There’s a lot of pleasure in visiting old places. The danger is that the theme-park attraction of them is often not met by anything resembling food, Alternatively, you can be forcibly reminded that the theme park is in your head, and the people who own and run these places aren’t doing it to be retro […]
Author: Jon
35 Annual Chiba Bluegrass Festival, Sakura
Saturday was clear and hot, until it rained like hell and started steaming, and the agenda was for nothing but renting a car, doing some driving, and listening to American country music played by unironic Japanese men. And some women. If you don’t know what bluegrass is, this post is unlikely to change your life. […]
- Other treats
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Kichiemon ramen, Yachiyo (きちえもん)
With nothing but clear skies and bluegrass ahead, the first order of the day was to pick up a rental car and hit the highway. This is the Keio Road, which runs east into Chiba. Tokyo’s highways really look like video games, don’t they? Or rather, driving video games have probably evolved to look like […]
- izakaya
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Yamato, Morishita (山登)
Sometimes people ask how I find all these places. Much like Eddy Merckx describing his approach in training to be the world’s best cyclist as ‘Ride lots,’ I spend an inordinate amount of time looking. Seek and ye shall find. I actually find the looking almost as enjoyable as the finding and eating, because it’s […]
Uoju, Kodemmacho (魚十)
Tokyo has a garment district, did you know that? Loads of cheap-looking clothing stores, and of course fabric and whatever bits ‘n’ bobs you need to, y’know, make clothes. (If you want to check it out, it’s in Bakuroyokoyama; you could walk from Kodemmacho on the Hibiya line or else there’s a direct stop on […]
Fujiya, Nihonbashi (フジヤ)
Around my place, we adhere to the ‘dirty is good’ philosophy. This may get you in trouble in, say, India or Vietnam (where I prefer to say ‘dirty is deadly’), but in Japan health standards are such that you’re never going to get sick from restaurant food. Fujiya exhibits layers of steamed-on grease from long simmering […]
- Kanda
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Miharado, Kanda (三原堂)
After the disappointing cold noodles at the Big Dragon (and don’t get excited by the name, just avoid it), I needed something else to eat. Preacher and I happened by this place and I remember liking the look of it before. It’s a normal sweets shop, so you can get the usual assortment of baked […]
Dairyu, Kanda (大龍)
The heat, my friends, makes one do stupid things. I keep having this problem where I get headaches from exercise, mainly from cycling – after 80 or 90 minutes, I start getting a headache that lasts all day. It feels like dehydration, but I drank gallons of water last time and it still didn’t work. […]
Kyushu Otokomichi, Ebisu (九州男道)
Chain izakayas. Do you think I hate them? I don’t. They fill a niche, and are fun, and the food is never bad even if it’s never surprising or exciting or different. Not liking chain izakayas is, I think, unnecessary snobbery. Despite the funny name (Kyushu Men’s Street?), you can sorta tell from the slickness […]
- bar
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Shu Salon, Shinagawa （酒茶論）
I’ve always thought Shinagawa is an odd place – the station is big, and a little confusing, and it’s really just anchored by hotels. If you’re not there for a wedding, why are you there? In this case we were planning to go to the aquarium, but being a cheap bastard in many ways I […]