Japan - Shinjuku (Tokyo)

Our first destination in Japan was Shinjuku, Tokyo. What did we think of the place? We sure did like it there! We had met up at Narita airport and took the bus out to Shinjuku station, our hotel was a mere 8min walk from the station. Well... that's if you start from the correct station exit! It took a little longer than expected and by the time we had found the hotel everyone was ready to eat. We were so excited, we were about to have our first meal in Japan!

Although we later realised that this place was a) a chain and b) a Japanese take on Chinese food (the sign seems to indicate chinese style noodles), it was still a great start to our two week culinary bonanza in Japan: simple, good food at very reasonable prices (around $6 a bowl) with friendly and efficient service. We all enjoyed a delicious bowl of harusame ramen (all except Dave who I think ate something different) and shared some tasty pan-fried gyoza which were delicious. Such a simple 'average' meal but very satisfying indeed!

Ok.. so it's a chain and it's Chinese style noodles...

But there's self pouring tap beer, tidy counter seating and a compact little kitchen which all speaks Japan!

Harusame Ramen (490yen) was delicious and Gyoza (200yen for 6)

Our first dinner was particularly exciting for Jack who had obsessed over Street Food's post featuring Piss Alley (omg! Jack just revisited Street Food's awesome post and they went to the same chinese-style chain, how cool is that!). So we arrived at Piss Alley and did a quick tour to see which places looked good. They all looked good, some were packed full including one place which even had a lady sitting on top of her suitcase at the doorway, enjoying some yakitori.

We finally settled on a place and were seated upstairs with a view of the lines above the railway tracks. Food is simple but flavoursome, perfect accompaniments for beer - skewers of chicken, pork, liver, mushrooms, eggplant and tofu. Hiyayakko tofu is chilled tofu topped with grated ginger, eschallots and bonito flakes needed just a draping of shoyu, whilst salt-seasoned salmon with grated radish needed only a squeeze of lemon juice. The non-complimentary starters ("otoshi") were light and refreshing salads - a mix of vegies and tofu served cold. But the most interesting translation on the English menu was "crab guts lightly" recommended to go well with beer. It's a strong crabby-tasting paste which we picked at in turns.

Piss Alley - yay!!!

Love the atmosphere of Piss Alley. Love luggage-lady even more!

Our chosen dining destination.

Otoshi, Crab Guts Lightly and crisp, fresh  Japanese draft beer.

Hiyayakko Tofu.

Salmon.

Skewers galore - chicken, liver, fried tofu, pork, mushrooms, eggplant...drool...

 
Back on the first day when we were still trying to find the hotel, we noticed a modest looking tempura place which had a queue of local Japanese outside, convincing us that we had to try to this place. We made it back to Tsunahachi Tempura a few days later for a tempura menu set lunch which was so good we weren't sure if we could bring ourselves to eat tempura again (thinking about it makes my mouth water). Except for Dave, we all had the "Hiru Zen" set menu for 1260yen which included tempura of 2 prawns, whitefish and 2 vegetables, shrimp kakiage and osoroi (rice, miso soup, pickles). Dave went for the "Special Tempura Zen" (2730yen) which from memory had about 4 additional pieces of tempura including shellfish and conger eel.

The osoroi was brought out first and ooh! the miso soup had tiny little clams in their shells. Then came the tempura, freshly made and so light. Then the shrimp kakiage came, a crispy clump of prawny goodness. The full set is both satisfying and filling, definitely value for money. We don't know how Dave managed to squeeze in the extra pieces that came with his set! We did add one extra item from the a la carte menu - I think it was eggplant wrapped in shiso leaf and then given the tempura treatment. It was indeed "とてもおいしいです" (it's very delicious), something we found ourselves saying about every meal and snack in Japan.

Tempura Tsunahachi - lucky for us there was no line at this brunch hour (who eats tempura for breakfast?)

Tempura masters at work!

Pickles, grated radish.... makes one excited about the upcoming meal...

Eggplant in shiso leaves tempura, miso soup with tiny little clams.

Our lovely waitress serving fresh tempura, and to finish - shrimp kakiage.

Shinjuku served us well as our base for exploring Tokyo and surrounds, but more importantly for some good food options as you can already see from our first few meals. It was a sign of more good food to come so watch this space for more Japan blog posts!

Jack Jap-Snacks!... Royce' Nama Chocolate

Last year a friend brought back some Royce' Nama Chocolate from Singapore, Maccha flavour no less, so it goes without saying I liked it very much! I made a mental note to get some when I was in Japan but, as anyone who's ever been there would agree, when you're actually in Japan there are just sooooo many different things to eat that you're constantly distracted with something new.

So it wasn't until we were at Narita airport on the day of our departure that I managed to buy some Nama Chocolate. It's made with fresh Hokkaido-milk cream which makes it super soft, creamy and rich. There are various flavours, both alcohol based and non-alcohol based. But I couldn't go past the maccha which is both strong in fragrance and taste.

With it's high cream content refrigeration is necessary - naturally the Japanese have this sorted with thermal cooler bags for an additional cost. They put the chocolates in the bag and then place a little cooling pack inside which preserves the precious cargo.

Stay-cool packaging to protect the chocolate.

Yum! I highly recommend trying it because it tastes great. Even my mum (who doesn't eat chocolate) liked it and ate several pieces in one sitting!

It's appearance is a little worse for wear after 2 flights but the creamy texture and maccha taste are unaffected - oishii!

What: Royce' Nama Chocolate (Maccha flavour)
Where: Buy it in Japan (I got mine at the airport complete with cooling bag). Their international outlets are listed here
How much: Nama Chocolate cost 660yen (containing 20 pieces), it cost me an extra 100 yen to get the thermal cooler pack

Japan - Mamezen (Kyoto)

First, a message to Minoru Yonekawa and Mitsue Yonekawa:

私たちの新しい友達に。どうもありがとうございました。私たちはあなたの両方が大好きです。我々はMamezen が大好きです。我々は、豆乳ラーメンが大好きです。我々は両方の再を見に京都に戻ることを望む！

[Jack] Happy New Year! Welcome to our first post of 2012 and our first post from the Japan trip and... our first joint post! This was actually the second last dinner we had in Japan but I really wanted to start off the Japan posts with Mamezen. Due to being so busy with work I really didn't have much time to research food places for the Japan trip but Mamezen was one of the few gems that I was really keen to try. Why? Because they make a unique dish, Kyoto-style Dashi Soymilk Ramen. It sounded interesting and delicious and I just couldn't wait to check it out. In all aspects it far exceeded my expectations and it's an evening that I won't forget!

[Jess] Mamezen is not the easiest place to find although it is well worth the trip. As it was late we took a taxi from the centre of town with only a vague idea of where it was on our map and the address saved on Jack's phone. In a country like Japan, this is not an issue at all as everyone is SOOOO helpful and kind - here's what I mean: after driving around the small suburban streets with no sight of any restaurants, our taxi driver stopped the meter running but continued driving around. After 5 minutes without any luck, he called the restaurant and took us to the front door, charging us from when he had stopped the meter 10 minutes earlier. How awesome is that!! But anyway, back to Mamezen....

The street where Mamezen is, a little hard to find at night time!

But luckily, the entrance is well lit - look for the sign!

[Jack] We went through the outer door and walked down what looked to be a little garden pathway to the restaurant. It was dark, but I imagine this would be very pretty during the day. Even though it was dark, it felt serene and peaceful and this was the same lovely atmosphere we found when we entered the restaurant. It's a small restaurant that seats just a handful of diners at the counter and a few small tables on the tatami floor. But it feels spacious and bright, I like the atmosphere and am excited about our upcoming meal.

 

Love the kitchen.. and hooray! There is an english menu.



[Jack] The team at Mamezen consists of chef Minoru Yonekawa and his wife Mitsue Yonekawa. They are two of the loveliest people you could meet and really made our meal that much more special. Despite knowing only a little english, Mitsue endeavoured to converse with us and we had a lovely conversation peppered with numerous "ano's" (Japanese for "umm") and phrase-book-flipping-pauses as Jess and I struggled to find our inner Japanese. As we were obviously tourists, Mitsue asked if we had found Mamezen on the web, I said yes and that I'd seen it on a blog and straight away she asked if it was Kyoto Foodie, which was indeed correct. She continued to explain that since KyotoFoodie posted about Mamezen many foreigners came to eat there, especially vegetarians.

Chef Minoru Yonekawa and his wife Mitsue Yonekawa - two of the nicest people you could ever meet!

[Jess] The ramen at Mamezen is lovingly prepared - it's pretty much the only dish on the menu and is so simple, but the care that has gone into the preparation of the noodles, broth and the overall dish can be felt when you eat it as it gives you a warm, satisfying feeling. I loved that the broth had an ever so slight zesty taste to it from the yuzu peel and the umeboshi plum on top which worked so well with the milky broth.

[Jack] Totally agree with Jess - every component of this tonyu ramen works perfectly together so that no one flavour overpowers the dish.  It is instantly my new favourite ramen! Don't get me wrong, I love a good tonkotsu with it's pork-some soup but Mamezen is really something special, kind of like a heavenly and pure ramen. You really have to taste it and then you'll know what all the fuss is about!



Mamezen Kyoto-style Dashi Soymilk Ramen - perfection in a bowl.

[Jess] Yep our clean bowls at the end were testament to how good the ramen was. Add to that, that one of Dave's big holiday regrets was not ordering a large bowl, it was clear we had all fallen in love with soy milk ramen at Mamezen.  It goes without saying that if we are ever in Kyoto we will definitely go back, in fact we would return to Kyoto just for Mamezen.

Is that a clean bowl? Nope.. it's a post-Mamezen Soymilk Ramen bowl! Cause every last drop of soup is too oishii to leave behind!

What: Mamezen's Kyoto-style Dashi Soymilk Ramen
Where: Kyoto-shi, Sakyo-ku, Shimogamo, Higashi Takagi-cho 13-4 (京都市左京区下鴨東高木町13-4). See the Kyoto Foodie post for more detailed information or you can also check out their facebook page
How much: Soymilk ramen comes in 3 sizes - small (60gm, 840yen), normal (90gm, 950yen) and large (120gm, 1050yen). Lunch sets are available as well as a daily kid's set menu. There are also a couple of desserts on offer which I will try next time!