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Archive for the ‘Food in Japan’ Category
My wife and her friends are a network of housewife beer drinkers on the lookout for the latest and greatest beer. Last night I opened the fridge and found this one, Suntory Sawaka Harunama. At first, I thought it was a chuhai until I asked. Nope. Beer. Poured a glass and was pleasantly surprised. I thought it would taste like sakura. Nope. It had a very good beer smell (for lack of a better word), light body, and a touch of the pale ale bitterness I look for. I thought it was a real beer until my wife told me it was HAPPOSHU. So what’s happening with beer in Japan? Is the world drinking happoshu? Are you? I mean, is the world producing beer with less than 25% malt? Why isn’t Japan exporting this beer? It’s quite good. Suntory DEFINITELY has the best happoshu out there. Why aren’t they exporting it? Suntory also produces the most popular whiskey in Japan. Looks like this company is up and coming. Just a side note; I tried to find this beer on Suntory’s web site and couldn’t. It seems the special beers are not listed as products. Is this how the companies are testing new products. I seem to recall Super Premium starting out the same way. So when are we going to see Bonne Biere and Sawaka Harunama on tap? Heellllooooo Suntory.
Just think, maybe now I can make that Lobster Bisque I’ve always wanted with the leftovers from my fridge. Maybe many of you are wondering what’s happening with cuisine in Japan. This is probably one of my favorite topics to talk about since the food here is soooooo good. I mentioned before that Sosaku dining is becoming quite popular. Well, another type of cuisine, which has actually been around longer than Sosaku, maybe 15 years or so, is Mukokuseki ryori or ‘mixed cuisine.’ The difference between Sosaku and Mukokuseki is the variety. Sosaku is generally considered to use more French accents while Mukokuseki is basically a mix of all countries. I believe Sosaku is more popular because of the presentation, whereas Mukokuseki seems to have no emphasis on style and tradition so important to Japanese. Personally, I think French food is old fish and meat covered in a sauce which masks the flavor, and then done up real pretty like to distract you–nice sauces, though. No offense Frenchie, I’m just a ‘gourmet.’ See more at http://www.gnavi.co.jp/en/w_theme/ Check the back issues if you are reading this post after May 2006. A reader asked in the Chat box what my favorite restaurant in Kobe is? It’s difficult to decide because there are so many good restaurants in Kobe. I’ll tell you my favorite kind of food instead of the name since most readers aren’t from Kobe nor are they visiting Kobe anytime soon. Read the rest of this entry » |
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UPDATE - My wife called Suntory to find out if it was still being brewed. Nope. They have stopped brewing Sawayaka. Boo hoo.
I was watching TV yesterday and stumbled onto this story about a taste sensor developed by Professor Kiyoshi Toko at Kyushu University. The device is able to absorb a sample of the foodstuff onto lipid paper, after which it translates the data gathered by the machine into graphical representations which is used by companies wishing to research ways to improve their products. Until now, only researchers themselves were able to determine the various tastes of sweet, sour, bitter, salty and umami (flavor).
No problem. Glad to hear from you. I hope you can join our little circle of friends who are curious about living in this country of mystery.
so uhm yeah, greetings from an half irish half arabic guy that lives in germany! ah and start making more podcasts, like 3 a week 
it was still good 
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