Random Picture 48

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There are many foods in Japan which are better than what you can get in other countries, and there are some foods which are prepared uniquely to suit Japanese tastes which are different, but still good (not better, not worse, just different). Some things in Japan are pretty  much complete and utter failures, and that is sandwiches. The specimen pictured above is a soba sandwich. Soba is a Japanese noodle made from buckwheat. It is the equivalent of a spaghetti sandwich. There's nothing better than carbs heaped on carbs with, of course, some mustard (karashi) mayonnaise to boot!

While this is one of the nastier looking sandwiches (seriously, don't you think it looks like worms?), there are plenty of nice looking sandwiches with crusts removed that are full of paper thin ham slices, extremely mayo heavy potato, egg or tuna salad (more of a mayo paste with flavoring), and strawberries and cream.

Kirin Nuda Cooling Grapefruit

You have to admire Kirin's testicular fortitude and not because they named this drink "Nuda". Using anything that implies nudity actually takes no balls whatsoever because even a hint of sex sells more products. No, I think it's pretty gutsy of them to sell a "cooling" beverage in the winter time in a country where most of the people (especially the women) have the heat-retention capacity of those in the reptile family. The last thing people in Japan want when the temperature drops below 82 degrees F. (28 degrees C.) is anything which is "cooling".

The Nuda brand has been around for awhile, but this is my first sampling of it. I like grapefruit flavored food and drink, but not actual grapefruit. Oh, I have tried to get into eating the real deal but I just never saw the point in smothering something in sugar in order to make it palatable. I figure that, if I'm going to go for a large amount of sugar, I might as well eat a donut and stop fooling myself into thinking I'm eating something healthy because it was plucked from a vine before being saturation bombed with sucrose.

The  point of the "Nuda" line has nothing to do with supple naked bodies but rather with offering up light refreshment with bubbles. The basic "Nuda" is clear sparkling water and this is the same with a hint of grapefruit flavor. I found it for 87 yen ($1.06) at Seiyu supermarket. The question wasn't going to be about how well this bowled me over but rather about how they worked with the grapefruit flavor. Since this is just a flavored sparkling water, one can't expect too much.

When you unscrew the cap, you can smell a light grapefruit flavor. The water itself is carbonated adequately. You can really sense the bubbles if you hold it in your mouth for a few seconds before swallowing. I rather like this because I like the burn you can get from carbonated beverages. The grapefruit flavor is just enough to be detectable, but not enough to overwhelm. It is quite a good balance because the flavor is there, but there's absolutely no bitterness.

Kirin recommends their sparkling waters as office refreshment. Their ads hint that this will perk you up in meetings, brainstorming sessions, etc. I think that's expecting a bit too much from carbonated water. Nonetheless, this is good sparkling water and if you are inclined to go with bottled water, this is no more expensive than plain water and a nicer experience. I'd certainly buy it again if I were out and about and wanted some water and if it were available and it definitely beats club soda, which has always had a funky taste to me.

Nissin Spa King Carbonara Gratin

As part of my irregular reviews of "real" food, I decided to give this pasta-based entree from Nissin a go after one of my commenters said that the noodle-based packaged foods in Japan tend to be better than the rice-based ones. Though I'm not a fan of noodles, I don't "hate" them, and this carbonara beckoned to me with the promise of the bacon, egg and cheese... okay, it's more like the real deals are diamonds and this is offering a cubic zirconium, but even fake bacon is better than no bacon at all. Also, it's called "Spa King". Anything with "king" in it gains automatic awesomeness points. This is, after all, how "Burger King" stays in business. ;-)

All of the separate components await assembly. I guess they must be kept separate or they may combine into a mutant off-spring if prematurely mixed.

I found this 277 gram (9.7 oz.) meal packet at Seiyu supermarket for 198 yen ($2.36). That may sound like an impressive amount of grub, but it's actually only 6 oz. (170 grams) of food. The rest is plastic and foil, which rather makes me feel guilty for buying this given all of the associated material waste.

The various squiggly thing and goo packets squirted into the plastic tray.

Taking off the wrapping reveals quite a few separate packets including what look like somewhat scary cooked noodles pressed into an unappealing wad of carbohydrates. The blue packet is some sort of oily substance that you squeeze over the pasta first followed by the red and silver packet of sauce and finally the tiny bit of powdered cheese. After you squeeze all of the components into the tray in the proper order, you're supposed to put the cover back on before heating. Since it's just a sheet of plastic, you just sort of lay it back over the top of the mess. The instructions recommend various times depending on your microwave's power and I went for 3 minutes at 600W which seemed about right. 

It looks pretty good when it's cooked, though there isn't as much sauce as there appears to be here.

This smelled like canned white sauce. It's hard to describe it as anything more than that. The flavor was very heavy on the ham flavor, slightly peppery, rather salty, with hints of egg and cheese. It definitely could have used a stronger cheese element, but I really have no complaints. One of the biggest surprises is that the pasta is chewy and neither under nor overcooked. It's pretty much perfect, though it does come out in a mass that you have to fight to untangle after heating.

The Spa King's carbonara has a lot less bacon/ham product than one might hope for.

The "good" news about this is that it tastes pretty good for what it is and it has about 20% of the daily requirement of protein. I find that somewhat impressive for a dish that is pretty much a wad of pasta covered in various types of goo. I had this with some leftover chicken breast on the side to supplement the protein content of the meal (and a huge carrot for a vegetable). The bad news is that it has 1300 mg. of Sodium and ones daily recommendation is 1500 mg. So, 87% of the salt and 20% of the protein. It provides 370 calories, which isn't bad either.

Clearly, this isn't the best option for a meal, and it is designed to be something you have for lunch as a stand-alone entree. It tastes better than average though, is relatively cheap, and wouldn't be a bad occasional quick meal. I personally think it would serve one best as a quick side dish to some sort of lean protein, but then I'd recommend eating only half of it in such a case.

Tirol Premium Tiramisu

I grew up in a rural area where people ate a lot of potatoes, corn, chicken and beef. "Dessert" to us was usually ice cream or pie. Things like tiramisu were alien to us. In fact, I'm guessing anyone who even talked about such things with a sense of curiosity or longing would be viewed as trying too hard to be some snooty food connoisseur. Hence, my first exposure to tiramisu came during the period when it was a monumental food fad in Japan in the late 80's/early 90's. It hasn't exactly faded away since then, and the continuing release of chocolates like this is evidence of that.

For those who grew up like me and aren't familiar with tiramisu (all 2 or 3 of you), it's an Italian dessert made with ladyfingers (or cake), coffee, cocoa, liqueur, and Mascarpone cheese. Well made tiramisu is a textural and taste delight with depth and a certain delicacy. The last time I tasted something which was supposed to be the real deal was a sample at Costco, and it was heavy and nasty beyond belief. Most of what is on offer in Japan is a thin layer of yellow sponge cake with a mixture of whipped cream, cocoa, and coffee flavors. It's good, but also clearly no authentic.

Yeah, it broke into fragments when I tried to cut it in half.

The chocolate tries to emulate the layered sense and look of the real dessert including having a layer with cocoa powder in it. The look is rather easier to convey than the complex flavors of chocolate, coffee and mascarpone cheese. The main thing that this was going to lack was the textural elements of tiramisu. However, the flavor combination was actually pretty good. There was bittersweet chocolate, cocoa, coffee, and even the vaguest hint of mild cheese. The biggest surprise was that it wasn't too sweet as many Tirol chocolates with white chocolate as a main component are overbearingly sweet.

This was pretty good, not great, but a solid contribution to the Tirol Premium line-up. I wish there had been something else in the layering to add more variation in texture rather than just lots of solid chocolate. Also, while the flavor mixture was good and the sweetness level subdued, each flavor felt a bit flat. You can tell that these are low-quality chocolates, but one can't expect too much of a 1-inch/2.5 cm square for 20 yen (25 cents) that is picked up at a convenience store.

This is a little higher in calories than usual for a Tirol candy at 66. Since it's not incredibly sweet, I'm guessing it's just fattier than usual though the chocolate isn't any softer than usual (and mine was firm because I kept it in the refrigerator). I'm not sure if I would recommend this to others. On the one hand, it's pretty good for what it is and if you're in Japan and can just buy one cheaply and you like coffee chocolates, you might want to give it a try. If you have to pay a higher import price though, or dislike coffee chocolates, I'd say give it a miss. I don't think I'd buy another, but I don't regret having sampled this either.

Random Picture 47

 Click this to see a bigger one that you can read better.

This sign is from Becker's, a fast food place that is either owned or has an exclusive deal with Japan Railway (JR). In some stations, you can find these places though only in some of the bigger ones that aren't already surrounded by other fast food options. As fast food goes, they're at least a small cut above the rest. Like Subway, they bake their own bread (buns) on the premises and claim to make everything fresh. I used to work near Itabashi station and they had a Becker's, but my local station does not.

This poster is for breakfast options at a Becker's at a neighboring station and it caught my eye for several reasons. First of all, the presentation on the sign is very elegant for fast food. Since I didn't actually eat there, I can't say for sure, but I believe that the food is served on actual plates. The sets are:

"Morning Plate 1" - scrambled egg, toast with butter, and a scrap of bacon with coffee
"Morning Plate 2" - this is called the "balance plate" which includes everything in the first set (egg, bacon, toast, coffee) plus yogurt and juice
"Morning Plate 3" - a hot dog, yes, a hot dog and a few scraps of lettuce and tomato with coffee
"Morning Plate 4" -  coffee, toast with cheese or mayo with various goo (can't tell which and the poster doesn't say), coffee, and a thimble of cabbage
"Morning Plate 5" - English muffin halves with scrambled egg and ketchup and seaweed, cheese and bacon, and coffee


The configuration of these sets illustrates something about Japanese food culture which one can either find charming or irritating, and that's that the equivalent of gustatory lip service when it comes to the sides. The amount of vegetables is so minuscule as to be pretty much pointless. They function more as garnish than as meal components.