Bamboo Shoots. So good grilled! This was a secret little family spot off a side street of Shibuya. Vegetarian to recover from all the meat in Korea.
That’s Tuna jaw! So tender, just falls off the bone.
One of my favorite things is the intimacy of the restaurants in Tokyo. More often than not, they seat less than 15 people total.
Really interesting meal.
Process: First, you actually buy your meal from a vending machine at the doorway. The machine doesn’t actually give you the food, but instead prints a ticket – movie ticket style – which you then sit at the U shaped counter and give your ticket to the big guy who runs up and down inside the U to take your ticket to the kitchen and about 1 minute later brings you a tray of whatever you ordered.
Food: That is a raw egg. You crack it open, add soy sauce and spicy spices (alliteration!) and then pour over your meat (don’t ask what kind!) and rice bowl. It actually tastes quite good. Then, the other bowl is filled with a minced meat (again, don’t ask about quality) and some udon noodles. You also get free cold green tea (very smoky flavor).
Overall: The meal was especially good for a slight hangover. The entire purpose of the service is to facilitate speed, so no one talks in this restaurant and it is head’s down slurping and eating. We were in and out in 15 minutes max.
Fun
My co-worker Q took me to my new favorite secret spot in Tokyo – a traditional watering hole where Japanese men go after work for “dinner” which basically consists of anything and everything you can possibly imagine – lightly fried. And the beer is ice cold. This was the view from where I was standing – you see – everyone stands in this dinner spot – no sitting.
Once again, each wooden stick represents a different lightly fried item. Yummy yummy in my tummy. My favorite was the shrimp, although the green bell pepper was also interesting.
Exterior of my new favorite after work spot.
This was my lunch on the same day. A traditional Japanese lunch spot around the corner from work and my apartment. Soba lunch. Includes cold noodles, tempura vegetables, hot tea, and we added a Miso Soup. It was delicious. The way you eat it is pour a ‘special’ sauce into the empty small bowl and then add the onion and wasabi. Then dunk your cold noodles into the sauce and slurp them up as loud as possible. You can also dunk your tempura vegetables into the magic sauce as well. Then, once you get close to finished with your lunch, they bring out a teapot that is filled with steaming hot broth that they use to cook the noodles in. You drink this to warm your soul. Amazing!
Interior of a little hole in the wall Japanese French spot in Ginza. Only seats 20 people with no venting so the entire place stinks of meat-smoke. But so, so good.
Same spot. Each one of these wooden sticks was served with 4 pieces of meat per stick. Do the math! Delicacies included steak, pork 4 different ways, foie gras, liver, and others. I literally woke up in the middle of the night with a meat hangover.
Name and Menu for the meat place in Ginza. It is in a semi-dark alley, behind the Gucci, across the street from the BEAMS store. Not a word of English is spoken in the place.
Menu at my lunch spot I ate at yesterday by myself.
My lunch yesterday. My favorite. Unagi over rice. Why can’t this become a standard meal in US? everyone loves Unagi sushi…
Menu for dinner last night. My co-workers Tomi and Takashi took me to their favorite local Japanese restaurant. Again, down a semi-dark alley, in the basement (there is a lot of basement restaurants in Tokyo). Food was fantastic, and the drinks were even better! Soju and cold green tea is my new favorite cocktail. I also tried a traditional Japanese hot cocktail which is a peeled Japanese plum in the bottom of the glass and then you add Soju and hot water. The plum flavors the cocktail as subtly or strongly as you desire (depending on how much you poke and prod the plum). My favorite food dish was at the end of the meal, they served a bowl of rice and seaweed over which you pour hot green tea. It was delicious. Oh, and did I mention that everyone smokes in Tokyo, including IN the restaurants.
