Tengu

Tengu Restaurant Tokyo

Tengu is a chain of izakaya restaurants found all over Tokyo.  I have been to a couple of them, but I find the one just outside the Shinjuku station convenient.  It is located upstairs of the UniQlo store right near the station exit.  We proceeded to have a great time eating some very tasty inexpensive dishes.  This Tokyo restaurant offers yakitori (grilled chicken gizzards, along with regular chicken parts) 126 Yen per skewer, kari kari gobo salad (deep fried shaved burdock root on a tossed salad with fried shrimp) 500 Yen, cheese pizza 600 Yen.  The restaurant serves the more traditional dishes like sashimi, salads, tempura, oysters, chicken katsu, to mention a few, all at a reasonable price.  This Tokyo restaurant serves drinks that are quite reasonable too, with 180 ml glasses of sake' for 399 Yen, glasses of shochu for 400 Yen, and mugs of beer for 500 Yen.  The izakaya is noisy with mostly working folks, but with super drinks and lots of great, inexpensive food, it's worth it.  For more information on this topic or Japan, please go to http://traveljapan-us.com/.

Sapporo Nijo Market

Sapporo Nijo Market
Just a few minutes walk from Tanukikoji Arcade in Sapporo, the Sapporo Nijo Market is an interesting place to visit. You will find the freshest fish, scallops, sea urchins, shrimp, squid, octopus and king, queen, and hairy crab. The taraba gani(king crab)of the highest quality can be found here from 5,000 yen to 7,000 yen, or more depending on size and quality. I personally purchased a very high quality large king crab, with all legs intact, hard shell and just caught for 7,000 yen. My purchase of king crab and other seafood items was made at the Maruichi Market from Mikami-san, but the vendors are very friendly, and if you buy enough you can bargain with them for a better price. Dried seafood is plentiful, and we just enjoyed the dried and smoked scallops, smoked octopus legs, dried squid, and some of the soy sauce prepared sea kelp.


We even had an early morning seafood breakfast at one of the restaurants in the fish market. At the Donburi Chaya restaurant I had the Kaisen assorted seafood bowl. 9 toppings including maguro(tuna)sashimi, salmon sashimi, ikura(salmon roe), hotate(scallop)sashimi, king crab meat, botan ebi(peony)shrimp, uni(sea urchin), egg roll, and yama imo(diced mountain yam) on a bed of delicious rice along with hot Japanese tea for 1,449 yen. You can try a steaming bowl of miso soup with crab inside as flavoring for an additional 200 yen. Awesome breakfast!

You can easily see why the Sapporo Nijo Market is a Travel Japan-US favorite.

Location: Just at the end of Tanukikoji Arcade on 2nd St. Fish vendors open at 7:00AM and close around 6:00PM. Restaurants open a little later.

For more information and pictures on Japan: http://travljpn.blogspot.com/.  For other articles on Japan, please go to http://traveljapan-us.com/.

Japanese Yatai

The Japanese Yatai, or portable food stalls, could be found in numbers along the streets of Tokyo and Fukuoka, and other localities in the past, but now are few and far between. Nowadays the yatai appear late at night and almost stealthily to avoid the police. The portable "food wagons" cook the food on site and provide benches or chairs for their customers.  The yatai operators usually serve ramen(noodles), oden(Japanese stewed vegetables), or fried and grilled food. On a recent trip to Japan I ate and drank at a yatai right outside the Shinjuku station late one night(around 11:30 PM)and had a bowl of hot ramen along with 2 large glasses of sake. Needless to say, the food, drink and company were excellent, and the tab “yasukatta”(inexpensive). This would definitely qualify as cheap eats.
If you are lucky enough to stumble across one in the evening, please be sure to stop in and have some food and drink. I think you’ll like it. Plus it’s a rather unique part of the Japanese culture and an experience that shouldn’t be missed.
It's especially good on a cold night with a hot bowl of ramen or a hot bowl of oden and sake to cut the chill.  This is a Travel Japan favorite!

Crab Crab Crab

Crab Crab Crab in Sapporo Japan. That’s all you can eat crab, in 90 minutes. Hard to believe-well it’s true. All-you-can eat KING CRAB in 90 minutes, for 4,000 Yen($50 US). In Susukino, the entertainment center of Sapporo, Japan, there is a crab restaurant called Ebi Kani Gassen, on the 11th floor of a commercial building where you can get this unbelievable meal. I had the 3,600 Yen($44 US) All-you-can eat(tabehoudai)assorted crab(King crab, Queen crab, Snow crab) in 90-minutes meal. Here’s what I got:

3-shrimp tempura and vegetable(sweet pepper)tempura

3-shrimp and crab sushi, shrimp tempura sushi

1-chawan mushi with lots of crab crab crab

3-very large platters of assorted crab legs and body meat

Those crab legs were super sweet!!!!

All that crab went well with 2 bottles(300ml each)of Chitosetsuru Junmai Ginjo sake.


Tips and notes:

The staff will only bring out what you can eat because crab is a valuable resource in Hokkaido Japan. Don’t order what you cannot finish.


The staff is a little slow in coming out to help you, so ask them with a “Sumimasen-Kani okawari!” (Excuse me-More crab please!) when you are getting low on crab.

Don’t forget-you must finish the crab on the plate before the 90-minutes.

How to eat the crab: Use the scissors provided to cut the crab shells-makes it a lot easier to get to the meat, and use the small spoon to dig out the crab meat from the body cavity or as you get to the outer reaches of the crab legs. Discard the shells in the big containers on the table.

This is a Travel Japan recommendation for hungry crab eaters. So go ahead and eat crab crab crab!

Location: A short walk from the Hosui Susukino subway station or the Susukino subway station. Address is 1-jo South, 4 West, 2-chome (1chi-
jo Minami yon Nishi ni-chome. On the 11th floor. 4:00PM - 12:00AM. Telephone: 011-231-3043. Restaurant name is Ebi Kani Gassen.


For more information on Japan please go to http://traveljapan-us.com

Hakone Prince Annex

Hakone Prince Annex Review

Upon arriving at the Odawara Station from Tokyo, we inquired at the local Odawara Visitors Bureau office in the station and the very nice lady there helped make us a reservation to catch the Hakone Prince shuttle. The shuttle driver met us outside the station next to the samurai statue. Upon boarding the van, the driver stored our overnight bags and when all the other guests arrived we drove out of the station. The driver was gracious enough to give us a guided tour of the Hakone area as we drove-but in Japanese.

The Hakone Prince Annex is the newer wing of the original Hakone Prince Hotel. The front desk staff spoke English and serviced us quickly and gave us tips on what to do in the area. There was a large sitting area just off the front desk with a great view of Lake Ashinoko. I think it doubled as a lounge.

The room:
The room was larger, much larger than the Shinagawa Prince Hotel in Tokyo. The room on the 1st floor had a back door which gave us access to the back lawn overlooking Lake Ashinoko and gave us a wonderful view. The room had nice furniture and the sitting table allowed us to have a cold beer and snacks to eat before we went out. The room had the deep tub and the bidet toilet. The safe in the room was a larger. Little older model that we liked. We also found that the “rotem buro” outdoor onsen bath was a mere 50 feet from the room. Although the onsen was small, the hot water and the cool air hitting your head made it feel almost zen-like. The men’s bath had the same nice lake view we had from our room.

The food:
Since we arrived off-season, the hotel was not full, and the restaurant limited meals to the Potomac Restaurant just past the front desk. The restaurant had that same great Lake Ashinoko view as the lounge. With a salad bar that was quite good, we found the meals quite good as well. For dinner we had the “set menu” beef tenderloin that was cooked to a perfect medium rare and very tender and with the cooked veggies and starch and a dessert of a Japanese roll cake with filling and coffee to end the meal. 4,500 Yen for the dinner.

Shopping:
There was a nice shopping area at Hakone-en next to the Hakone Prince Hotel where you could find food items, clothing, and souvenirs, including an aquarium and the Komagatake Ropeway station, and also a bus terminal for both the Izu Hakone Bus Company and the Hakone Tozan Bus Company.

Location:
Hakone Prince Annex, Hakone-en, Hakone Japan.

For more information and photos please go to http://travljpn.blogspot.com

For more information on Japan, please go to http://traveljapan-us.com.

Richmond Hotel Sapporo Odori

The Richmond Hotel Sapporo Odori is basically a businessman’s hotel in Sapporo, Japan, with smallish rooms with nice amenities.  The hotel has a small restaurant next to the lobby that serves good food and drinks, and desserts at reasonable prices.

I recently rented a double room of 177 square feet and found a small room with a double bed, a nice Regza 25” Toshiba digital TV, a bidet toilet, air conditioning a Sharp Ion unit, refrigerator, coffee pot and complimentary coffee and tea, and internet connection.

The staff is extremely helpful and very accommodating, the breakfast buffet is good, but the best thing about the hotel is its direct entrance into the Tanukikoji Arcade, nearby access to Pole Town underground shopping arcade, sheltering you from the inclement winter weather in Sapporo, Susukino entertainment district, Nijo Fish  Market, and the Nanboku Subway line.  If you walk through the Tanukikoji Arcade 3 1/2  blocks to the south, you will end up at the Nijo Fish Market where you can see and taste some excellent seafood including king crab and huge scallops fresh off the fishing boats.

To get there: From the new Chitose Airport take the JR train to and exit from the Sapporo Station, then take the Nanboku subway line from Sapporo Station to the Odori Station. Walk from the Odori Station through Pole Town underground arcade until you get to the south Exit #4,5,6,7, exiting Pole Town using the up escalator and go into the Tanukikoji Arcade and walk less than 100 yards until you see the Richmond Hotel Sapporo Odori sign.

For more information and photos, please go to http://travljpn.blogspot.com

For more information on Japan please go to http://traveljapan-us.com.

Sapporo Chitosetsuru Sake Brewery

Sapporo Chitosetsuru Sake Brewery
From the time you get there you are met with the large round Sapporo Chitosetsuru Sake Brewery cedar ball at the entrance, and you know that the adventure begins.


Once inside the museum you will be greeted by a fountain of pure water from the Sapporo area. This pure, clean water is the key ingredient of wonderful Japanese sake. Take a sip of the water from the fountain, and you will know that excellent sake is made there.

Take some time to look at the old implements that were used to produce the sake. You will notice many wooden barrels that were used by the sake makers of old.

The free sake tasting features 5 of the brewery’s sake, although many more types are made.

Start with the “junmai” grade, dry, about +4 on the Nihon Shudo scale and made from 100% sakamai, or special sake rice which is 40% ground away. Then try the second “junmai”grade with a sweeter fruitier bouquet. The Nihon Shudo scale is about +3. Then try the “Honjyozo” grade, made from sake rice and a shot of brewers alcohol at the end of the process to spike the flavor. Next try the “ginjo” grade, with a slightly fruity and nice bouquet. Finally try the “daiginjo” grade, the top sake of the brewery-smooth, sweet, and very good bouquet. All of the sake I tasted were excellent, and I ended up purchasing 4 bottles.

Location:  Nippon Seishu Company, about 5 minutes from the Bus Center Mae Tozai Line subway station,Minami San-jo, Higashi go-chome, Chuo-Ku, Sapporo.  The museum is open 10:00AM-6:00PM.  Only closed at year end and New Years.

For more information on Japan please go to http://www.traveljapan-us.com/.