Hiranoya is a Japanese restaurant at Saga, Kyoto City. You can enjoy a variety of ayu (Japanese trout) of each season at this beautiful thatched-roof teahouse restaurant. Hiranoya was established about 300 years ago in the Kyoho era (the Edo period). This tea house is located just past the torii (shrine gate) of Atago Shrine, which has been admired by the citizens as the holy place to enshrine the deity who takes care not to start a fire. So in the old days the worshippers who passed through torii used to drop in at this tea house and took a rest for a while before heading for the shrine at the top of Mt. Atago, having its specialty of sweet “Shinko” and green tea on the bench. Hiranoya also ran a business of the commission merchant of ayu, and their river fish cuisine of ayu, amago and carp was very popular among the customers. They still serve delicacies of the season including natural ayu and other freshwater fish, matsutake mushroom, yu-dofu, botan-nabe (wild boar hotpot), all unchanged since old times. You can easily spot the restaurant by the chochin lantern seen under the torii. Why don’t you drop in at it once at least when you go to Saga?