Travel Story – Japan and Food Talk
We cannot deny the fact that Japanese food has caught the world like crazy. We can find Japanese restaurants everywhere in any major towns or cities and they are not only meant for Japanese customer alone but Japanese food has found a place in other community just like any other Western, Indian or Chinese food.
My first taste of Japanese food was actually in Japan. Back then we did not have the luxury to eat at Japanese restaurants as there were very few back then. The name sushi and sashimi were just too foreign for me and my rough understanding was Japanese food is all about raw fish.
Nor do I understand why people like raw fish when it is so nice when fish are cooked or fried as what is usually done in other countries.
My first taste of a real Japanese food was a tempura set. Tempura as we know is a fried shrimps, cuttle fish and other vegetable fruits like okura. I was brought by a friend on the first I stepped foot on Tokyo to a Japanese restaurant as tempura was like the most acceptable food to a foreigner as it is not raw.
My first impression was that everything was done in a big serving. As a person who eat very little, a set lunch with a bowl of rice, a plate of fried tempura and a miso soup were just too much for me to finish. Everything was in a fixed size and put nicely on a tray.
I did not have a good impression with tempura and I found it was rather tasteless. But there are funny things about food and tempura became one of my favorite not too long after that.
Sushi and sashimi was a bit expensive for me at that time and I just indulged myself at the kaiten sushi and it was relatively cheap at about 200-400 yen for plate of sushi. Now whenever I take sushi I remember the good taste of the sushi in Japan. Even those from the Kaiten sushi are so much better.
It is hard to imagine that sashimi has become the most favorite Japanese food to foreigners all over the world. Thus it makes tuna and salmon fish to be among the most expensive fish that can reach thousands of dollars.
Not every food in Japan are that of raw fish. Many restaurants serve western food and Chinese food which to some may look like Japanese food. In the college restaurants we can find chicken cutlets rice, curry rice or char han which come together with miso soup and prepared in a very Japanese style.
Most of the time I had this type of food and they were not really expensive. As I did not have any handicap in the language, I did not have the problem reading the menu or ordering food.
Japanese ramen is a Chinese food that has settled very well in Japan and has become almost 100% Japanese as the taste is very much different of any noodles dishes serve in Chinese restaurant elsewhere. Everybody likes ramen in Japan and I was so surprise that the size of the bowl to serve ramen was so big and the quantity was enough for 2 people serving. But most Japanese people can finish the food serve to them. But at the same time we hardly see any Japanese people who are overweight.
As student we need to save a lot in Japan especially on food and we just take any kind of food which was affordable to us. Many students take bento from the bento shop. It is a packed Japanese food and it is cheaper than those serve in the stall. I remember one bento that has become my favorite that is the karaage bento or fried chicken bento.
Japanese drink a lot. I could hardly remember of the number of the brand names of beer in Japan. They come in different names like Asahi, Sapporo, Kirin and many more. In almost any dinner table a beer is almost a must.
In my next post I will touch a bit on the drinking session we used to have and how it was done back then.
