| | Plastic Food? | | The first thing to keep in mind when desiring food in Japan is that most people do not speak any English. Fortunately many restaurants had plastic examples of food so those who spoke no Japanese could point at what they wanted. |
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| | Pictures of Tasty Food! | | Also, many places had pictures of what they served instead of plastic items. This photos is of a poster outside an amazing Japanese restaurant near the fish markey in Tokyo. We liked what we saw on the pictures so we went in! |
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| | How to order... | | Unfortunately when we went in we had to put our yen in the above machine and make our selections. This was very difficult as everything was in Japanese with a LOT of kanji! Luckily we got some help from the staff! |
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| | Picture Menus | | Another useful thing we found in Tokyo were menus with pictures. This was fantastic for gaijin who knew no Japanese! |
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| | More Picture Menu | | This restaurant was a delicious Chinese restaurant in Harajuku! |
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| | Tempura | | Many people in the United States are familiar with tempura. It was not as common in Japan as I would have thought as a standalone dish, but I had it a lot in noodle soup dishes. mmmMMmmmm! |
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| | Spicy Ramen Noodles with Tempura and Pork | | This dish was soooooooo good! I had this at the Japanese High School. Can you believe it? I wish our food was this good! |
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| | Cold Soba Noodles | | I ordered this dish without knowing in advance they were cold noodles. If you look closely at this picture you can even see some of the ice on the noodles. Served with the noodles was a delicious light broth that you can see pictured on the right. Dipping the noodles in this sauce was so good!!! |
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| | Hot Soba Noodles with Mixed Veggies | | Here is another dish with hot soba noodles and veggies. Unfortunately I did not take a picture of the MANY dishes of Udon noodles that I ate. Udon is a much thicker noodle and very good!! |
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| | Miso Soup | | I had a lot of miso soup in Japan. One thing that most westerners do not realize is that miso soup is a standard part of the traditional Japanese breakfast, along with cold fish. It was heaven! Unfortunately, I was so preoccupied with eating my breakfasts I never took a picture of them. Please forgive me! |
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| | A Full Japanese Dinner | | This dinner was served at a banquet durinig our last night in Aomori. it was really, really good! |
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| | Fish and Clear Soup | | This meal was ordered by one of my friends in Tokyo the same night I had the cold soba. She said it was amazing! Doesn't it look good? |
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| | Sashimi and Miso Soup | | I had this meal for breakfast at a tasty restaurant by the fish market. Above you can see how difficult it was to order! It was worth it though!!! mmmMMmmm |
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| | Room Service | | I had this meal one night in Tokyo when I was simply too tired to leave my room. It was quite good, though like any room service meal it did not come cheap! |
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| | Bento - Box Lunch | | Here is a photo I took of a man eating a box lunch in Hirosaki. |
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| | School Bento | | Here is a picture of a box lunch (bento) that I received at a University in Hirosaki. |
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| | Cute Store Bento | | Presentation is everything in Japanese cuisine. Here are a few adorable bentos that I saw during my trip. |
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| | Another Cute Store Bento | | Here is a really adorable pig bento! |
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| | Yet Another Cute Bento | | This bento was really cute. I regret not purchasing one of these! |
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| | Aisu Cremu! | | No meal is complete without desert! Japan had an amazing number of interesting deserts, but an old favorite in the summer is ice cream! |
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