Isetan Market Restaurant AGIO in Shinjuku, Tokyo #HIasia #FB

Last night after checking into our awesome hotel (not), we went for a walk around the Shinjuku area.  We decided to use the evening to browse Isetan Department Store.

When we got there, we went up to the 7th floor to check out the restaurants because we were hungry.  Most of the stuff looks like overpriced regular food, displayed attractively.  We opted for the Italian restaurant, AGIO. 

The prices at AGIO were moderate, 1500-3000 yen a dish (around $20-40 at current exchange rates :-/).  We had the AGIO pizza and the meat sauce type spaghetti.

The spaghetti tasted too much like beef stew (concentrated beef flavor) with spaghetti noodles.  It wasn't impressive at all.  In fact I don't recommend it. :P

The AGIO pizza thing was OK.  The crust was OK, but not really a pizza crust.  Seemed more like a flour tortilla with hamburger helper and cheese on it.  The cheese didn't really match the "pizza" flavor. 

Anyway, that's my experience at AGIO.  I doubt I would eat there again.  It is rather surprising considering how obsessed, for so many years, Japan has been about creating this Japanese style of Italian cuisine.  While this place isn't a Japanese flavored Italian restaurant, it certainly wasn't an authentic Italian flavored one either.

Hope we have better luck with breakfast.  We are cooped up in Starbucks right now because the typhoon changed or Disney Sea plans.  Nothing else in Shinjuku is open yet, other than convenience stores, and it's almost 9am!!  Don't really want to eat Starbucks for breakfast! :P

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Iyemon Salon Kyoto 京都のお茶カフェイエモンサロン #HIasia #FB

While we were in Kyoto for one evening, we met up with some friends.  We first had dinner at Gogyo (the post prior to this) and then we went to have tea.  お茶しょうか。(Ocha shiou ka?)  Is a common Japanese question/invitation.  It translates to, "shall we have tea?".  It is just like it sounds, have tea, coffee and desserts while socializing.

We made it to Iyemon Salon just before last call for kitchen items.  There were some unusual items on the menu and I ordered one of them, the matcha soda or green tea soda.  It was very interesting.  Slightly bitter as it is served, but tastes nice after adding some sweetener.  I used a little of the dark molasses looking syrup that came with my panna cota or custard looking thing.

It is a very nice place in the city to have tea.  The front of their store has tea and souvenirs available for retail purchases.  The rear of the restaurant has a nice Japanese garden.  I wish I could've taken a photo of it.  I couldn't because there were too many other customers sitting around that area.

Iyemon Salon is a cool place!  I hope I can go there again some day.  If you're in Kyoto City check it out.  Their address and phone number are in the photo of the receipt.  If you're in Kyoto for a longer period, I'm sure you'll have tea and dango at other traditional places near temples and such places.  Iyemon is a different setting because it's a fancy place in the city.  :)

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五行京都 Gogyo Restaurant in Kyoto #HIasia #FB

A few days ago, we met up with some of my friends in Kyoto.  My friend, Taka, suggested we have dinner at a "secret spot" in Kyoto city.  It's not really secret, but it is very difficult to find even for the locals because they can't remember which block it's on and all the street blocks look almost exactly alike.  After circling a few blocks, he finally found the place he was looking for.  It's called 五行 or Gogyo.  Taka describes it as a sort of ramen place, but izakaya (bar tavern) style because they have a special ramen, but it's a type of restaurant that you can sit around an snack on various other dishes while chit chatting and drinking.  A perfect venue for entertaining out of town/country guests like we are.

The specialty ramen is what is called a koge (burnt) taste soup.  Hearing or seeing a dish described as "burnt", wouldn't necessarily sound appetizing.  I assure you that while this ramen soup does have a burnt taste, it is balanced well and gives this ramen character.  Please try it in either the shoyu or miso koge flavors.

Gogyo not only has delicious ramen and other foods, but it provides a nice environment for chatting with your friends.  It was great catching up with Taka, Masami and Takeshi.  Thanks for taking us there!

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お好みハウスふくろう広島 Okonomi House Fukurou Hiroshima #HIasia #FB

Last night my family in Hiroshima took us to a Hiroshima style okonomiyaki restaurant near their house.  When I say near, I mean really near, like a 2 minute drive.  This may not sound unusual to hear unless you realize how deep into the boonies their house is from the "city".  It's over an hour drive just to get near the city.  The drive back and forth passes beautiful rice fields and other local agriculture.  The roads in and out are barely wide enough to fit one sub compact car at a time.  In fact one morning driving in to town while we yielded to a stop to let oncoming sub compact car (actually k-car smaller than sub) pass, his (passing driver) car slammed into our cars side view mirror and he continued driving along on his merry way as if it's a casual experience.  Hehe.

Anyway, the restaurant is called Okonomi House Fukurou (お好みハウスふくろう).  Okonimi is a Japanese dish that is popular in the Kansai areas around Osaka.  There you will find "traditional" okonomiyaki, resembling a pancake type of food texture filled with hearty ingredients and topped with sauce.  In Hiroshima, okonomiyaki is traditionally prepared differently.  It's more a yakisoba (Japanese fried noodles) type of dish than the pancake dish.  Many rivalries are debated about which is better.  As far as I'm concerned, I prefer Hiroshima's style.  Not just because it is where my family is from, but I don't care for the gooey pancake type.

This restaurant, as its name suggests, resembles visiting someone's home for dinner.  There are about 5 tables with teppan (Japanese grill) in them.  What I liked about this restaurant is that the actual cooking of the okonomiyaki is done by the chef at a big main teppan.  After it is done it is brought over and set on your table's hot teppan.  You eat the okonomiyaki hot off the teppan.  :)   If you go to some other places in the city, your okonomiyaki is cooked on the teppan right in front of your face.  While this may be an interesting experience for most people, the experience also comes with excessive heat and leaving smelling like food and cooking oils.  I can do without smelling like I just got off work at a restaurant.  After all, I hated smelling like that everyday after finishing work many years ago.    

If you're in Hiroshima, give Okonomi House Fukurou a call and reserve your table.  Their phone number and address is in the photo of their menu.

PS benefit of an hour+ drive into the city each morning is a lot of time to write my post and tweet! ;)
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Add photos Fwd: すし辰広島 sushi tatsu hiroshima #hiasia #fb

Sorry gmail android application dropped my photos again!  I hope it works this time!  :P

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Rick Nakama, R GRI" <ricknakama@gmail.com>
Date: Oct 27, 2010 5:29 PM
Subject: すし辰広島 sushi tatsu hiroshima #hiasia #fb 　
To: "Posterous All" <Post@posterous.com>

Today we had a kaiten sushi lunch at SUSHI TATSU in Hiroshima.  It is a kaiten sushi restaurant (the sushi goes around in circles).  There were some interesting varieties that they have there.  Take a look at the photos.

In one or two, you should see what looks like a giant mountain of negi toro (scallions & fatty tuna).  That was an unusual sighting.  I guess even in Japan they've started adding strange things at kaiten sushi restaurants.  I didn't see any spam today.  ;)

There's another photo of a pineapple going around the belt too!  Interesting!  おもしろかった！

Another neat thing was the tea powder at the table and a hot water dispenser to make your own green tea.  Fresh ocha whenever you want!  This ocha tasted good too and the cup/tea didn't taste like chlorinated sanitizer, like in Honolulu.  Check out the qik video link below to see a short clip of the お茶(tea) ceremony.  Hahaha.
http://qik.com/m/v/16858892?link=06c79d33

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すし辰広島 sushi tatsu hiroshima #hiasia #fb

Today we had a kaiten sushi lunch at SUSHI TATSU in Hiroshima.  It is a kaiten sushi restaurant (the sushi goes around in circles).  There were some interesting varieties that they have there.  Take a look at the photos.

In one or two, you should see what looks like a giant mountain of negi toro (scallions & fatty tuna).  That was an unusual sighting.  I guess even in Japan they've started adding strange things at kaiten sushi restaurants.  I didn't see any spam today.  ;)

There's another photo of a pineapple going around the belt too!  Interesting!  おもしろかった！

Another neat thing was the tea powder at the table and a hot water dispenser to make your own green tea.  Fresh ocha whenever you want!  This ocha tasted good too and the cup/tea didn't taste like chlorinated sanitizer, like in Honolulu.  Check out the qik video link below to see a short clip of the お茶(tea) ceremony.  Hahaha.
http://qik.com/m/v/16858892?link=06c79d33

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Matsukiya near Karahashimae Station. #HIasia #FB

We just arrived at my cousin's town, Ishiyama in Shigaken.  After dropping our luggage at their house, we went for lunch at a restaurant that specializes in serving Oumigyu (近江牛肉), the specialty beef of the origin that is similar to Kobe's famous beef.

It is a small three story building just a few steps from the
Karahashimae train station.  The ground floor is a shop that sells the raw beef and the second and third floor the restaurant are where the restaurant seating are.  We sat at the second floor in the teppan grill seating.

I ordered the "Lady's lunch" because it was an assortment of food for 2800 yen.  Lots of beef tataki or raw beef dishes were part of the set.  It was delicious!

Kelli had the beef ginger fried rice.  It was also delicious!

If you're in the area, try it out.

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