Tag - japanese-cuisine

 
 

JAPANESE CUISINE

Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Mar 25, 2014
La Tepparnya: Izakaya fare with a European twist
A few years back I spent an insufferable summer in an insufferable apartment (in a room as big as a shoebox), which I would rather forget than remember, in Juso, which is just beside the Yodo River in Osaka. Luckily, I found La Tepparnya, an izakaya that became my surrogate home. With good timing, I...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Mar 25, 2014
Sumo Cha-ya Terao: Spirit of sumo in every bowl
Chankonabe is wedded to sumo in the same way as whiskey is to the Wild West and cowboys; they're both fuel for fightin'. Terao Tsunefumi, the man behind this eponymous restaurant, is a well-respected sumo wrestler who had a career in the ring spanning 20 years, long by any measure in sports. For his...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Mar 18, 2014
Feed their tummies and minds with a back-to-school bentō
April marks the start of the school year in Japan. If you're a parent, this may mean that you're faced with the task of making bentō (boxed lunches) for the first time. While bentō are virtually a national institution that come in many formats and are enjoyed by almost everyone, making them for small...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Mar 18, 2014
Ajisen: Seasonal seafood and more in Tsukishima
There are many reasons for heading across the Sumida River to Tsukishima. Most of them involve monja, those griddle-splattered, dogs-dinner "pancakes" that are Tokyo's unconvincing answer to the okonomiyaki of western Japan. The one blessed anomaly is Ajisen.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Mar 11, 2014
Answer the kitchen's call with a casual cookery course
While economic growth remains slow, many restaurants are feeling the pinch, as customers choose to stay home and cook in order to save money.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Mar 11, 2014
Malebranche: French toast and a dozen matcha confections
I have a bread maker and often have leftover heels of bread, which are ideal for French toast. In theory. In my kitchen, my pain perdu, as the French rightly call it, is more often than not flat, dreary and sans raison d'etre. Which makes the French toast at Malebranche all the better, and mine all the...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Mar 6, 2014
Japan's top chefs grapple with sustainable eating
After the Asia's 50 Best Restaurants awards ceremony in Singapore last month, chef Yoshihiro Narisawa was in high spirits, despite the late hour and the tropical February heat. His Tokyo restaurant, the eponymous Narisawa in the Aoyama district, had been named Best Restaurant in Japan for the second...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Mar 4, 2014
Kagari: Creamy soup and noodles worth lining up for
Tracking down tiny, one-counter restaurants in Tokyo's narrow backstreets can often feel like the proverbial haystack needle-search. No such problem finding Kagari. The giveaway is the perpetual line of people outside.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Mar 4, 2014
Fuku: Your new local yakitori stop
Yakitori is neighborhood food, not destination dining. When you feel like nibbling on skewers of grilled chicken, you don't go across town; you head for your local. If you're lucky, it will be good. But it's unlikely to be as good as Fuku in Yoyogi-Uehara.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / EVERYMAN EATS
Feb 25, 2014
Prize-winning local dishes are the real taste of Japan
With memories of the Winter Olympics still fresh and with the Academy Awards just around the corner, Japanese food lovers are saluting some medalists of their own — prize-winning dishes from cooking competitions, public opinion polls and government surveys around the country. Here's a guide to some...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE PERSISTENT VEGETARIAN
Feb 25, 2014
Yakitori: not just skewered toward meat lovers
One of my favorite ways to unwind after a stressful day in the city is to hunker down in my local yakitori (grilled chicken) joint with a pint of beer and some deep-fried cheese on a stick. Not quite the quintessential picture of a vegetarian? Maybe so, but there's something about the dingy, low-key...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Feb 25, 2014
Hanakujira: Steamy scenes from the oden pot
Hanakujira is an all-society restaurant. At 5 o'clock on a Monday evening, the air still frigid with cold shock after a recent snowstorm, Osaka's great and ordinary are packed inside (and queuing outside) to get close to the steaming vats of oden. There are families with young ones, friends, office ladies,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OSAKA RESTAURANTS
Feb 25, 2014
Sobakiri Karani: The noodle shop you wouldn't suspect
The only clue that this is a soba shop is from the inscription on the noren curtain, but even that I didn't notice until leaving. That's not to say while passing by you don't slow down and look inside in wonder. I had pegged it as a hipster joint; there was an expensive fixed-wheel bicycle chained up...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Feb 18, 2014
You'll either love or hate those stinky, sticky beans
Soybeans have long been an important part of the Japanese diet. They are enjoyed in many forms — as edamame, tofu or yuba; boiled or roasted; ground up as flour; and so on. Soybeans also have religious significance, as we've seen this month during Setsubun, when roasted soybeans are thrown to signify...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Feb 18, 2014
Bettei: Duck shabu-shabu you'd be quackers to miss
Even a lingering winter has its upsides. The longer and harsher the conditions, the more appealing it is to sit down to a bubbling, warming nabe hot-pot — especially if it comes with a dash of contemporary style, as it does at Bettei.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Feb 13, 2014
Feed desire with our seductive Valentine's pairings
When I was a student at the University of California at Berkeley, I taught a class called Female Sexuality with some of my fellow schoolmates (yes, everything you've heard about Berkeley is true). As my work with food and drinks seldom crosses into the realm of sex education, few people know this about...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Feb 11, 2014
Okudohan: Fresh ingredients would be on the menu if there was one
In the hierarchy of Kyo ryōri, or Kyoto cuisine, obansai is at the bottom. Essentially it is home cooking that has wound its way from the homestead to the restaurant. At Okudohan it remains uncomplicated and comforting — as it should be.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Feb 11, 2014
Tourists offered a rare glimpse of the Japanese dining table
For visitors to Japan, a ride on the subway or the high-speed shinkansen can take you to almost any corner of the country. But those who want to learn about the daily lives of the Japanese rather than look at temples may find it difficult to gain access to the sanctuary of a Japanese home.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Feb 11, 2014
Greenhouse CoLLabo: A peaceful retreat in Umekoji Park
Umekoji Park, near Kyoto Station, has in recent years been through more makeovers than a beauty queen. The park is already home to the Umekoji Steam Locomotive Museum and Kyoto Aquarium, and now the builders are working on an enormous playground. Occupying a quiet corner of the park, Greenhouse CoLLabo...

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Yasuyuki Yoshida stirs a brew in a fermentation tank at his brewery in Hakusan.
The quake that shook Noto's sake brewing tradition