Food in Tokyo

We arrived at our hotel in Tokyo, from Sapporo, close to midnight. So we went into the first decent looking cafe near the hotel for our dinner. And this is the first meal we had in Tokyo.

I had the beef stew, which was served inside the hollow of a large bread roll. My wife had the seafood udon and my son had the chicken rice set. As we were very hungry and tired, even though the food was ordinary, we quickly gobbled down everything and went back to the hotel to sleep.

The next day we went to the Asakusa Kannon Temple (Sensoji 浅草寺) where people go to pay their respects to the Goddess of Mercy. On a side street to the left of the temple, you can find this fabulous restaurant Tempura Daikokuya (大黑家天麩羅).

Daikokuya is famous for their tendon (with rice in bowl), the most delicious is the Ebi-Tendon. The side dishes are also very appetizing. The Kurage-no-Sunomono (Jelly fish marinated in vinegar) is fresh and springy and the Nasu-no-Shigiyaki (grilled eggplant with sweet miso sauce) is simply excellent. The eggplant is grilled till soft but not mushy, and you need to taste it to get the full flavour which is hard to describe in words.

The tendon at Daikokuya is a very filling rice dish topped with huge prawns flavoured with tempura sauce. Their tempura sets are also very flavourful, with prawns, kisu fish and ocra deep-fried in light batter. This casual restaurant is a simply must try when in Asakusa. I found this restaurant more than 10 years ago when I visited Tokyo with my dancing friends. Although they have recently moved to a bigger premises (a stone's throw away from the old), the food and service is still as good.

One night, after visiting the Tokyo Skytree on our way back to the hotel, we found this quaint little eatery round the corner from Shin-Ohashi Dori, 碇そば金碇庵 (Japan 東京都中央区日本橋蛎殻町１丁目３９−１１). 

It is a small restaurant but the decor is very interesting. It has a wonderful collection of cute souvenirs ranging from Mickey Mouse photo to other animal figurines from all over the world. What caught my attention especially was the owl alarm clock. I remember my grandmother used to have one just like it.

The chef and staff were all very friendly and made us feel very welcomed. We had the duck soba, which was excellent on a cold rainy night.

We also visited Osaka Ohsho (大阪王將) in Shinjuku, the Japanese style "gyoza" restaurant. It was just a month before the restaurant opened a branch in Singapore (at Raffles City).

Other than the gyoza, we also tried other dishes such as the meat ball iin sweet sour sauce, the soup dumplings and the oozing sweet sesame seed balls. I especially loved the sesame balls, which were deep fried and filled with red bean paste, which oozed out when you bite. Hope they have that in the Singapore branch.

The gyoza (Japanese pork dumplings) are made fresh in the kitchen and not taken from some frozen packet. They are panfried till golden brown on the bottom, yet still moist and juicy inside. They were as good as they are claimed to be.

Shopping in Shibuya is rather tiring, having to walk through a myriad of streets, up and down hill. But the excitement and constant discovery of beautiful clothes and things makes it all worth the effort. When we got tired, we went into Pronto, cafe/bar/restaurant for some afternoon tea.

The iced mocha and iced milk tea was quite good. The mocha was sufficiently chocolatey and refreshing. The cakes were also very good. The chocolate black forest was moist and not too sweet. The cheese cake came with a small glass of mixed berries which added to the multi-flavour of the cake.

I used to visit Shimbashi every time I went to Tokyo, and remember the yakitori restaurants there were very good. The very first time I almost got drunk was also in Shimbashi (that was many years back). So this time round, I brought my son and went back to look for the yakitori restaurants.

Things have changed so much in Shimbashi since my last visit. Many of the old buildings have been torn down and new high rise have sprouted up. Many of the old shops have also given way to new ones. I could hardly recognise the place anymore. We wondered around and found this interesting bar/restaurant 新橋忘 under the railway tracks.

The cold Japanese lemon cocktail was quite refreshing. And the Skewered Barbecue was grilled just right. We had the rectum of pork, thigh of chicken, chicken with green onion and the baked rice ball.

But the best surprise of the evening was boiled cabbage with spicy soybean paste. This dish was so good, I could have eaten it all night. The cabbage was boiled just enough to make it moist, succulent, soft and still abit crunchy. The spicy soybean paste was simply out of this world. When eaten with the cabbage, the salty bean paste was somewhat neutralized and the slight spicyness came through with excellent result. This is a must try dish if you are in the vicinity of Shimbashi subway station.

Along the main street in Harajuku, we went into this shop building and tried out this restaurant. Service was not up to expectations, and the food, though the presentation was interesting, was at best passable. Nothing fantastic, just to fill our stomachs.

Our last meal in Tokyo was eaten at the Narita Airport. Simple fare which was quite good.