When you think of good food in Kobe, the first thing that comes to mind is the cluster of French restaurants in Kitano. These places, with that cute, polished Kobe sensibility showing in both the food and the …
An old friend was coming to visit Osaka, so I offered to be the guide. The main goal of this trip was Kyoto rather than Osaka, but since we were also planning to swing by Kobe while we were at it, we booked ou…
This April, the Shangri-La Hotel, the world-famous hotel chain, opened in a building near Tokyo Station. I always crash at a friend’s place in Tokyo, so I’ve never had reason to pay attention to To…
I went for lunch with a friend to Daifukuya, which has been getting a lot of buzz in Akabane lately. Daifukuya is apparently part of the Setagaya group. I like the Setagaya shops and have been visiting them wh…
It was a short weekend trip so things were pretty hectic, and I had drinks with friends lined up for the evening, so I decided to keep dinner simple with a bowl of ramen. There are two ramen shops that have be…
Shintomicho is a neighborhood roughly halfway between Ginza and Tsukiji, and by its very nature it’s packed with countless bars and great places to eat. Yuzukamiya is the soba shop the locals rave about …
Henri Charpentier is a famous dessert shop that has been in business in Ginza for 40 years. Lately it has kept opening branches, mostly in department-store food halls, and unusually, even those branches get ve…
June was a really busy month for me. There was work, of course, but I was also exercising and dieting at the same time, and I got hooked on reading as well. So I neglected my eating out and barely touched the …
Kurume is a town in Kyushu, roughly halfway between Fukuoka and Kumamoto. It’s famous for Kurume ramen, which is either a compromise between the punchy Kumamoto ramen and the mellow Hakata tonkotsu ramen…
I told myself I was on a diet… and since I’d spent quite a lot on travel in May, I spent my June weekends at home doing nothing but reading. So I barely made it to any good restaurants. Enjoying li…
Marugame Seimen is a Sanuki udon chain that’s all the rage these days. One happened to open near my place, so I went. The house specialty: kamaage udon The skill level looked lacking at a glance, so I…
There are two (or maybe three) places around here that I still haven’t been to. The reason I never went is that I knew full well there isn’t much to see compared to their reputation. Still, I’…