Japanese Food Feast

DISCLAIMER: If you are hungry, do not read this post!

There are several foodies on this trip and we have been eating all sorts of delicious food! I personally love cooking and eating different types of food. I believe that you can learn so much about a culture through food and at a meal table. I have noticed that many restaurants in Japan are small in size (probably due to limited space) and that there are numerous food stands compared to America. There are also food courts at almost every major train stations and big shopping areas. Many items are gift goods since the Japanese never visit someone empty handed. I have learned how gracious our hosts from Kobe Gakuin University and Osaka University are and I hope I can later do the same to others who visit us.

Now, back to the food… I'll focus on food for this post and will discuss other thoughts at a different post.  

Before the trip, I did some research on what foods are unique to Japan and there are several… such as ramen, sushi, udon, tempura, yakitori, taiyaki, takoyaki, okonomiyaki, yakisoba, and so much more. I am SO happy that I had the chance to try all of these….

First real ramen in Sannomiya. There are wide variety where you can choose your soup base (soy sauce, miso, or salt) and your toppings. The one shown above is a sho-yu(soy sauce) ramen with a slice of pork.

Right next to the ramen shop, there was a taiyaki stand. Taiyaki is a dessert with red bean paste inside the fluffy fish. Traditionally, the red bean paste is the only stuffing, but there was also sweet potato stuffing option as well. This snack is the best during the winter -- so I decided to buy a small machine to make it at home during winter! 

 Kobe beef in Kobe, Japan. This was probably the best beef I've ever had. The beef melted in your mouth and they also served garlic chips.

 This was part of a 8-course meal we had to celebrate Jen's birthday. This dish contained tako (octopus) with onions and italian dressing like sauce. I enjoyed this dish since it's rare to find octopus in Tucson, but I know some of my classmates could not enjoy it due to the texture.

Another dish part of the 8-course meal. I don't recall the name of the dish, but it had thinly sliced beef mixed with vegetables in a sweet, savory sauce. It was cooked right on the table, which made sure the food was hot.

 The next day, we traveled to Osaka where some of the students and I had okonomiyaki (Japanese style pancake made with cabbage). There were choices of adding different toppings in the pancake such as beef or seafood. We chose to try the original with few pieces of pork. The size was pretty large. -- Caitlin and I made a good choice by sharing one.

 For dinner, we went to a food court and this was one of the dishes I had. The menu had no English and even though we had KGU students helping us order -- it was hard for them to describe each menu item for us. But thank goodness that Japanese are known for their fake food displays! -- which are practically at every restaurant, food stands, etc. The displays are very detailed and realistic. We took pictures of what we wanted to eat and ordered our food by showing our server pictures. We all got what we wanted and had no problem.

 For the next night's dinner, we had takoyaki (ball shaped dough with octopus, cabbage, and other toppings) party with the KGU students. It was fun and simple to make.

 This is the finished product with mayo, sauce, and green onions.

One night, some of us decided to try different Japanese snacks and drinks. There were some interesting flavors of chips such as curry or baked corn. There was also green tea flavored kit kats -- pretty delicious if you enjoy green tea!

We took a day trip to Tokyo and went to harajuku district. There were many crepe stands with long lines, so we had to try some. This one had cookies& creme cheesecake with strawberries, but it was not overwhelmingly sweet.

The green tea shaved ice and sushi bowls were bought at Tokyo train station before we had to leave back for Kobe. The sushi bowls were around $5-$6 per bowl -- very cheap for decent quality.

 Ron, Jen, and I enjoying our dinner in shinkansen (bullet train) from Tokyo to Kobe.

 We also couldn't forget dessert -- a whole skinless peach tart.

During our trip to Kyoto, we went to a conveyor belt sushi restaurant. This was a fun, interactive experience. We could also order sushi or other types of food directly to our table by using a touch screen. The food came out quickly and we only interacted with a server in the beginning and at the end, which was something different in a restaurant.

 On our last day, we had a chance to visit Hiroshima and Miyajima island. There were many food stands at Miyajima island -- cooked oyster, fried fish cake, and many more. One of the more interesting food was rice burger (shown above) where the patties were made with sticky rice and black sesame soft serve ice cream (shown below). It had a savory taste, not too sweet, but one downside was that the black sesame seeds stuck in between your teeth after.

Our last night meal in Sannomiya was at a yakitori restaurant. There were variety of chicken parts on a stick such as liver and gizzard. We weren't feeling too adventurous and stuck with chicken breast with different types of sauces.

Overall, my expectation of eating great food at the trip was met and even exceeded! I now have different foods to try and recreate at home.