Two of my most favorite restaurants near where I live recently were more or less forced to undergo some major changes, in one place for the better, and in the other, I still not sure. Both are tachinomi-ya (stand and eat and drink) places I have frequented for nearly my entire time in Japan, Edomasa, in Higashinihonbashi, and Shukuzū in Ningyōchō. First, the change for the better: For the second time in the past seven years […]
Read moreMy wife frequently says that the Ningyōchō of today is not the same as it was ten years ago. Or even five years ago. And nothing, in my opinion, epitomizes that sentiment more than the loss of our neighborhood tōfu shops. When I moved here fifteen some years ago there were six tōfu shops within a few minutes walk, one in Kakigarachō that was the first to go, perhaps because the tōfu wasn’t really all that good; […]
Read moreFolkways Brewing is a small craft beer brewery just a couple of blocks from the Kiba MOA (Art Museum) whose IPA I really like. It’s not too far from home, but far enough away that I usually try to tie my visits with some other errand, such as shopping at Conan, the home center. One day while there I happened to look at the books they have on a small book shelf and noticed a title that […]
Read moreWhisky Week The past week or so has been filled with whisky (whiskey) events, starting with the annual Chichibu Whisky Matsuri in Chichibu, Saitama. Chichibu is home to Ichiro Akuto, the owner of Venture Distilling and the maker of Ichiro’s Malts whiskies, perhaps the most famous whisky in the world over the past ten or fifteen years. The fest brings whisky makers from all over the world to pour samples of their wares, plus other whisky collectors […]
Read moreSomething about Japan’s food culture that I realized long ago is that most people have a very high tolerance for hot food and drink. Hot as in temperature hot, not spicy hot. When it comes to myself, however, I have what is known in Japan a neko jita (猫舌), a term literally meaning “cat’s tongue” that is used to describe people who can’t eat or drink hot things (cats will drink warm milk, but if served milk […]
Read moreBack in April of this year, I think it was, I read a review of a book in the New York Times that made me put it on my list of books to buy when I visit Portland; Romaine Wasn’t Built in a Day: The Delightful History of Food Language, by Judith Tschann. I finally got around to reading it the other day, and it was just as good as the review claimed. The book is fun […]
Read moreOne day this past spring while getting my hair cut I picked up a copy of a magazine that was featuring soba that month. I soon forgot the name of the magazine, but I didn’t forget about a soba shop in Asakusa that looked worth visiting; Asakusa Hirayama. I get a lot of my soba ideas, and awareness of good restaurants, looking through the many food magazines published in Tokyo and Japan, including Hirayama. Unfortunately, while I […]
Read moreHashigoro はしご楼 A new building full of restaurants opened last week in Ningyōchō, Hashigoro. It’s on the corner of Kinza dori and Ningyōchō dori on the site of a former shoe repair shop and something else that I don’t ever recall seeing open for business. It’s a Mitsubishi project, which surprised me as Nihonbashi is mostly Mitsui territory. It consists of five floors of restaurants offering all sorts of Japanese and foreign cuisines, each restaurant more or […]
Read moreMitsui Fudosan and Why Foreigners Come to Nihonbashi I was recently asked to give a talk to some employees of Mitsui Fudosan (Mitsui Real Estate) on why foreigners visit the greater Nihonbashi area. Over the past month or so whenever I have spotted foreigners in the area I have introduced myself and explained what I am doing and then asked people a series of questions, starting with where the are from. If they live here I go […]
Read moreAfter a three-year absence, FoodEx Japan, a giant trade show for the food industry, returned to Tokyo Big Site last week for four days, although unlike in the past, this time it was not open to the public (I had a press pass). I went on two days, which was almost enough time to see perhaps half of the exhibits. Over sixty countries had exhibits, with the non-Japanese exhibitors aiming to break into the Japanese market, or […]
Read more