Tororo | SHIZUOKA GOURMET

Service: Friendly and informative
Equipment & Facilities: Old but very clean
Prices: Reasonable
Strong points: Traditional japanese food in a traditional environment full of history!

Chojiya/弔子屋 in Mariko, the 21st station of the Old Tokaido Highway made famous by Utagawa Hisroshige’s (real name: Ando Hiroshige) wooden prints, has served traditional tororojiru, grated yam soup, for no less than 400 years! actually many think that the inn featured on Hiroshige’s woodblock print is Chojiya indeed!

Chojiya under the rain.

In 1596 Shojiya Heikichi/丁子屋平吉 established this tea house in the post town of Mariko to serve the many travelers using the Old Tokaido Route from Edo/Tokyo to Kyoto.
Before reading this article I strongly encourage you to visit their superb HOMEPAGE (English)! A window opened on the history of Japan and Shizuoka!
Great bilingual pamphlets are available for free, too!

History is all around you in this tradtional Japanese inn! take as many photographs as you wish but bear in mind this is a busy place!

You will dine under the benign protection of giant Hina Dolls! Such dolls are to celebrate the Girls Day on March 3rd and Boys day on May 5th, but they are on constant display!

Do not forget to visit the little museum at the entrance where you will discover a genuine ukiyoe wooden print!

A genuine ceramic dish showing a scene of Mariko in Edo Era!

Keep your cameras on the ready!

The tororojiru/grated yam soup that Mariko and Chojiya are so famous for!
I visited the place with my good friend, Patrick who loves the delicacy served on freshly steamed rice!

You pour it yourself on your rice!

And you savor it with chopped thin leeks! The perfect dish for a vegetarian!

The whole traditional lunch!

You will also have the opportunity to enjoy great local sashimi!

Local vegetables served as a traditional boiled vegetable salad!

Their dashi tamagoyaki is a must! Tamagoyaki is the famous omelet-like dish in Japan that all egg lovers must try once!

I’m not too keen on grated yam soup myself but the staff readily agreed to replace it with vegetables serrved as tororoage/vegetables deep-fried in tororojiru! Lovely and such kind and great service!

The menu is impossible to explore in a single day so I definitely plan to come again, especially as the whole establishment is non-smoking!

CHOJIYA
421-0103 Shizuoka City, Aoi Ku, Mariko, 7-10-10 (Take the bus going to Fujieda from North Exit Platform No 7 at Shizuoka JR Station. Get off at Marikobashi Iriguchi stop!)
Opening hours: 11:00~19:00
Closed on Thursdays and last Wedenesday of the month
Entirely non-smoking!
HOMEPAGE

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