Torisawa 22

A Black Door on Sukhumvit 63

Bangkok's Ekkamai neighbourhood has accumulated a particular kind of restaurant over the past decade: small, format-driven, and staffed by cooks whose reference points are Japanese. The area draws a mix of long-term expats and Thai diners with serious eating habits, and the dining rooms that thrive here tend to reward repeat visits more than first impressions. Torisawa 22 is a yakitori restaurant in Bangkok's Watthana district, with counter seating and a price point around $90 per person. The entrance, a non-descript black door marked only with the number 22, offers no signage, no menu board, and no street-level seating. The charcoal smoke arrives before anything else does.

The smoke signals the operating principle. Inside, diners sit around an L-shaped black counter, which places the grill and the grill master at the centre of the experience rather than at a remove. Counter formats of this kind, common in Tokyo yakitori specialists, ask the diner to watch rather than wait. The work is visible: the coal bed, the skewers' position, the colour change across a chicken thigh as heat moves through it. In Bangkok's broader restaurant scene, where tasting-menu formats at addresses like Sorn, Baan Tepa, and Gaa set a certain tempo of theatre, the yakitori counter offers something different: quieter, more repetitive, and more technically demanding in its narrowness.

The Case for Hormone-Free Chicken

Yakitori's reputation in Japan rests substantially on sourcing. The category's leading counters in Tokyo treat bird provenance as seriously as a wine program, specifying prefecture, breed, and rearing conditions. That attention arrived in Bangkok with Torisawa 22's menu construction, which centres on hormone-free chicken throughout. The distinction matters not for marketing reasons but for textural ones: hormone-free birds, typically reared more slowly, develop denser muscle fibre and more defined organ texture. Liver holds its centre without turning grainy. Gizzard maintains chew without becoming rubbery. Thigh carries enough fat to caramelise under binchotan heat rather than dry before it colours.

Binchotan charcoal, white charcoal produced from Japanese oak, historically ubakashi, burns at high, consistent heat with minimal smoke and almost no flame. It is harder to manage than standard charcoal precisely because it operates at temperature ranges that leave very little margin. The counter format at Torisawa 22 exists in part because binchotan cooking requires constant monitoring; the proximity of diners to the grill is a function of the cooking method as much as an aesthetic choice. Other Bangkok restaurants operating in the premium tier, including European-format addresses like Côte by Mauro Colagreco and Sühring, work with different heat sources and larger brigade structures. Yakitori at this level is a solo or duo operation built entirely around a single fire.

What the Menu Covers

The range of cuts at Torisawa 22 maps the full chicken: thigh, wing, liver, gizzard, and hatsumoto (the aorta, a cut found at serious yakitori counters but rarely elsewhere in Bangkok's restaurant scene). Each piece is seasoned through one of two routes, four tare sauces or a selection of salts sourced from three regions. The tare/shio division is standard yakitori practice, but the specificity of three distinct salts signals a sourcing commitment that extends beyond the bird itself. Salt at this level of attention affects finish: mineral intensity, the speed at which salinity fades, and whether the char reads as bitter or clean.

The menu closes with chochin, a skewer that combines the unlaid egg and the ovary of the hen. It is the most Tokyo-specific item on the list, uncommon outside yakitori-focused environments, and the kind of detail that distinguishes a kitchen operating from genuine knowledge of the category rather than approximation. Regulars at serious yakitori counters in Japan treat the chochin as the marker of a kitchen's commitment; its presence here positions Torisawa 22 within that tradition rather than adjacent to it.

Where Torisawa 22 Sits in Bangkok's Eating Scene

Bangkok's premium dining tier has, over the past several years, consolidated around tasting-menu formats and internationally recognised chef names. Bangkok's dining media has often focused on tasting-menu formats and internationally recognised chef names. The more interesting development, running quietly beneath it, is the accumulation of single-format specialists operating at counter scale: ramen shops with serious dashi programs, omakase sushi rooms with direct Japan supplier relationships, and yakitori counters like Torisawa 22 that apply Japanese category discipline to a Bangkok context.

These venues tend to build loyal followings instead. For diners exploring Thailand's wider food scene beyond Bangkok, the country supports other kinds of specialists worth noting: PRU in Phuket operates a farm-to-table format with similar sourcing seriousness, and AKKEE in Pak Kret represents the kind of regional-specialist format that Bangkok's dining culture increasingly references. Further afield, Aeeen in Chiang Mai and Angeum in Ayutthaya extend the pattern of focused, format-driven kitchens operating outside the capital's tasting-menu mainstream.

For counter-format dining that shares Torisawa 22's reliance on sourcing as structure rather than storytelling, the comparison points are places like Atomix in New York City or Le Bernardin, venues where the quality of the primary ingredient carries the menu's architecture. The scale and price point differ considerably, but the underlying logic is the same: know your source, apply disciplined technique, and let the material lead.

Planning a Visit

Torisawa 22 sits on the second floor at 267/16 Soi Sukhumvit 63 in the Ekkamai area of Watthana district. The black door marked 22 is the sole exterior indicator. Reservations are recommended. Arriving with a reservation, or at minimum confirming availability in advance, is the practical approach.

Quick reference: Floor 2, 267/16 Soi Sukhumvit 63, Ekkamai, Bangkok. Counter seating. Binchotan yakitori. Hormone-free chicken. Reservation recommended.