Japan: Hiroshima – Peace Memorial Museum

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

After lunch at Miyajima, we took the ferry and tram back to Hiroshima, where we spent several hours at the Peace Memorial Museum.

As I’m sure you know, on 6 August 1945, at 8:15am, the world’s first atomic bomb to be used on an inhabited city was dropped on Hiroshima. It killed an estimated 140,000 people, most of them civilians. The Peace Memorial Museum was established in 1955 to present the facts about the bombing, and to encourage the abolishment of nuclear weapons and advocate for world peace.

The A Bomb dome

Inside the museum, the exhibits started with the history of Hiroshima City before the bomb, as well as the development of the atomic bomb, and what lead up to the decision to drop it on Hiroshima. Two large models of the city sit in the middle of the first floor, one showing Hiroshima prior to the bombing, and one showing the flattened city afterwards.

There were also displays and exhibits that presented information and history of the nuclear age, as well as scientific information about the atomic bomb. Other exhibits of the museum were rather confronting, with photos and relics showing the damage that the bomb and resulting fires caused. There were rather gruesome photos of bomb victims, covered in burns. Some exhibited artefacts were heartbreaking – items such as burnt and tattered clothes or shoes, blackened watches stopped forever at 8.15, a black and rusting child’s tricycle.

The location of the hypocentre. The sign reads: Carried to Hiroshima from Tinian Island by the Enola Gay, a U.S. Army B-29 bomber, the first atomic bomb used in the history of humankind exploded approximately 580 metres above this spot. The city below was hit by heat rays of approximately 3,000 to 4,000°C along with a blast wind and radiaion. Most people in the area lost their lives instantly. The time was 8:15am, August 6, 1945. (View of the devastation looking north from hypocentre, November 1945.)

One amazing relic was a section of the old Hiroshima Branch of the Sumitomo Bank wall and steps, where a human “shadow” was etched into the stone. Just before the bomb was dropped, a person was sitting on the steps of the bank. When the bomb exploded, the intense heat rays bleached the surrounding stone, leaving the spot where the person was sitting dark.

The final exhibits were photos and descriptions of the health effects suffered by survivors due to the radiation of the bomb, and at the very end were survivor stories, guest books, and photographs of world leaders who had visited the museum.

In 1949, Hiroshima was proclaimed a City of Peace by the Japanese parliament. Hiroshima has been rebuilt into a lovely city, and it uses the lessons learned from its tragic past to encourage the abolition of nuclear weapons. The museum itself was poignant and heart-rending, and a definite must see. I was very, very moved.

Sorry to be so serious – let’s talk about food again.

Here are some photos of that evening’s dinner from a random izakaya in Hiroshima.

We ordered some fried spicy chicken wings. They were hot and juicy, although not very spicy.

I ordered us a serve of deep fried tofu. I have had better tofu – it wasn’t as soft and silky as I like it to be. It was acceptable though.

This is deep fried mochi. When I found out that there was deep fried mochi on the menu, I HAD to order it. But unfortunately it wasn’t that great. It was rather bland, and the chewy texture didn’t appeal to me (and normally I love mochi). I preferred the tofu.

We had some pork skewers with miso. These were delicious – salty and slightly sweet.

And I ordered us a vegetable salad in an effort to counteract all that deep fried stuff. That’s how it works right? Salad cancels out the other calories? The salad was surprisingly delicious, with a sweetish, soy sesame dressing. The little blob of white was potato salad.

I must admit it was a terribly unhealthy dinner – at least we didn’t eat like that the whole time!

This will probably be my last post before Christmas (I can’t believe it’s in TWO DAYS, where has this year gone?!), so I hope everyone has a fantastic Christmas! I will be eating and drinking a lot, and I’m sure an afternoon nap will also feature in my day. Bliss!

Japan: Miyajima – kakidon

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

Continuing the Japan posts – our next stop after Osaka was Hiroshima. From Hiroshima, we did a day trip to Miyajima.

Miyajima, offically named Itsukushima, is a small island that is most famous for its giant torii gate which appears to float on top of the ocean at high tide. I’m sure everyone has seen photos of it – it’s very recognisable.

Ticket for one, please.

Lots of wild deer roam around the island. However, the deer are very accustomed to people and, due to their tameness, have become very naughty. Their lack of fear, combined with their love of eating paper, means that they will often “attack” people for pamphlets, maps or bags.

We saw one deer eat a hole in someone’s paper bag, and another deer nibbling on a women’s sweater. I was quite amused to see it, but the deer smelt pretty bad and I wouldn’t have let one come that close to me!

We had a walk around the island, checking out the very famous torii gate, and Itsukushima shrine. This woman had brought her dog to the island to take pictures of it. She didn’t even bother with taking one with the gate in the background!

Both the gate and Itsukushima shrine are built over water, and the shrine consists of multiple buildings that are connected with each other by boardwalks above the sea. It was nice enough, but we were a bit “shrined out” by this stage after seeing numerous shrines already.

But one thing that we never get bored of is food! So after checking out the shrine, we had lunch at a small restaurant on the island. I had kakidon – oyster omelette on rice. The oysters, even though they would have been frozen ones at that time of year, were sweet, plump and juicy. Delicious!

Japan: Okonomiyaki – Osaka/Kansai vs Hiroshima!

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

While in Japan we ate okonomiyaki twice – once in Osaka and once in Hiroshima. Did you know that there are two styles of okonomiyaki? I didn’t!

The predominant style is the Osaka/Kansai version, where the okonomiyaki is prepared somewhat like a pancake, where the batter and other ingredients are mixed together and fried. The other style is the Hiroshima version, where the ingredients are layered rather than mixed together.

Naturally, both regions claim that their style is best. But which one did I think was better? Read on for the okonomiyaki showdown!

Osaka/Kansai style:

We had the Kansai style okonomiyaki at a restaurant where they were grilled in front of us. This was NOT a cook-it-yourself joint (although I believe those places exist), and we had been warned beforehand not to touch the okonomiyaki until it was ready. Apparently that is not the done thing!

For Kansai style oknomiyaki, a batter is made of flour, grated yam, water/dashi, eggs and shredded cabbage. Also added was tempura flakes and pickled ginger. It usually contains other ingredients such as spring onions, meat, or seafood – we had ours with seafood.

The batter, cabbage and seafood was all mixed together. Surprisingly, most of it stayed in the bowl. Skills!

The batter was poured on to the hot plate, and shaped into a circle. You can have cheese on it, if you so desire.

As well as cheese, there’s also the option of having yakisoba noodles. You can see some here under the mountain of bonito flakes!

After spending some time cooking on one side, the okonomiyaki was flipped over.

Mayonnaise and okonomiyaki sauce was spread over it.

Seaweed flakes were sprinkled on top.

And it was ready for eating! Boy, was it delicious! Cutting pieces off the okonomiyaki while it was on the hot plate meant that each bite was fresh and hot. They were quite filling but we gobbled it all down with gusto.

Hiroshima style:

Now to to Hiroshima – as mentioned before, Hiroshima okonomiyaki differs in style to the Kansai style by having the ingredients layered rather than mixed together.

For Hiroshima okonomiyaki, we went to this building that was kind of like a food court of okonomiyaki “restaurants”. The restaurants were basically kitchens surrounded by grills, with seating around the grills.

The okonomiyaki was cooked in front of us again, and we definitely didn’t touch anything. Chef looked rather grumpy! For this style of okonomiyaki, a circle of batter was spread on to the grill, and then topped with lots and lots of cabbage, bean sprouts and spring onions.

Alfalfa sprouts were placed on top.

He placed slices of bacon on top of the cabbage and sprouts.

Then some more batter was squirted on top of the bacon. (I’m pretty sure it was batter since I certainly wasn’t going to ask – remember me saying before that Chef looked grumpy??)

It all got flipped over to cook the other side.

We wanted oysters in ours, so the oysters were placed on the grill to start cooking.

Next he squashed it down into a more compact pile.

Cooked yakisoba noodles were placed on the grill.

The noodles were spread out, and a bit of oil was sprinkled on top.

Chef separated the noodles and shaped them into circles. The cooked oysters were placed on top.

Then the cabbage piles were placed on top of the noodles. It was looking good, but there was more to come.

Eggs were broken on to the grill and lightly fried.

And then the okonomiyaki was placed on top of the fried egg.

The okonomiyaki was flipped over again, placing the egg on top, and then a generous amount of okonomiyaki sauce was spread on.

And finally, some spring onions and seaweed flakes were sprinkled on to finish it off.

And it was finally ready for eating! Ahh, it was delicious too. And SO big and filling. But yes, we ate one each. Gluttons.

The verdict:

Both versions were delicious, and worthy challengers for the Okonomiyaki showdown.

With the Kansai style okonomiyaki, it was like a savoury pancake, with a mixture of texture from the cabbage and seafood. However, the Hiroshima style version is like a glutton’s dream with the bacon, seafood, a ton of cabbage, noodles plus a fried egg. If someone wasn’t full after eating it, then they would have a stomach the size of a house.

I would gladly eat either them again, but there can only be one winner – and for me the Kansai style okonomiyaki takes it out. It just edged out the Hiroshima version because each piece of the okonomiyaki was a combination of tastiness – no one ingredient in it stood out from the others. With the Hiroshima version, even though it was really good, because it was layered, everything seemed quite separate.

And there you have it! Has anyone else eaten both versions? What was your preference?

Japan: Osaka – Shabu shabu

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

After our visit to the aquarium, it was time for dinner. There was an opportunity for us to try fugu, but neither Alastair nor I thought it was worth it – both price wise and risk wise! So we had shabu shabu instead.

(For those interested, I’m told that fugu is a very firm, white fish that has a mild flavour. Everyone we knew who tried it survived – phew!)

Shabu shabu is cool! It’s pretty much a hot pot where paper thin slices of meat and vegetables are cooked in a broth at the table. Shabu shabu roughly means “swish swish” which refers to the sound of the meat being swished through the broth.

We received personal little cookers of broth to cook the meat and vegetables. Too bad I didn’t get an action shot of the swish swish!

And here is my plate of meat and a few chopped vegetables. Look at that beef – isn’t it beautiful. It was so tender after a quick cook in the liquid.

There was dipping sauce for the meat – very nutty and sesamey.

A couple of pieces of rather good sashimi, beautifully presented.

We also received some tempura. There were long beans, a prawn, and I think that item on the left was a mushroom.

Have you figured out from my posts so far that it’s not a Japanese meal without chawanmushi (savoury steamed egg custard)?

Nor is a meal complete without pickles and rice.

When everything was brought out, we had a serious lack of table space! Fortunately I’m good at Tetris, so managed to shuffle things around to fit it all in. We were so full afterwards – it was another great meal.

Coming up next time: Okonomiyaki showdown. Oh yes!

Japan: Osaka – crab lunch and Kaiyukan Aquarium

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

After eating takoyaki, we wandered to the Umeda Sky Building to check out the view of Osaka. The building is rather neat, although not located conveniently – it’s about a 15 minute walk from a train station, but we became terribly lost in the underground maze of Umeda, where a series of underground malls connect. To the point where, when we stopped an older man to ask for directions, he walked 20 minutes out of his way to send us off in the right direction. Bless! We never would have found it otherwise.

After seeing the Umeda Sky Building, we headed back to Dotonbori Street for a crab lunch. There are several restaurants on Dotonbori Street that have a large mechanised crab sign (I’m pretty sure we saw three of them). I believe they’re all part of the same chain. We had lunch at the second one on Dotonbori Street.

The price of the lunch sets were from about 1900 yen – 4000 yen. Dinner sets were from 4500 yen – 10500 yen. As you can see, lunch sets were MUCH cheaper than for dinner.

There were four lunch sets on offer. We wanted to have one of the mid-range ones, but unfortunately we were told that it would take thirty minutes to cook. We couldn’t afford the time because we wanted to get to the aquarium and spend a couple of hours there before dinner. We weren’t hungry enough for the most expensive option (damn that delicious takoyaki!), so settled on the cheapest one.

For the first course we received cold, cooked crab legs. They had very thoughtfully pre-cracked the legs for us, so the meat was easy to get out. The flesh was sweet and yummy.

After the crab legs I’m SURE there was a salad topped with crab meat. But I don’t seem to have a photo of it. Did I accidentally delete the photo or did I dream it? Hmm.

Oh no, I didn’t dream it! There it is in the top left hand corner of the next picture. Unfortunately, without a proper photo to remind me, I no longer remember what it tasted like.

Next was a chawanmushi (savoury steamed egg custard). It had a small amount of crab meat on the top. It wasn’t the best chawanmushi we’d had on the trip, but it wasn’t bad either.

After the chawanmushi we received – strangely – what was basically a macaroni and cheese, with a small amount of crab meat on top. It seemed a very odd dish to serve as part of the meal, and there wasn’t much crab in it, but soft, cheesy pasta? Yeah, I loved it.

After the mac and cheese were a few pieces of crab meat sushi.

And finally, to finish, clear soup with fu and a crab meat square.

As mentioned previously, we had the cheapest set, which mean that we didn’t receive much actual crab (apart from the crab legs). I was pleased with lunch, but I would have loved to have had more time (and stomach space) to try their more expensive sets!

After lunch, we dashed off to Osaka Aquarium (Kaiyukan). Kaiyukan was amazing. The fish and other marine life were displayed in 15 tanks, each of which represented a specific region on the Pacific Rim. There is a enormous central tank, nine meters deep, which represents the Pacific Ocean and in which is the star attraction – whale sharks!

The layout of Kaiyukan means that the tour starts on the eighth floor, and you walk down floor by floor in a spiral around the central tank. It’s very well laid out and rather impressive.

It was hard to take good photos inside the aquarium apart from the jellyfish tanks. I do love taking photos of jellyfish though. They are so pretty! Here are some of my favourites:

Kani Doraku
1-6-18 Dontonbori, Osaka or
1-6 2 Dotonbori, Osaka

Japan: Osaka – Takoyaki

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

Glico Man!

Oh Osaka! Osaka, Osaka, Osaka! Out of all the cities in Japan we went to, Osaka was my favourite and I was VERY VERY disappointed when we had to leave. I could’ve happily stayed for a couple more weeks, there is so much to do and see and, of course, so much to eat!

Osaka is the main city in the Kansai region, and has a population of around 2.5 million people making it Japan’s third largest city (after Tokyo and Yokohama). It has the reputation of being the culinary capital of Japan and was traditionally referred to as the “nation’s kitchen”.

Our hotel (no more ryokans for us, sob!) was located 5 minutes walk from Dotonbori Street. Dotonbori Street is the main destination for food travel in Osaka, and runs alongside the Dotonbori canal between the Dotonboribashi Bridge and the Nipponbashi Bridge. On the street are lots of shops, tons of restaurants and many neon and mechanized signs.

One day in Osaka, we ended up eating four meals. We had breakfast at the hotel (which, in hindsight, we should’ve skipped!), and then takoyaki just before lunch. A couple of hours later, we had a second lunch at a crab restaurant, and at dinner we ate shabu shabu. Oh, and we also had okonomiyaki the evening before, details of which will feature in a future post. This one will be about takoyaki!

Takoyaki are round dumplings made from batter, octopus, spring onions, and other ingredients. To make takoyaki, chopped pieces of octopus are placed into a griddle that has hemispheric indentations. Then, batter made from flour, water and egg, are poured over. As the batter cooks, it is scraped into the holes, and the balls are turned over, until they become round.

You can eat takoyaki at street stalls, but we went to a takoyaki restaurant. We were seated around a table with the cast iron takoyaki griddle set in the centre. When we were seated, the gas was turned on to start heating the griddle.

We were told to oil the indentations really well, so we grabbed some oil sitting on the side of the table and started greasing it up, making sure the oil was not only inside the little cups but also around the sides of the griddle. It needed A LOT of oil.

Then the waiter placed a small piece of octopus inside each of the moulds.

He sprinkled over a lot of spring onions.

And poured in the batter.

We scattered over some tempura flakes.

As well as some pickled ginger over the batter.

The takoyaki cooked for a couple of minutes, and then we were shown to use our skewers to separate the batter on the surface of the pan. Then we pushed the skewer into the metal cups, to separate the cooked batter from the surface and to roughly turn the ball over.

Remaining bits of batter were pushed back into the ball with the skewer.

After another minute or so, we repeated the process of turning the balls. Eventually, they become browner and rounder, until they were ready to eat!

The takoyaki was topped with takoyaki sauce and seaweed flakes and a bit of mayonnaise.

And also some bonito flakes. I do like me some bonito flakes!

The takoyaki was delicious! They were piping hot, lightly crisp, savoury and tangy. Swoon. It was just supposed to be a snack, but we ate so many of them that we could’ve skipped lunch (Err, not that we did. But we could’ve!).

Takoyaki is very popular in Osaka, there were numerous street stalls selling the little dumplings with many people lining up to purchase them. And there’s even a takoyaki museum. I’ll have to see it next time we visit Osaka (and there will definitely be a next time!).

PS: I wish that I had bought a takoyaki pan while in Japan.. I’m thinking that perhaps a poffertjes pan could work as a substitute. Has anyone ever made takoyaki at home? Do you think one would work?

Japan: Koyasan – Katsu curry don & curry udon

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

In Koyasan, one of the main sights is Okunoin. Okunoin is the temple where Kobo Daishi, the founder of Shingon Buddhism and one of the most revered persons in the religious history of Japan, rests in eternal meditation. It is considered one of the most sacred places in Japan.

Okunoin is surrounded by Japan’s largest graveyard. People from all over Japan, who wished to be buried close to Kobo Daishi, lie there, including former feudal lords, politicians and other prominent personalities. Their graves (over 200,000 gravestones are in the cemetery) line the approach to Okunoin for 2km through a forest of tall cedar trees.

The walk to see Kobo Daishi’s shrine had made us hungry, so afterwards Alastair and I headed back into the town to find lunch. We went into a simple little eatery – it was nothing flash at all and we weren’t expecting much. I ordered the katsu curry don and Alastair ordered tempura udon.

When it came out, I found that the katsu curry don was AMAZING. The katsu had a light, crunchy crust covering the moist pork. The curry was nicely spiced with a lot of flavour and chunks of meat. The meal was warm and satisfying, and very delicious.

Sigh. I still remember it fondly!

Alastair’s udon? I have no idea, I was too busy in raptures over my meal! It looked good?

The following day, we had breakfast at the monastery and an early lunch in the town before leaving for Osaka. One of the shop keepers in Koyasan had passed away a few days ago, and his funeral was being held that day, so lots of shops were closed. It became difficult to find a place to eat, and it had started raining quite heavily, so eventually we just walked into one that was open.

It was a small family run business and we didn’t have high hopes for a good meal. It was still early (just after 11am) and as the shop had just opened, the menu options were limited. We couldn’t order anything that was deep fried as their oil was still heating up and pretty much the only thing that was available was the curry udon.

We consoled ourselves with the fact that if it was bad, at least it would keep us going until we got to Osaka. But when it came out, well – it was delicious! I already loved udon noodles, but fresh udon noodles? Gahbahfuh, they’re just fantastic! The noodles were soft, elastic and chewy with a very pleasing slipperiness. The curry sauce covering them was so tasty and perfect for the rainy day.

After that surprisingly good lunch, it was time to go to Osaka for more good eating. Osaka food stories coming right up!

Japan: Natto

Agnes cuisine, japan, japanese, travel

While in Koyasan, we took the opportunity to try natto. For those who haven’t heard of the almightly natto, natto is made from soybeans. The soybeans are soaked in water, steamed for several hours, and then are mixed with the bacterium Bacillus subtilis natto. Next, the beans are fermented for a couple of days and then aged in a refrigerator for up to one week.

As a result of fermentation and aging, the beans develop a pungent smell, similar to a strong cheese, and a sticky, glue-like consistency. Natto is commonly eaten with rice at breakfast.

Still, you don’t know whether you’ll like or dislike something until you try it – so we purchased a pack at a local convenience store. It was cheap – 100 yen for two small polystyrene packs.

We took it back to our room, and opened the lid. It didn’t look that bad. Inside the packet were a small sachet of soy sauce and mustard. We opened both packets and poured them in and started mixing. Mixing the natto produces lots of mucus like strings and the natto becomes stickier and stringier.

When we pulled some beans out of the packet, long spider web like strings of mucus followed it. It really isn’t the most attractive foodstuff out there!

The taste itself wasn’t particularly nice – the beans were quite bland and didn’t have much flavour but I thought there was an slight bitter aftertaste that I found off putting. The texture was not pleasant either, with the mucus like strings ensuring that we didn’t eat more than a couple of bites.

Natto is apparently very popular in Japan. I’m sure that, similar to other strong smelling/flavoured food, it’s just an acquired taste. However, I don’t think I’ll be taking the time to acquire it!

So next time someone suggests natto – I will be saying nattNo. No thanks!