Random Picture #205

The picture above is of a poster for a restaurant near my old apartment in Tokyo. The characters on the left say "samurai" in katakana (the phonetic alphabet used for foreign words - at least usually). I was looking back through my pictures from Japan and something I hadn't thought about in many years occurred to me and that was the fried chicken and the way it is prepared. I don't eat fried chicken, but I did have some many, many years ago when I first arrived in Japan and it is quite different from what you get in the U.S.

You'll note that it is lighter in color. It is more like tempura in terms of the coating than fried chicken in the U.S., which tends to have a redder, darker, and much spicier coating. I also have a vague recollection that the Japanese version tastes of white flour and a hint of soy sauce and ginger, but the years may have dulled my taste memory. Of course, I'm not talking about Japanese KFC, which is almost the same as American KFC, but rather traditional pub-style (izakaya) fried chicken. Also, you'll note the thick slabs of chicken skin on the skewers of (thigh) meat in the center. That's actually supposed to make it more appetizing to people since the Japanese like to eat the skin.

If any of my readers has had non-KFC fried chicken in Japan, I'd like to hear your recollections of the taste. I have to admit that I haven't eaten it for more than 20 years and can't really trust my memory, but the appearance of what is in the picture is exactly what I remember.