anymore, and I still haven't learned my lesson when it comes to letting food cool down a little bit before I consume it.
After my first initial tasting of the hot potato, I dipped my next one into some basil sauce and gave it a try. The basil sauce was incredible. It was not too creamy but still had a great texture to it that complemented the potato. The sauce did not take away the flavor of the potato either. The potato tasted like it was cooked just right. It was nice and soft on the inside with just enough hardness on the outside to give me that satisfying pop in my mouth when I bite down on the potato. These Andes Potatoes were truly a great appetizer to start our meal, and my wife agrees. She loved every single morsel of those tasty potatoes. The great news was that our appetizer adventure was not over yet.

Today's Appetizer

Today's appetizer, or appetizer of the day, was a salad with a small cup of soup. This was a nice, light, and tasty appetizer to start our meal. The salad featured typical vegetables accompanied by a delicious slice of ham with spices inside. It also had tiny specs of what I think was parmesan cheese, a sweet mustard sauce to the side, and two zeppole or zeppolini in Japanese. Zeppolini are these light fried dough balls that go well with salad. It looked like a great work of art when it arrived at our table, and it was delicious. The balsamic vinegar with the other salad dressing was very tasty. The slice of ham went great with the radish. I wasn't a big fan of the cold soup we were given, but it still wasn't bad. My wife really enjoyed the salad dressing with the parmesan cheese, and she could not wait to try her main dish.

Today's Pasta-Lasagna

My wife's pasta arrived at our table after we finished our appetizer. The pasta was lasagna, and it looked glorious. I wasn't too sure how the boiled egg on top would fare with this lasagna, but I was willing to give it a chance. Looking at the lasagna picture, you might be wondering to yourself, what is that white, shredded-looking cheese on top of the lasagna? That cheese is called Raspadura Cheese. This is a young cheese that is served by shaving the top of the cheese with a special knife. What is crazy about this cheese is that it is lactose-free. So, for those of you with lactose intolerance, this is the cheese for you. The staff of Raul shaved a generous amount of raspadura cheese from the big cheese wheel and put those shavings on top of my wife's lasagna. My wife, being the awesome person that she is, cut off a piece of the lasagna with egg and raspadura cheese, and let me try it first. It was amazing. The lasagna was so creamy, and the raspadura cheese melted into the lasagna, which made it taste like I was trying cheese from the cheese gods of Italy. The egg felt weird at frist but then it became a welcome addition to the lasagna.
My wife gave her own lasagna a try, and instead of giving her usual thumbs up, she did that cute wide-eyed surprise of how delicious the lasagna was. She loved how the outside pasta layers had a perfect hardness to them while the inside was nice and soft.
My wife's lasagna was great, but I think my pizza was the star of the show.

Today's Pizza-Half Margarita and Half Roast Beef

My pizza arrived after my wife's lasagna, and it looked magnificent. The pizza was half margarita and half roast beef. I couldn't wait to grab a slice. Before I could do that, the staff brought that beautiful-looking raspadura cheese and shredded some pieces of the cheese for my pizza. That is when my pizza went from good to great.
I gave the margarita a try first. When I bit into it, I had a huge problem. The first thought that came to my mind was, "There is no way any other pizza in my town compares to this." I am going to have to drive more than an hour the next time I have a pizza craving. This pizza was incredible. Again, the raspadura cheese melted into the pizza, which enhanced the flavor of the fresh tomato sauce and the mozzarella that was already on the pizza. The crust was heavenly. It held the pizza very well and was just cooked enough to not have that overly burnt taste, but still encompassed that oven-cooked flavor.
Next was the roast beef pizza. Take everything I said about the margarita pizza and make it more meaty. The roast beef and raspadura cheese were a match made in heaven. I loved every bite of that roast beef pizza.
My wife was a huge fan of the roast beef pizza, while I was a huge fan of the margarita pizza. My wife loved how meaty and cheesy the roast beef pizza was, while I liked how fresh the margarita pizza tasted. Both sides of this pizza were excellent. I am going to be dreaming about this pizza until my next visit to Raul.

After we finished our lasagna and pizza, it was time to go. Raul was closing up, and we had other places to be. Luckily, I was able to meet Raul himself and tell him how great our meal was. He let me know that the next time he had Colombian arepas on the menu (which I love), he would let me know through Instagram and that I should come and try them. Count me in!

Italian Restaurant Raul was a delicious and interesting experience. Even though it is quite far from where I live, it is worth it for all the incredible Italian and Colombian cuisine that Raul has to offer.
So if you are around the Hitachiota area and are looking for some great Italian and Colombian food, why not give Italian Restaurant Raul a chance? Who knows? You might see us there. Enjoying some pizza while trying some Colombian arepas.
Enjoy!

For more information on Italian Restaurant Raul, check out their Instagram page:
https://www.instagram.com/italianrestaurantraul/?hl=en