Tokyo: FOOD!

Oh the food in Tokyo!

I had heard so many times that to eat well in Tokyo you have to spend a lot of money.

Our experience was to the contrary. On the whole, I loved the food in Tokyo and we only had one expensive meal on our trip. 

Our one splurge meal was Shabu Shabu. It is like fondu with kobe beef and vegetables served with rice.

We've made this many times at our house thanks to Uwajimaya but it was even better in Japan.

Did I mention that The Pants was mistaken for Matt Damon (or Matto Damondo) at least 5 times?

When we ate at this restaurant the chef and the whole wait staff watched us eat because they were sure The Pants was Matt Damon. When I came back from the restroom, The Pants said he had been asked by our waiter if he was a movie star because he just looked so cool. He savored that compliment for a while.

After a long day of trapsing all around Tokyo we stopped in with Utako-san and Eriko-san for Okonomiyaki.

This is essentially a savory seafood pancake cooked right at your table.

It comes with a couple sauces including a creamy mayo and sweet soy sauce and is garnished with fish flakes and herbs. It's kind of a trip actually. This was the one food that I couldn't eat very much of--I think the abundance of flavor combinations made me a little nauseated.

We had to stop in for ramen, and it was definitely cold enough during our trip to make it all the more warranted. We were met at the front door of this ramen shop in Shibuya by a contraption that looked like a slot machine. It was however how you placed your order.
And order up, a hot steaming bowl of broth with noodles, eggs, vegetables and meat mixed with spicy goodness. It was super cheap and super good.

We did get to have one meal at a Japanese family's home. This is where I got to finally taste some yakisoba with cocktail weiners. Yep, you got it-I don't need to say it twice. It wasn't somethng I'd eat everyday but it wasn't bad.

image from http://fooddiary.blogsome.com/2010/01/01/taiyaki/

Taiyaki was by far my favorite thing that I consumed in Japan. Taiyaki is a crispy fish-shaped pancake filled with lovely things. We sampled the custard and sweet potatoe varieties. It's a street vendor food that we were under the impression could be had throughout the city. But we were wrong. I would have bought 12 if I had known it would be our last encounter. I'm positive The Pants was frustrated by my exhaustive hunt for more throughout our trip. Gift idea: Taiyaki maker. Hint...hint, Mr. Pants...if you ever read this thing.

The Pants happened to get food poisoning on our last day in Tokyo. It happened to be the day we were planning to go to the Tsukiji fish market to get some authentic, fresh sushi. He tried so hard to be well enough to eat sushi but he looked (and walked) like he was going to pass out. I wasn't going to force the issue so we didn't have any sushi in Japan!

There's always next time...