Japan is a strange and wonderful place. Hidden subcultures about – usually these only peek out for a moment when some intrepid foreign journalist comes to town and writes a story about a colorful character in one of them. You read it, you think it’s interesting, and you forget about it. I started playing music […]
Month: October 2009
Pivoine, Monzennakacho
Friday I took the day off from work to get legalized again – as they say, it’s no fun being an illegal alien, and I’m not interested in deportation. But getting legal doesn’t take very long, and the weather and my spirits were both so good that I wanted to do something nice. There are […]
- Kanda
- ...
Aburaya Seimen, Kanda (油屋製麺)
Pon pon. Pon and I went for an early/late lunch (horribly late for her, a bit early for me) and found ourselves heading toward Kanda, which we evidently do all the time in various other groups as well. With no clear plan, we were seduced by the lure of noodles, and in particular tsukemen, which […]
- izakaya
- ...
Yuasa, Mita (湯浅,芝)
This post innaugurates an exciting new chapter in ‘places I’ve never been before but will have to explore’ – Mita. If you’re like me, you may well have thought of Mita as a boring subway stop consisting mainly of office towers and huge apartment blocks. If you were like me, you would have been wrong, […]
Taikourou, Yaesu (泰興楼)
I’m starting to feel like a Shitamachi dining insider – this very good recommendation from Ricky is a gyoza specialist (with a broad menu) whose branch is Gyoza Bar Fei, in Kayabacho, tidily reversing my own dining trend between last night and today. I don’t really remember the gyoza at Fei, but I’ll remember the […]
- bar
- ...
Beer Bar Talo, Kayabacho
This post is for distant reader and longtime Tokyo dining expert John Wood (hi Woodie) who was kind enough to point out that there are restaurants on The Map that are not featured in posts. This is because The Map features all places that I can remember visiting, while the posts are only for new […]
Yamaichi, Awajicho (やまいち,淡路町)
I really can’t imagine a better tonkatsu than this. Should I stop there? This is unfortunately one of those reviews that’s in the vein of “This is the best place in the world, but you’ll never go there,” but it was really good. I wish I could go back every day, but when you consider […]
Brasserie Paul Bocuse, Tokyo (大丸１２階)
In the past I’ve said more than once that Les Brasseries Paul Bocuse are not a good thing. This is based on one particular visit I made to the Yurakucho branch; the food consisted of standards prepared in a barely competent way, and the prices were high. Today’s lunch was altogether more satisfactory, although in […]
- Other treats
- ...
Tarumatsu/Kanda Daruma, Ueno (たる松,神田達磨)
Considering that we started out for a short walk around the neighborhood, ending up on the train to Ueno was a bit of a surprise. It happened because the Modern Art museum was closed for the month (renovations) and a random walk left us back at the Oedo line in Kiyosumi Shirakawa. These stations often […]
King of Curry, Otemachi （カレーの王様）
What would you think if, say, McCormick had a fast food chicken place? (I grant you this won’t resonate unless you’re American. McCormick is probably America’s biggest manufacturer of spices. At least it’s the only one I can name, and that usually means something. Like my memory is going.) And they played only 70’s rock? […]