When you sit at the sushi bar chances are you'll end up chatting with your sushi chef. This interaction is one benefit of sitting close to the action—you can easily express your preferences, find out what's fresh, and develop a nice rapport. If you're not one for small talk, though, you may like the new standing sushi bar Ushio, located at Shinagawa Station in Tokyo, where you can order sushi without uttering a single syllable.
How it works: Rows of tokens—each labeled with a kind of fish or beverage and marked with its price—are neatly stacked on the counter. Want some freshwater eel and tuna? Grab the anago and maguro coins and toss 'em in your personal tray. The sushi chef will take a look at the coins in your tray and wordlessly serve you your food.
Don't read Japanese? Not an issue: The English translation is also written on each token. It may not be the most traditional sushi bar experience, but it's certainly tourist-friendly and won't have you fumbling every few minutes for your English-Japanese dictionary. [via Watashi to Tokyo]
I share Marvo of The Impulsive Buy's sentiment: "I’m allergic to cocktail umbrellas and drinks that make me look like a drunk sorority girl ready to flash her boobs when a video camera and Joe Francis come by." Hence I, like Marvo, have never experienced a Blue Hawaii cocktail, consisting of rum, pineapple juice, blue Curacao, sweet and sour mix, sometimes vodka, and always a festive paper umbrella.
Maybe I'd enjoy the Blue Hawaii better in soft drink form. This summer, Pepsi unleashed the limited-edition Pepsi Blue Hawaii. Sorry, unlucky Americans—it's only available in Japan. Marvo got his hands on a bottle and reviewed the drink, describing its color as "Smurf-like," and the pineapple and lemon flavor combo as "really smurfing sweet and artificial." Although the bottle is spiffed up with a picture of a palm tree and the blue Hawaiian sea, consumers are left to find their own cocktail umbrellas.
Last summer, Pepsi Japan did a similar limited flavor release for Pepsi Ice Cucumber, which sold out in less than a month.
Different kinds of Japanese vending machines from PingMag.
Americans are seriously missing out on the ability to purchase hot french fries or socks without having to talk to an actual human being. So until our country gets with the program, we'll just have to sigh into our sake and wish we lived in Japan. Meanwhile Tokyo-based design magazine PingMag, after doing some investigative reporting at a manufacturers' convention in Tokyo, provides updates on the latest in amazing Japanese vending machines. From a self-serve tourist information center to cigarette dispensers with age recognition software, the only thing these innovative machines have left in common is automated awesomeness.
What I'm guessing is that, as a commenter says on the page that this photo appears on, is that this is simply a version of the Japanese sports drink Pocari Sweat that's marketed for people to give to their pets. Yes, Pocari Sweat itself is a zany name, but as you know, you can never account for translation.
Clockwise from top left: wine, coffee, ramen, and green tea spas at spa theme park Hakone Kowakien Yunessun in Japan.
If you've ever fantasized of loafing in a pool of wine, visit Hakone, Japan and your dream can become reality. Food-themed spas are just one of the trends listed in Adage.com's feature on Japan's latest could-be trends, from ramen-noodle baths to self-cleaning toilets (Madonna is a fan).
Hakone Kowakien Yunessun, a spa theme park in Hakone with a menu of "amusement baths," is your spot for that wine bath. Not feeling wine? Perhaps you would prefer a soak in green-tea, coffee, or sake.
I'd go for a ramen-noodle bath, myself, which is shaped and outfitted like a ramen bowl. Chopsticks and noodle decorations hang over the hot tub; the pepper-flavored water is flecked with skin-healthy collagen and garlic extracts; and, best of all, "a man dressed as a chef dispenses noodle-shaped bath additives" and soy sauce into the water.
Speaking of diets, Japan is taking the measuring tape to its citizenry to make sure the populace does not get fat—or, as they call it there, metabo. Companies and local governments are required to add the statistic to employees' annual checkups.
To reach its goals of shrinking the overweight population by 10 percent over the next four years and 25 percent over the next seven years, the government will impose financial penalties on companies and local governments that fail to meet specific targets. The country’s Ministry of Health argues that the campaign will keep the spread of diseases like diabetes and strokes in check.
A handy graph included with this story in the New York Times shows that average Japanese waistlines are 32.8 inches for men and 28 for women; U.S. waistline averages are 39 for men and 36.5 for women.
I must lead a deprived life, having never seen ice balls before. Ice balls are popular among drink connoisseurs because, due to the lower surface area, they melt more slowly than ice cubes.
The Japanese. Known primarily for cute, they seem to have a bit of a naughty side, too. Open this box, and you'll see what I mean. On the outside, nothing big, right? Well, click through the jump and there's a bit of a NSFW surprise formed by the two pudding cups it contains. As tipster Matt Buchanan says, "BTW, purin isn't really pudding in the Bill Cosby style; it's more like flan." Full flash ahead, after the jump.
1958 was a big year. A fourteen-year old Bobby Fischer won the U.S. Chess championships, NASA was created and the very first sushi conveyor belt scooted around a restaurant! It all started in April of 1958 when a mobile stream of plates carrying tuna belly fat and salmon first rotated inside Mawaru Genroku Sushi restaurant in Osaka, Japan. Creator Yoshiaki Shiraishi called it "kuru kuru sushi," which adorably translates to "sushi-go-around" in Japanese, and eventually decided that 8 centimeters per second was the ideal speed—slow enough for safe arrivals, but also fast enough to keep up with voracious appetites.
Shiraishi also invented a robotic sushi model, where robots carry the raw fish, but it didn't "go around" with customers as well. He was clearly not a big fan of human waiters. [via YeinJee]
How bad is Japan's butter shortage? Here's some more photographic evidence: Yongfook, a web designer based in Tokyo, took this photo in a supermarket where a block of a butter blend now costs about $7. So for $14 you could get a full only-butter block.
Where is the butter? — cry Japanese consumers who have been hunting everywhere for the dairy product. The drastic reduction in raw milk production, complicated by hikes in the price of grain as well as changes in the global patterns of dairy product consumption, have caused a serious butter shortage in Japan. Empty shelves in the dairy section of grocery stores across the country have not seen a shipment of butter for days, and stores are posting signs apologizing for the shortage.
Too cute to eat: The winners of the second Sanrio Character Bento Grand Prix 2008 were announced last week, with the top prize given to "Tenorikuma's Exciting Lunch Box" (pictured, center). Two Silver Charabenist (an amalgamation of "character" and "bento") awards were handed to the cutesy "Best Friend" set and the carblicious "How Do You Feel About a Bread Lunch?" set. Truth be told, all of the winning entries were way too cute and creative to herald a clear victory, if you ask me. [via Watashi to Tokyo]
Holy canoe! Not wanting to see so many wooden chopsticks go to waste at the city hall cafeteria where he worked, Shuhei Ogawara collected over 7,000 chopsticks for two years, then glued them together over three months, resulting in this 13-foot long canoe. At 66 pounds, it's a bit heavier than your average canoe, but a launching ceremony in May at Lake Inawashiro in Fukushima, Japan, will determine whether it'll be smooth sailing or not. [via Gizmodo]
Do you really like udon? I mean, really, really like udon to the point that you'd want to eat a bucket of it? Then Japanese competitive eater Nobuyuki Shirota has the restaurant for you: Shirotaya, a limited-time noodle shop in Osaka whose standard bowls of udon come with 16 portions of noodles for about $40. Don't be intimidated; those with normal appetites can order a sixteenth of a bowl of udon.
The words fresh and instant don't normally go together, but Kyo no Matcha lets you make your own fresh, bottled green tea on the go. A twist of the air-tight cap releases high-grade matcha powder from Kyoto into the water. Give it a shake, and you've got your fresh serving of green tea on the spot—no chemical additives or preservatives. Other flavors include turmeric and aojiru (a kale-based health drink). Only available in Japan, but with the rise in health drinks, it might be coming Stateside in the near future. [via Trends in Japan]
D.C.-based chef Michel Richard, whose "virtual egg" made from yellow tomato (yolk) and mozzarella (white), has nothing on this bowl of "noodles" (right). The broth is actually a caramel mixture, the noodles are pudding, and the toppings are chocolates and such. If you wanna get your hands on one, you either have to live in or travel to Japan, of course, where they're available from IchiMonji. [via CScout Japan]
"It may look just like a waffle, but one bite is enough to tell the difference. While the outside is toasted and crispy, the inside contains a thin layer of glutinous mochi." —The Japan Times
At right, a moffle maker. Place in it a thick slice of mochi, the ultra-gummy pounded rice cake popular in Japan, close the lid, and voilà: a new type of treat. Word is that moffles are selling like gangbusters in Japan. And Sanyei, the company that makes the moffle-makers, is selling out of them. But you don't need a dedicated moffle-maker—bloggers in Japan are trading tips on making them in ordinary waffle-makers.
And how do you adorn it?
It is also possible to make moffle sandwiches by combining ingredients with the mochi before cooking. Alternatively, you can add sweet or salty toppings as the plain taste of mochi goes well with either. For example, a moffle can be made into a meal by adding ham and cheese to the mochi, or a dessert by putting ice cream on it.
Japanese restaurants already have the habit of displaying menus in the form of realistic plastic models to give customers a clear idea of what they're ordering. What's the next step? Tables with LCD touch screens that display 3-D pictures of the food. It's the future.
You may not think of fried mashed potato patties or beef stew served with rice when craving Japanese food, but these dishes of Western origins are popular in Japanese cuisine. Mari Kanazawa of Watashi to Tokyo explains the origins of some of these Japanese-Western dishes and where you're most likely to find them in Tokyo.
Heartstick Ojaru, a co-op of nine women in Chiba, Japan, have been selling these cute heart- and star-shaped cucumbers in grocery stores in Tokyo. Plastic molds affixed to the stem shapes the cucumbers into the shapes when sliced cross-wise. The arrangement possibilities, as you can see, are endless. [via Trends in Japan]
One reason I don't like eating street food in New York City is because I either have to eat it while walking or find a place to sit down before digging into my food as it gets progressively cooler. If I lived in Tokyo I could just eat ramen or oden in front of a cart on the side of the street, as seen in PingMag's feature on Tokyo's mobile food bars in which they interview a handful of food cart vendors about how they run their businesses.
How does a visually impaired person pick out a can of beer from other canned non-beer beverages? By feeling the braille on the top of the can—if you're in Japan, at least.
Beer manufacturers in Japan have started stamping braille on the top of cans that spells out "alcohol" or, if made by Kirin Brewery, "Kirin Beer." Whether this will increase the number of drunk blind people on the streets is not yet known.
Posted by Robyn Lee, February 27, 2008 at 12:30 PM
Pretz is a popular Japanese snack in the form of a pretzel-like stick that mostly comes in savory flavors. Like many Japanese snack commercials, the advertising for Pretz is...unique. Sumo wrestlers, geishas, and dancing scientists are just some of the characters used to illustrate the awesomeness of this snack.
Posted by Robyn Lee, February 27, 2008 at 10:45 AM
Japanese architect Oki Sato has teamed up with patissier Tsujiguchi Hironobu of Mont St. Clair and Le Chocolat de H to create what may be the only dessert to feature something you may find in your office supplies cabinet. Their new chocolate pencils come with an accompanying "pencil shaver" that allows the diner to shave chocolate onto their dessert. [via Cool Hunting]
Posted by Robyn Lee, February 26, 2008 at 12:00 PM
I love this commercial for Pupurun, a candy from Japan-based Meiji, because instead of highlighting the joy the eater gets from the candy, it shows the candy being ecstatically happy to be eaten. Look how freakin' jubilant this candy is to be dissolved by your saliva! It's practically having an orgasm.
These subterranean farms look like a conceptual factor from a sci-fi movie (remember that oxygen garden from Danny Boyle's 2007 thriller Sunshine?), but they're actually being cultivated right now in a former bank vault in Tokyo. Pasona O2 covers about a square kilometer, growing vegetables and fruits like tomatoes, lettuce, and strawberries, as well as flowers and herbs—even a rice paddy! Snazzy state-of-the-art technology controls temperature and artificial sunlight levels.
Is Japan one step ahead in planning for a sustainable agricultural model for the future? Actually, Pasona O2 is more or less a showcase and serves primarily as a training facility for jobless youth interested in the agriculture field. Still, the merging of advanced technological resources and the food industry in this experiment might be something to keep an eye on in the future. [via Japundit]
In a further attempt at globalizing its brand, the Michelin Guide has, as we reported last March, now been introduced in Japan. As was the case when Michelin introduced its American guides in New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, the ride has not been all that smooth.
Lots of interesting stuff in this New York Times story:
Many Japanese food critics, pundits, and serious eaters feel that the Michelin folks do not have the expertise and experience to properly judge Japanese food, although, like Michelin's American forays, it has enlisted the help of locals. I have always been skeptical about Michelin's American efforts.
Posted by Emily Koh, February 24, 2008 at 10:00 AM
Now you don't have to feel guilty about your late-night snacking. In fact, there are products made specifically for your midnight munchies—if you happen to live in Japan.
Morinaga/Eskimo is launching its new brand of premium ice cream for late night called Mayonaka no Zeitaku ("Midnight Indulgence").
With each cup clocking in around 140 calories, it's specifically targeted to the health-conscious woman who doesn't want to compromise her sweet cravings. (Morinaga/Eskimo's research shows that 43 percent of women between ages 20 and 40 eat ice cream around 11 p.m.) And if you want to get really elaborate, there's even a cute little "Midnight Story" illustrating that, yes, ice cream is exactly what you crave in the middle of the night (Japanese only). [via Japan Marketing News]
Maki at Just Bento shows how you can have fun with Japanese egg molds, my favorite mold being this overly adorable bunny head. Cooking and peeling perfect hardboiled eggs takes some effort, but if you want cute, blemish-free food, you have to put in some elbow grease.
Posted by Erin Zimmer, February 22, 2008 at 2:45 PM
According to Business Week, bigwig Western chocolate companies like Nestle and Hershey are trying to please Asian tastes, given a booming chocolate industry there. Say hello to azuki-bean Kit Kats in Japan, green tea Hershey's Kisses in China, and ginseng-enriched confections in South Korea. Here we thought Abba-Zaba was crazy! Check out the article's matching slideshow.
Tokyo-based design magazine PingMag has a feature on the history and making of the Japanese snack cake ningyo-yaki, which translates to "fried dolls." These small cakes made by pouring batter into intricate molds—varying from Hello Kitty to a traditional lantern—are typically filled with red bean paste, but may also be filled with chocolate or custard. Grab a box on your next trip to Japan!
Thank you notes get a "sweet" upgrade with Tokyo Super Sweets' Arigachoco. Based on a fusion of the Japanese word for "thank you" (arigato) and "chocolate," these chocolates (green tea-flavored, enrobed in a white chocolate coating) come with a QR code on the box. Scan the code with your cell phone and you'll receive a message of thanks that the sender picked for you (all ending cutely with "Arigachoco!"). Saves you from buying all that unnecessary stationery, eh? [via Trends in Japan]
Posted by Emily Koh, February 14, 2008 at 11:00 AM
You've got your milk chocolate, dark, white, and ... garlic?
Takko Shoji of Aomori, Japan, has been developing "black garlic chocolate" there. Fermented black garlic is coated with chocolate and sprinkled with cocoa powder. It's got a "sweet-and-sour taste resembling prunes, with the bittersweet taste of chocolate." Perfect for your adventurous valentine (although I'm not sure how much kissing will be done afterwards). [via Japundit]
Next time you're in Japan and you're trying to eat local, look for one of these green lanterns. Called midori chochin, any restaurants with these lanterns (based on the traditional red paper lanterns) indicate that they use domestic ingredients in their dishes.
The system works on a five-star ranking scale, helpfully displayed on the lantern. Restaurants using locally produced ingredients for more than 50 percent of their cooking are awarded one star; five stars mean the restaurants source 90 percent or more ingredients locally.
However, it's not a formal certification, since the movement is focused simply on raising awareness of eating locally, and restaurants only need to self-declare their status to apply for a lantern. On the other hand, this being Japan, if it turns out that the restaurants lied about the ratio of domestic produce that they use, the restaurant staff must wear headbands with the kanji for "regret" and shave their heads (!?).
There are currently 80 restaurants hanging the midori chochin. A full list can be found here (Japanese only). [via Japundit]
Posted by Robyn Lee, February 13, 2008 at 12:00 PM
Pounding mochi, or cakes made out of glutinous rice, is a traditional New Year's activity in Japan. After the jump, watch these expert Japanese mochi pounders alternate hitting the mochi with a ginormous wooden mallet and turning and wetting the mochi by hand at breakneck speed without smashing any human bones. [via Cha Xiu Bao]
"The sounds of waves crashing onto a rocky shore mingle in Taiji with the screeching wails of dolphins being chopped and hacked to death by fishermen." Residents of Taiji, Japan have been eating dolphin for over a century, but social pressures and high levels of mercury challenge their culture of dolphin-eating.
If a specially licensed Japanese chef doesn't correctly cut fugu—a potentially fatally poisonous blowfish—he could kill the diner. If you ever order fugu, just hope your chef is as skilled as the one above.
Watch the fugu go from whole fish to plated dish after the jump. A warning for the squeamish: The fish is prepared while it's still alive. [via growabrain]
How would you like to gulp down a frothy, steaming glass of...beer? According to American expat in Japan Peter Payne Japanese beer company Kirin is introducing Hot Beer, beer that is heated to about 120°F and accompanied by a cinnamon stick and sugar cubes. "The heat of the beer is supposed to bring out flavors not present when served cold, including a deep aroma not unlike that of coffee." If you're curious enough, you can try this at home by microwaving your own beer.
Learn about the innards of your favorite (possibly edible) animal with these intricate Japanese animal dissection figurines! They're available online for $7 each at Giant Robot where you can choose from a fish, pig, cow, rooster, monkey, horse, panda, or bear.
Why don't Japanese people (in Japan) get fat?Maki gives a few reasons: peer pressure, more unplanned movement, and smaller portions. Also, as a Japanese expat living in Switzerland, she comments on the extra weight Japanese people gain when they leave Japan, known as the kaigai seikatsu, or "overseas living," 15.
Researchers at the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology have developed a robot farming "exoskeleton" suit designed to help aging farmers lift heavy objects and perform manual tasks more easily. The current cost for each suit is about 500,000-1,000,000 yen ($4,500-$9,000) but may drop to 200,000 yen ($1,800) when they aim to mass produce it in four years. [via Boing Boing]
My first thought when seeing Jon Cheng's photo of o-toro (fattiest part of the tuna) in Tokyo was, "That's a big chunk of tuna." And then a moment later, "That's a huge-ass knife."
Having visited more than 80 restaurants in Tokyo, Nicolas Sternsdorff compiles a list of his top Tokyo eats across 11 categories (or 12 if you include the worst restaurant he ate at) complete with photos and short descriptions.
PingMag rounds up popular characters on Japanese produce packages. Squash, mushrooms, cabbage, eggplant, oranges, and more are all graced by aww-inducing cartoon likenesses of themselves, sometimes clothed, sometimes sporting stylish hairdos, and mostly smiling.
The above photo is not photoshopped—it really is a bowl of ramen topped with soft serve ice cream, cones and all. I love ramen and I love soft serve ice cream, but methinks the combination of the two would not placate my rumbling belly. Japan it UP! has more details about the ramen shop, which also offers yogurt ramen, hot cocoa ramen and coffee ramen.
Japan's per capita consumption of rice—the symbolic staple of the Japanese diet—has dropped to half its 1960 level as bread, pasta, and other wheat-based goods have grown in popularity. Farmers and retailers find new ways to sustain its popularity—by offering designer rices, incorporating rice flour into baked goods, and marketing Japanese rice to other countries.
Lori spotted this cute coffee shop on a recent trip to Yokohama. The potential to have a "delightful moment" and fill myself with "sweet flavor" even makes me—a longtime non-coffee drinker—want to go inside and order a cup of joe. Read more about Lori's trip to Japan in her blog, Dessert Comes First.
This fine specimen of street food, the "tornado potato" or, if you prefer, the "tortato," was spotted on the streets of Seoul, South Korea. They can also be found in Japan.
Pour some clear broth into this Japanese-designed topography soup plate, surround it with broccoli florets and you've got yourself a minimalist mountain scene that doubles as a meal. Just be careful to pick the right liquid so that it doesn't look like your mountain valley is full of mud (gravy) or blood (tomato soup). Blue Gatorade may look best. [via TasteSpotting]
If you find typical cooking shows are too boring, maybe a battle between "chefs" constructing fake food made of painted plastic will catch your interest. This clip from Japanese TV show TV Champion pits two fake food craftsmen together as they prove to three judges who has the better skills. Be amazed as a brown, craggly slab of plastic turns into a steak and a bumpy beige lump is turned into a piece of fried chicken! Is it sad that their food looks more edible than anything I can cook? [via TV in Japan]
For those who don't know, the over ninety-years old fake food industry in Japan is pretty awesome. Fake food (also known as sampuru, the Japanese spelling for "sample") is frequently used in Japanese restaurants' displays to provide customers with clear images of what they're ordering. Be sure to visit Kappabashi, the "Kitchen District" of Tokyo, if you want to start your own fake food collection.
Your RDA of Levity: A mountaintop hot dog cart celebrates its 25th year in business at the junction of California highways 9 and 35: "[John] Hagen [pictured] works seven days a week and said his constancy has earned him the endearing nickname of 'mustard' from family, friends and customers."
I knew Japan was the birthplace of square watermelons, but the concept of watermelons vaguely shaped like human heads with bulging eyeballs is new to me. PingMag takes us into the world of strangely shaped watermelon breeding, where pyramidal watermelons will set you back $650 and the human head-shaped ones may cost you your soul. The heart-shaped cucumbers are much more accessible at around $2 for one cuke and probably taste more like their normal-shaped counterpart than the molded watermelons.
New on my list of "Things to Eat Before I Die" is ayu, specifically skewered, salted, and roasted over hot coals as seen in bobby stokes's photo. Ayu, also known as sweet fish, is regarded as "the queen of freshwater streams" in Japan.
My favorite type of noodle is soba, a Japanese noodle primarily made of buckwheat flour commonly served chilled with its own dipping sauce. FX Cuisine's photo-laden account of making soba at Tsukiji Soba Academy illustrates the labor intensive process from mixing the flours to rolling the dough to precise thicknesses and—my favorite part—ultimately cutting the noodles from the mother dough with a gigantic cleaver. If you ever find yourself in Tokyo, visit Tsukiji Soba Academy to learn the ways of the sobatician.
Here's a great video of the soba making process packed into less than three minutes:
In his series of videos about life in Japan, Kevin Cooney takes us on a stomach churning tasting tour of Namjatown'sIce Cream City. What could be so bad about a city of ice cream, certainly one of the best things to have ever been concocted by humans? This city may contain the flavors of your dreams, but it also contains the flavors of your nightmares. Twisted nightmares at that, mostly featuring sea life. Observe:
[video contains some strong language]
Here are some choice quotes if you don't want to watch the nine and a half minute video in its entirety:
Octopus: "Oh my god. Oh. Oh my god, this is horrible. It's a sucker. There's an actual sucker..."
Squid: "That is the most aquatic ice cream I've ever had in my life."
Shark Fin Ramen: "I think whoever decided to make shark fin ice cream should also be put to death for crimes against my mouth."
Saury: "It's in fact chocolate and fish, together at last, fish and chocolate. Fish and chocolate. Peanut butter and chocolate—I can get that, can wrap my mind around that—but fish and chocolate...god, why?"
After tasting the last ice cream he breaks down and gives the impression that he's about to die. I think a strong message here is that sea life and ice cream don't mix well.
If Kevin's expressions of nausea amuse you (they sure amused me), be sure to watch part 2 of the ice cream horror where he painfully digs into octopus, curry, and snake flavored ice creams. [via TV in Japan]
The winner of last Friday's first Character Bento competition in Tokyo depicts the scene of a frog and a rainy day, appropriately titled "Rainy days are fun too! Frog bento." The bento was judged not only on its cute and colorful appearance, but also on its high nutritional content and relevance to Japan's rainy season. It's more than carefully arranged vegetables and balls of rice.
You may think that this kind of well thought out bento is limited to contests, but there are many dedicated people out there who make intricate bento boxes every day for their loved ones, mostly mothers for their children. I wasn't one of these children, nor do I think I could be one of these mothers considering that my idea of packing a lunch is washing some fruit and tossing it into a box with a piece of chocolate or a cookie, but it's never too late to get into the world of bentos. Check out the mind boggling array of cute bento-making possibilities at e-obento.com or learn the basics from Bento Box! [via Tokyo Times]
This instructional website at Nippon Ham teaches you how to turn a boring tube of meat into something that kind of resembles a bunny. Or a duck. Or a hippo. Or a sheep. Now you can fulfill that lifelong dream of creating a menagerie of flesh colored animals with just the power of a knife and a pack of ham-based weiners!
I had this at the Hara Museum of Contemporary Art's very elegant cafe. And I gather that this cafe has a tradition of representing the museum's current exhibition in dessert form. Well, the exhibit on right now is Henry Darger, who is best known for his vastly creepy collages of little girls being tortured. And let me say, it was six kinds of weird to eat one of Darger's little lovelies in cake form.
Tien Mao visited Japan earlier this year and just posted photos from an early-morning trip to Tsukiji Fish Market, the world's largest wholesale seafood market, where millions of dollars and tons of fish pass through in the early morning six days a week. If you love food, it's definitely one of the places you have to see when you visit Tokyo. I don't know when I'll be there next, but I do know these red tentacles are making me really hungry.
Good Kobe beef is surprisingly difficult to find in its namesake city, at least according to Japan-based food blogger Rameniac. But here's his tip:
Look for the old, graying guy in the business suit, the one that’s perfectly at ease and carries himself like he owns the town. He’s smoking a cigarette, waiting for a cab perhaps, but definitely not behaving like a drunken ass or brown-nosing superiors. You don’t want middle management and you don’t want the underlings after all. If you’re lucky, you will have chanced upon a vice president or even a shachyo, the big boss, a higher up for a major electric power or heavy industries conglomerate. He might then give you his card and point you towards a referral-only steakhouse somewhere in the vicinity. “Show it to them if you have any problems,” he might say.
The series — part cooking show, part game show, part reality show, part documentary — airs Saturday nights on Asian-language cable station KSCI (the program, with English subtitles, is listed as "Cooking Showdown"). With its frenetic pace, glistening food close-ups, slapstick humor, a soundtrack that might include a Debbie Harry hit or a heavy metal ballad, and some of the general quirkiness that catapulted the original "Iron Chef" to cult fandom, it has gained an enthusiastic following of Japanese and non-Japanese viewers.
The LAT has a short clip from the show, completely in Japanese and without subtitles, but you'll still get a good idea of its sense of humor and frenetic energy.
"Japan is known for cars, Japan is known for electronics. Japan is known for cute. Japan is also home to some of the best KitKats in the world (okay, and some of the worst, but this is the price of innovation and an example of the bell curve). What else can I say except that the KitKat Bitter is what a KitKat should be all day, every day." Candy Blog talks the KitKat Bitter up so much I find myself wanting to eat one despite the fact that I usually don't care for either KitKats or dark chocolate. Ah, the power of food bloggers.
Maki Itoh says, "Tomorrow, March 3rd, is Momo no sekku or Peach Day in Japan. Peach blossoms usually start blooming around this time, signifying the coming of spring. It’s also the day for hina matsuri, the Doll Festival or Girls’ Festival." She then suggests making two kinds of pretty, delicate sushi in girly colors that match those traditionally associated with the festival (yellow, pink, white and green), the Hamaguri-zushi (clam sushi) and the Smoked salmon temari zushi (ball-shaped sushi). They both look so good (and so tasty) that you'll be probably be making them for dinner parties in the future, even if you don't make them tomorrow.
Posted by Lia Bulaong, February 28, 2007 at 5:47 PM
"The late inventor of instant noodles was symbolically blasted off into space at a funeral ceremony attended by thousands in Osaka, western Japan. The event was a tribute to Momofuku Ando's creation of Space Ram, a noodle soup that works at zero gravity. Mr Ando, who died in January aged 96, created the instant noodle in 1958 and worked hard on the vacuum pack that was taken into space in 2005. " Requiem In Paces.
Posted by Lia Bulaong, February 27, 2007 at 12:34 PM
Novel Noshing: When Dining Rooms Upstage Menus by Fodor's Katie Hamlin discusses six different restaurant concepts from around the world. Most of them are old hat (kitchen tables and conveyor belt sushi, especially) but I'd love to eat at the Fukuoka branch of the Zauo, The Fishing Boat Café chain, a restaurant that has "500 seats on two giant boats "anchored" side by side in the restaurant's massive indoor pond. After casting your pole (there is one stationed by each seat) and making your catch, your fish or lobster is wisked away to the kitchen for proper cooki
I share Marvo of 
The Japanese. Known primarily for cute, they seem to have a bit of a naughty side, too. Open this box, and you'll see what I mean. On the outside, nothing big, right? Well, click through the jump and there's a bit of a NSFW surprise formed by the two pudding cups it contains. As tipster Matt Buchanan says, "BTW, 
Holy canoe! Not wanting to see so many wooden chopsticks go to waste at the city hall cafeteria where he worked, Shuhei Ogawara collected over 7,000 chopsticks for two years, then glued them together over three months, resulting in this 13-foot long canoe. At 66 pounds, it's a bit heavier than your average canoe, but a launching ceremony in May at Lake Inawashiro in Fukushima, Japan, will determine whether it'll be smooth sailing or not. [via 
The words fresh and instant don't normally go together, but 
At right, a moffle maker. Place in it a thick slice of 
In a further attempt at globalizing its brand, the Michelin Guide has, 
Now you don't have to feel guilty about your late-night snacking. In fact, there are products made specifically for your midnight munchies—if you happen to live in Japan.
Thank you notes get a "sweet" upgrade with Tokyo Super Sweets' 
You've got your milk chocolate, dark, white, and ... garlic?
Next time you're in Japan and you're trying to eat local, look for one of these green lanterns. Called midori chochin, any restaurants with these lanterns (based on the traditional red paper lanterns) indicate that they use domestic ingredients in their dishes.
For those who don't know, the 
Don't blame us, say U.S. ethanol makers, 
