Ekiben/Railway Station Lunch Boxes-Bento 2: Tai Dontaku


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”Ekiben” or Railway Station Lunch Box (eki=station + ben/abbreviation for bento)in japan and Shizuoka are a must for travellers who wish to experience real local food!
Shizuoka has a higher average because of the great numbers of railway stations and access to many kinds of food and ingredients.
I purchased that particular one at Ito City Railway Station on October 23rd.

It is called “Tai Dontaku”.
“Tai” stands for seabream or snapper, a fish abundant along the Izu Peninsula shores.

The bottom half is steamed rice covered with powdered seabream flesh/surimi.
The top half includes “hotate karaage/deep-fried scallops”, “Gobo/simmered burdock roots”, and “Shiitake/simmered shiitake mushrooms”.


Provided with chopsticks and tooth pick, it made for a great lunch while visiting the Izu Kougen shoreline!

Shizuoka Breweries 8/1: Usami Brewery


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This is the 8th Micro Brewery in Shizuoka Prefecture I finally have ascertained. So far, I have nine confirmed! Usami Micro-Brewery and Restaurant are located in Ito City, Usami in the Izu Peninsula where great water is plentiful!

Usami Brewery: Thames/English type
Ingredients: Malt and hops
Alcohol: 5%
Contents: 330 ml
Unfiltered and unpasteurized

Foam: long head, very fine bubbles
Colour: dark brown, rich colour
Aroma: strong, caramel/bread.
Taste: Sweetish attack, bread, yeast
Solid but light
Does not vary with food and stays faithful to first taste.
Drank very easily in spite of its stout nature.

Overall: A pleasant stout-style beer.
Enjoyable for its own sake or with food, however heavy.
Best appreciated at room temperature, although cold beer fans would enjoy it if slightly chilled.

Usami Brewery
European ji Beer Company
Ito City, Usami, 3504-1
Tel.: 0557-33-0333
HOMEPAGE (Japanese)

Bryan Baird’s Newsletter


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Baird Beer & Taproom Events Bulletin 2008 #22
bryan-sayuri.gif

Dear Taproom Friend & Baird Beer Enthusiast:

If you are in search of the beery flavor of fall, seek no more. Baird Beer has captured that autumnal essence in a wonderful seasonal brew set for release today: Big Red Machine Fall Classic Ale.

Big Red Machine Fall Classic Ale (ABV 5.5%):

To baseball fans, October means it’s World Series (also known as the “Fall Classic”) time. To me, the annual Fall Classic invariably brings back boyhood memories of watching and rooting for the great “Big Red Machine” Cincinnati teams of 1975 and 1976 World Series fame. Big Red Machine Fall Classic Ale was brewed initially in 2005 as a 30-year tribute to the Cincinnati Reds World Series championship team of 1975 (they won in a dramatic 7-game series against the Boston Red Sox). We continue to brew it annually because it is such a fine beer and is the perfect libation to enjoy while taking in the Fall Classic.

Brawny in the depth and richness of its malt character (five different malts are used), this malt muscle is balanced beautifully by a wonderfully spicy and sprite hop essence (we use American Magnum, Amarillo and Glacier varieties). Much as the rare combination of power and finesse was a hallmark of the Big Red Machine on the field, so too is it a hallmark of the Big Red Machine in the pint glass!

Big Red Machine Fall Classic Ale (a bronze medal winner in the 2008 World Beer Cup) is now pouring from the taps of both the Fishmarket and Nakameguro Taprooms. It also will be available on draught, beginning Thursday, October 23, at fine Baird Beer retailing pubs and restaurants throughout Japan. The bottle-conditioned version (360 ml bottles) will be available for purchase at our online estore as well as via the fine family of Baird Beer retailing liquor stores in Japan.

Finally, please note a change in business hours for our Nakameguro Taproom. Beginning Monday, November 1, the Nakameguro Taproom will be open as follows:

*Monday-Friday (2:00 PM – Midnight)
*Saturday, Sunday, National Holidays (Noon – Midnight)

For all you late night drinkers, this is good news as we will be open later. We will not be serving lunch on weekdays any longer, however, although we will feature a lunch service on weekends and national holidays.

Cheers!
Bryan Baird

Baird Brewing Company
Numazu, Japan
HOMEPAGE

Today’s Lunch Box/Bento (35)


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My other half said this morning: “Today I’ll make an open sandwich bento!”
“Great and thanks!” (and a wet kiss…)

Actually it turned into a bit of an extravagant “open bento”!

The “main sandwich ingredients” included a almost soft-boiled egg (impossible to eat between two slices of bread!), a lot of cress, a few fresh endive/chicory leaves containing lightly boiled crispy/crunchy mini-asparaguses, plum tomatoes, cornichons, duck confit (she took it out the freeze and fried it until the skin was crispy light brown), and fried potatoes (not French, please) she had suteed/fried in the confit fat. Now, I gave up making up sandwiches!

“Haddock in the Kitchen” might be interested to know that the Missus baked the bread yesterday.
The bread contained shredded carrots, chopped mint leaves and crumbled walnuts. I have to admit that it was a beauty. Therefore I ate it bit by bit as I consumed my bento along!

Now, I will this opportunity to introduce the dressings I usually keep in the fridge at work:
The “white” one is a Japanese Kewpie Caesar Salad Dressing (Gold Type).
The “orange” one is a Soken non-oil dressing containing green shiso, herbs and lemon.
Both are light and tasty enough and all ingredients are described on the back!

Well, this time I had plenty of dessert! (I suspect the Missus was emptying the fridge…)
Kiwi fruit, Kaki/Persimmon and Nashi/Japanese pear and asome walnut!

Alright, I know I’m spoiled!

Thanks Foodbuzz for the freebies!


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Dear Foodbuzz staff, thanks you so much for all the freebies!
I actually got a few more than anyone else as I received four different packs of business cards for four different blogs!

The eco bag is quickly “changing colour” as most supermarkets have recently started charging for plastic bags in Japan!

As for the apron and the spatula, I might have to give them to the Missus as I am allowed in the kitchen only on week-ends when I’m on cooking duty!

Thanks again!
Cheers and all that,
Robert-Gilles

Today’s Lunch Box/Bento (34)


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Due to National Holidays falling on my usual “bento days”, it’s been some time since I could extoll the virtues of my (?) half’s bentoes (lol).
Today’s prepartions witnessed a few variations according to seasonal and unseasonal produces.

The “nigiri”/rice balls had been steamed together with tinned beans and “hijiki” seaweed, to which the Missus added a dash of shoyu before making the rice balls. As the rice was still very hot she used the “kitchen vinyl wrap” technique. Cutting a large enough piece of “Sun Wrap” (Japanese name) and holding it inside the palm of her hand, she put the proper amount of rice in the middle, close the “paper” around it and shaped it into a ball before releasing it onto a plate. The balls were later half-wrapped in shiso leaves. Incidentally I would like to thank here all the friends who left so many kind messages about the shiso posting!
In the centre she placed freshly sauteed “sasami”/chicken greast fillets on a bed of cress.
The pickles are green baby melon (home-made), tomatoes marinated in mirin (home-made) and shredded “takuan”/pickled daikon.

The “salad” consisted of a soft-boiled egg on a green leaves bed with “ameera rubbins”/the smallest sweet tomatoes in the world, exclusively grown by only two farmers in Shizuoka Prefecture.
Dessert consisted of small slices of nashi (white), or Japanese pear, and kaki (orange), a square variety of persimmon created some time ago in Shizuoka Prefecture. Nashi are almost at the end of their season whereas kaki have just apeared on the supermarket shelves.

Now did you know that persimmons contain five times as many Vitamin C in a lemon, weight for weight?

Cheese Plate at Gentil (1)


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This is the first installment of a hopefully long series of cheese plates served at Gentil Restaurant in Shizuoka City.
The Cheese Sommelier, Ms. Keiko Kubota is the not only Japanese holding the title of Grand Chevalier de Taste Fromage in Japan but she was asked to choose, prepare and serve the cheeses offered to all these vey improtantpeople at the G8 Summit held last July in Hokkaido.

I reckon the pic is not too great. The resaturant is a bit too dark for mobile phone cameras. I promise better ones next time!

The cheese featured on the above picture are:
Left top: Mozzarella Miso Zuke, a cheese from Hokkaido that Ms. Kubota matured in miso paste.
Left middle: Tsuki no Okurimono (Hokkaido)
Left bottom: Sakura (Hokkaido)

Centre: Maroilles (France)
Centre bottom: Chabichou du Poitou (France)

Right top: Vieille Mimolette (France, 18 months)
Right middle: Epoisses affine au Chablis (France, very near my birthplace!)
Right bottom: Brie de Meaux (France), matured for 3 months in France and one more month by Ms. Kubota.

Don’t worry, next time I will ask her cheese from Italy and elsewhere!

Restaurant Gentil
Address:420-0031 Shizuoka Shi, Gofuku-cho, 2-9-1, Gennan Kairaku building, 2F
Tel.: 054-2547655 (Reservations advisable)
Fax: 054-2210509
Opening hours: 12:00~14:00, 18:00~last orders for meals at 21:30. Bar time 18:00~23:30. Closed on Mondays.
Credit cards OK
Homepage

Shizuoka Supermarket Sashimi


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Last Sunday, as I had to “cook” that evening before the Missus came back from work, I ventured in Shizutetsu Store Supermarket in front of Ichiritsu High School.
Frankly speaking, I did not have a clue about I could concoct for my better-worse (sorry, Rowena!). That until I noticed ridiculously cheap seafood on display. Actually October is a great for lots of fish which come in plenty.

Here is what I bought on impulse:


“Maguro Sashimi/Tuna sashimi” for 480 yen. Allison, can you believe it?


“Ika Somen/Thinly cut fresh cuttle-fish2 for 217 yen


“Sakura Ebi/Cherry Blossom Shrimp” for 268 yen. These shrimps are exclusively caught of Yui shore in Shizuoka Prefecture.


“Katsuo Sashimi/Bonito Sashimi” for 480 yen from Shizuoka Prefecture, of course. Enormous portion!

“Myoga” and “Shiso” for 246 yen

Grand total: 1641 yen/less than US $ 16.50, enough for 4 persons (we managed to eat the whole, though!)!

Shizuoka Sushi Restaurant: Sushi Ko (revisited)


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Last Thursday, as I had to atone for some somewhat egoistical pleasure-seeking, I took the Missus to our favourite Sushi Restaurant in Shizuoka City, namely Sushi Ko,located along Aoba Park.


Although we did order the inevitable favourites, “katsuo/bonito” sashimi, “Shirako to Ankimo/Combination of Cod Sperm sacs and Frogfish/Monkfish liver”, “Pon Kara Maguro/Deep-fried tuna cubes”, “Shishamo/Spirinchus lanceolatus”, “Hotate/Scallops”, “Maguro Zuke/Marinated Tuna sushi”, and “Amaebi nigiri to Shiraebi Gunkan/Sweet shrimp and white shrimp sushi”, the star of the day was “Kawahagi/Filefish”!

The chef took a splendid live specimen (see top pic) just caught off Mochimune coast in Shizuoka City out of the “aquarium” and proceeded to serve the complete fish in three different manners:


“O-Tsukuri”:
After having taken away the inedible skin, the chef first cut the fillets into very thin slices to be served with thin leeks and dip sauce made of ponzu mixed with the fresh liver of the same fish. As now is the best season, those comparatively thin fish come up with enormous livers!


“O nigiri”:
The chef managed to keep four slices aside to prepare nigiri with the fish flesh topped with a piece of its liver, some “momiji oroshi/grated daikon with chili pepper” and seasoned with ponzu!


“Kara age”:
The “cheeks bones” with their meat were last deep-fried and served as they are with some lemon. Simple and great!
All this with one single fish!

Sushi Ko
shizuoka City, Aoi Ku, Ryogae-cho. 2-3-1 (Aoba Koen)
Tel.: 054-2512898
Business Hours: 17:00~25:00. 17:00~23:00 (Sundays)
Closed on Wednesdays
Reservations recommended
Credit cards OK
HOMEPAGE (Japanese)

Shizuoka Japanese Cuisine: Tomii (revisited)


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Last Wednesday, my merry companions, Etsuko, Melinda and Tim and I finally arrved at Tomii in Shizuoka after a long day interviewing local sake breweries.
It was fitting that it was also the first time I visited this favourite Japanese Cuisine Restaurant as it had just gone through a total re-designing.

The place is definitely more comfortable for it, having done with the mixture of Japanese and Western-style seating and adopted a more practical arrangement of tables and chairs that can either divided into smaller rooms or left completely open. The counter has been reduced by a third but is far more ongenila for it.

As for the Cuisine it is as high quality as ever with the difference that local sake has been increased to a toatl of nine with the notion of changing regularly to cover as many breweries as possible during the year.
We had actually asked the restaurant to prepare a meal according to the sake served.
We did managed to taste eight of them!
Just look at the food which was served with them and see if you recognize any!

Are you tempted?
I’m sure you are!

TOMII
Shizuoka City, Aoi Ku, Tokiwa-cho, 1-2-7, Tomii Bldg, 1F
Tel.: 054-274-0666
Business hours: 17:00~22:00
Closed on Sundays
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Shizuoka Sobaya (Soba/Buckwheat Noodles): Setsugetsuka


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Last week, during that memorable day spent in the merry company of Etsuko Nakamura, Melinda Joe and Timothy Sullivan, we had lunch at a sobaya I had planned to visit for quite some time in Shimada City: Setsugetsuka.

This is the kind of place I can recommend to a lot of people with very different culinary tastes, be they vegetarian, vegan or omnivourous (that’s for me).
The interior has just been revamped into a great Japanese semi-traditional atmosphere, which should please guests in search of a true Japanese setting.

The food from complimentary soba tofu (see above picture) to dessert is of refined quality at very reasonable prices.
The 7th generation chef (the place was opened 90 years ago) tries to combine classics and original recipes:


“Fuwa fuwa tamagoyaki”/a Japanese omelette with a twist: The tamagoyaki is first cooked, put inside a bowl with “dashi/soup stock”, then covered with beaten eggs and cooked again in an oven to attain a “cloudy omelette” reminiscent of a souffle!


Tenpura are served one at a time to ensure freshness.


Tenpura includes “sakura Ebi Kakiage”, made with Sakura Shrimps which can be caught only off Yui-cho shore in the Prefecture!


Soba come in many varieties from stright “10-wari” to:


violet soba (mixed with violet yam!)

Frankly speaking one cannot exhaust all the possibilities, so visit their homepage (Click on anything printed in blue or violet!). Even if you do not understand Japanese, you will enjoy the pics!

Incidentally, they serve great local sake from their neighbours at Oomuraya Brewery!

Setsugetsuka
Shimada City, Hotoori, 2-3-4
TEL: 0547-35-5241
Opening hours: 11:30~14:30; 17:00~22:00
Closed on Mondays and third Tuesdays
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LAUNCH OF GLOBAL FOODBUZZ BLOGGER COMMUNITY

San Francisco – October 13, 2008: Foodbuzz, Inc., officially inaugurates its food blogger community with more than 1,000 blog partners, a global food blogging event and an online platform that captures the real-people, real-time power of food publishing in every corner of the world. At launch, the Foodbuzz community ranks as one of the top-10 Internet destinations for food and dining (Quantcast), with bloggers based in 45 countries and 863 cities serving up daily food content.
“Food bloggers are at the forefront of reality publishing and the dramatic growth of new media has redefined how food enthusiasts access tasty content,” said Doug Collister, Executive Vice President of Foodbuzz, Inc. “Food bloggers are the new breed of local food experts and at any minute of the day, Foodbuzz is there to help capture the immediacy of their hands-on experiences, be it a memorable restaurant meal, a trip to the farmers market, or a special home-cooked meal.”
Foodbuzz is the only online community with content created exclusively by food bloggers and rated by foodies. The site offers more than 20,000 pieces of new food and dining content weekly, including recipes, photos, blog posts, videos and restaurant reviews. Members decide the “tastiness” of each piece of content by voting and “buzz” the most popular posts to the top of the daily menu of submissions. Foodbuzz currently logs over 13 million monthly page views and over three million monthly unique visitors.
“Our goal is to be the number-one online source of quality food and dining content by promoting the talent, enthusiasm and knowledge of food bloggers around the globe,” said Ben Dehan, founder and CEO of Foodbuzz, Inc.
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The Foodbuzz blogger community is growing at a rate of 40 percent per month driven by strong growth in existing partner blogs and the addition of over 100 new blogs per month. “The Foodbuzz.com Web site is like the stock of a great soup. The Web site provides the base or backbone for bloggers to interact as a community, contribute content, and have that content buzzed by their peers,” said Mr. Dehan.
Global Blogging Event
Demonstrating the talent and scope of the Foodbuzz community, 24 Meals, 24 Hours, 24 Blogs offered online food enthusiasts an international, virtual street festival of food and diversity. The new feature showcased blog posts from 24 Foodbuzz partner bloggers chronicling events occurring around the globe during a 24 hour period and included:
• Mid-Autumn Festival Banquest (New York, NY)
• The “Found on Foodbuzz” 24-Item Tasting Menu (San Francisco, CA)
• Aussie BBQ Bonanza – Celebrating Diversity (Sydney, Australia)
• The Four Corners of Carolina BBQ Road Trip (Charleston, SC)
• Criminal Tastes – An Illegal Supper (Crested Butte, CO)
• From Matambre to Empanadas: An Argentine Dinner (Buenos Aires, Argentina)
• A Sweet Trompe l’oeil (Seattle, WA)

“24 Meals, 24 Hours, 24 Blogs” captures the quality and unique local perspective of our food bloggers and shared it with the world,” said Ryan Stern, Director of the Foodbuzz Publisher Community. “It illustrates exactly what the future of food publishing is all about – real food, experienced by real people, shared real-time.”
About Foodbuzz, Inc.
Based in San Francisco, Foodbuzz, Inc., launched its beta Web site, foodbuzz.com, in 2007. In less than a year, Fooduzz.com and its community of over 1,000 exclusive partner food blogs have grown into an extended online property that reaches more than three million users.

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Le Cafe-Labo: Classic Cakes (9)


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Some patissiers, when they design their cakes, show more good sense than others.
I don’t know how many times I found myself digging into a cake’s various layers encountering vastly different textures and ending up in a mess on my plate.

Le Cafe-Labo In Shizuoka City achieved the perfectly balanced confectionery when they came up with their new strawberry cake, Fraisee.
Between two thin layers of Genoise/French short cake a mixture of custard cream and butter cream provided enough solidity to enable the spoon or fork to smoothly cut through the whole cake and bring a satisfactory portion to the expecting palate.
The strawberries inside, although untreated, had been so well chosen that the spoon did not meet with any change as far as the texture was concerned.
The strawberry coulis, the dried strawberries, the blueberry and the icing sugar enhanced the whole cake with the exact amount of sweetness and elegance!

A cake to be savoured slowly!

LE CAFE-LABO
424-0886 Shizuoka City, Shimizu Ku, Kusanagi, 46
Tel.: 054-3441661
Also available at Isetan Dept. Store, Shizuoka City, Aoi Ku, Shichiken-Cho

Robert Yellin Mishima Yakimono Gallery Newsletter: Bizen Yaki/Bizen Pottery


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(Wakimoto Hiroyuki )

Greetings from Mishima,

Just coming back from California last week I once again realized how important the seasons play out in Japanese culture. Talking with my friends in San Diego most had no idea about how the
Japanese take the seasons to a poetic height, for instance changing vessels to match the seasons. Here autumn is in full swing and thus autumnal delicacies and fitting pottery are to be
seen everywhere. I can argue that no other Japanese pottery style fits autumn better than Bizen.

A month or so ago I did visit Bizen and selected works by Harada Shuroku, Wakimoto Hiroyuki and Kakurezaki Ryuichi.

Works by Wakimoto

and Harada are mostly listed in the gallery–some preview photos for Wakimoto–and after my return from California I started listing Kakurezaki’s works. All three are major figures, yet


Kakurezaki is surely *the* Bizen ceramic artist representing the *now* for Bizen. Four of his larger not yet listed works can be viewed here:
1, 2, 3, 4.

Today I’ll be listing a katakuchi pouring vessel as well as a smaller vase. All are museum quality works and please do view them when you have a moment, if for nothing else then to refresh
the senses in these surreal days.

Also, Ajiki Hiro’s son Jun is also now showing some of his fine chawan with us; they are very much in his father’s artistic realm. Quite a few potters here are now copying the Ajiki style, especially their checkered Basara style, blatant copying really.
I won’t name names, yet one is a very celebrated–shameless–potter here.

In May our gallery was featured on a NHK special on Bizen and since then a small book was published by NHK with additional photos and copy. All in Japanese though, if anyone is interested
in seeing a copy please email me.

Also, if you happen to be in Tokyo on Oct. 25th, John Gauntner and I will be hosting a Sake-Pottery Lecture Dinner; please email me for further details or see John’s web site noted above, the events page.

In any event, thank you for your interest in our gallery and wishing you all a pleasant autumn.

Cordially,

Robert Yellin
Robert Yellin Yakimono Gallery

Today’s Lunch Box/Bento (33)


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Today the Missus made good use of yesterday’s leftovers and home-preserved vegetables.

There are always two or three boiled eggs in the fridge, so one of them found its way in today’s lunch. The Missus had kept aside some of the edamame served last night for my evening drink, took them out of their pods and also kept them overnight in the fridge.
Yesterday my Monday’s lunch consisted of deep-fried pork/tonkatsu muffin sandwiches. She seasoned the pork leftovers with home-made sweet pickled ginger and ponzu vinegar. The vegetables accompanying the meat in its little box are okura and aubergines/egg plants she had first fried, cooled down and then marinated overnight. The little tomato had been pickled/marinated separately.
The white-green thing in its foil paper is “wasabi zuke/wasabi stems and leaves pickled in sake white lees”, a very Japanese condiment. Most of the total national production is made in Shizuoka Prefecture!
As for the rice, she steamed it with fresh mushrooms, soy sauce and I don’t know what (she wouldn’t tell me…). All I can is that I loved it!

For once she did not omit dessert as mini apple slices were included in the salad!