Hakone

Hakone is a mountainous region southwest of Tokyo, famous for fall foliage and for views of Mount Fuji.  We've sent many people to visit based on what we've heard about it, but never been ourselves.  With Ana's visiting sisters in tow, we headed out for a night in a traditional ryokan in the Hakone region and to (hopefully) see Fuji with snow on it.  Photographic results available on Flickr.

To get to Hakone, we first bought Hakone Free Passes, which offers unlimited access to most forms of transportation to and in the Hakone area at a fixed and discounted price, then took a train to Odawara, switched trains, took a train up into the mountains to Gora, and then took a cable car up to our hotel's stop.  We had originally thought to take the cable car to the ropeway and find out if we could see the sun setting behind Fuji that night, but they close the ropeway at 4PM so that is impossible and we headed right to the hotel.

 We'd picked a less-expensive ryokan but it still pretty nice, and it was quite close to the cable car stop as well.  The point was to introduce the sisters to the traditional Japanese hot spring hotel experience without being too rough about it, so the hotel was a little more foreigner-friendly than some and they even had a vegetarian dinner option for our vegetarian guest.

 I requested and we got a Japanese-style room.

 Ana got them all in their yukata and I took a whole bunch of pictures to make sure we had some good ones, before she lead them off to experience the hot springs and being naked in front of strangers.  I went to the men's side afterward and was momentarily convinced I had entered the wrong facility as another guest had his two very young daughters in the bathing area with him and one ran by naked before stopping to inspect the foreigner, also naked.  I was immensely relieved to find out I had not misread the sign and I was clearly more shaken than her. 

 The reviews for the ryokan had emphasized the excellence of the food, but as the English-language ones were being written by foreigners, most of whom had little experience with Japanese food, I wasn't quite sure what to expect.  As formal Japanese dinners go, I thought it was pretty good.  There have been two posts in the recent past doing dish-by-dish coverage of such dinners so I'm going to skip it this time, though the pictures of all the courses are all available on Flickr.

 The main dish was shabu shabu, or basically cook-your-own-stew.  After dinner we headed back to the room and they watched movies on Ana's laptop while I ignored their regrettable cinematic selections and played games on my own laptop.

Breakfast was quite Japanese, which was expected, but I had never encountered this dish before and found its inclusion in a breakfast menu so arresting that I wish to share it here. Note that the small white pieces are not noodles or shredded cabbage, but very small fish.  The paste is daikon, and we were instructed to mix soy sauce in to create a semi-liquid mixture before consuming it.  I had to try it - tasted like soy sauce.  I don't think anyone else bothered with this one.

 The roasted fish was freshly grilled and therefore warm instead of cold.  I don't think I've ever had the pleasure of fresh and warm roasted fish instead of cold in a Japanese breakfast, and it was a large improvement. 

 I bribed one of Ana's sisters with my strawberry to try the fish.

 It really wasn't that bad - it was the for breakfast part that brought on the disgust, but I got enough drama on camera to justify the expenditure of the strawberry, and she had a real Japanese experience as roasted fish for breakfast is par for the course.

 The weather was looking outstanding, so we had high hopes for the views when getting back on the cable car.

From the cable car we got on the ropeway, which is more like a ski-lift gondola than anything else.

 Started getting pretty good views almost immediately.  It should be mentioned that of the four people / groups we've sent to Hakone, none have had good weather.  Looks like we saved that for ourselves.

 Even Fuji was mostly clear for us.

 The ropeway has a stop in an area that is still venting fumes from a volcanic eruption 3000 years ago - we disembarked to investigate.

 The warning sign uses three exclamation points.

 Fairly impressive quantities of volcanic gas were in evidence.  We stayed on the paths.

 One of Ana's sisters employed unique photographic postures trying to get Ana and I into frame with some of the scenery behind us.

 A normal person might think, sulfuric water boiling with all kinds of questionable substances - better stay away.  However, the Japanese set up a stand selling eggs cooked in the water, known in English as Black Eggs.

 For obvious reasons.  We didn't buy any, I just grabbed a picture when someone else held theirs up for their group's camera.

 Re-embarking on the ropeway, we got more views of Fuji and the Hakone region.

 The leg of the trip beyond the ropeway can only be accomplished by pirate ship, it would seem.

 The pirate ship moved pretty fast for not having the sails up, and there was some decent scenery on the sides of the lake.

 The other end of the lake would be our last really good chance to take pictures of Fuji, so we loitered a while and I messed around with the camera settings.  We also checked out a preserved section of the old Tokaido Highway (dating back 400+ years) but unfortunately they built the new highway right next to it so it wasn't very atmospheric.

 Looking carefully, you can see some of the trails zig-zagging up it.

 After that, we took a bus to a train to Odawara, and had waffles for lunch.

 After waffles, we walked to Odawara Castle, which is only a few minutes from their train station.  Odawara castle was fairly well restored and most of the moats had water in them, so the sisters saw a pretty good example of a Japanese castle.  As is pretty common, the interior is now a museum so we went in to inspect their cultural artifacts.  I found it amusing that the most famous things about Odawara Castle were almost all to do with the fact that the local ruling family, who built it, totally got their butts kicked by the guy they built the castle to defend against.

 Nice views from the top of the keep, too.

After the castle I dragged them all to Helmsdale because I might not get a chance to go again, and we ate the excellent fish and chips (the non-vegetarian sister commented "This is how fish was meant to be eaten") and they had hard cider and I had whiskey.  Ana won at cards.  Was a long day, but we had a lot of fun and great luck with the weather.  Ana will be blogging the rest of the sister's trip, so there should be another entry or few entries soon.

Tokyo: Narisawa

 Warning: High levels of food snobbery ahead.  Minimal anything to do with Japan.  Feel free to skip this entry if that doesn't float your boat.

When we went out for fancy dinner in Tokyo with some friends a few months ago, we went to a place called Yamada Chikara, which turned out to be fantastic.  What I didn't mention in that entry was that Yamada Chikara was the second place we selected, after we couldn't get reservations at Creations of Narisawa.  Yamada Chikara avoids the press and tries to stay undercover, but Narisawa does not and has regularly made it close to the top on a lot of "Best in Asia" type lists. Since we were in Tokyo again and Ana's sisters were at Disney until closing that night, we said "Hang the expense!" and made reservations.

Short version: We recommend Yamada Chikara for top-tier Tokyo dining.

Slightly longer version: Narisawa has a much showier building, a large and attentive staff, and some dishes were excellent.  Presentation on some of the dishes was probably better than we've ever seen.  But fewer dishes really wowed us on taste compared to Yamada Chikara, and I had a sense that they were trying too hard to be cool and to theme the meal and not hard enough to offer uncompromising excellence in the flavors of each dish.  The staff at times seemed nervous or twitchy, which should be absolutely absent at this price point.  Of the three highest-end molecular gastronomy places we've been (the other being FiftyThree in Singapore) we'd rank Narisawa firmly in third.  It was also the most expensive by a considerable margin. We're OK with having gone once, but I'd go back to either of the others skipping all the way, and would not go back to Narisawa unless someone else was paying.

 One thing they win over Yamada Chikara at is how easy it is to find the restaurant.  They're set back from a major road, next to a Bentley dealership.  They even have a sign!

 The dining room was plenty elegant, and well-lit / well-appointed.  As engineers, we especially enjoyed some of the hidden shelves and cupboards built into the walls around the room.  I'd call this one a tie, though they have different styles. Virtually everybody there had a camera, so I didn't feel crass when snapping pictures. 

 Fried oysters were good, but not the kind of good that haunts dreams.  I might have preferred a nice raw oyster myself - felt like their batter overpowered it a bit.

The fish in this raw fish and raw radish salad is called buri, and it came from Ishikawa (where we live) but I'm pretty sure this was the best example of that particular fish we've ever had.  Excellent ingredients, simple dish, very tasty.

 This dish had some of the best presentation I've ever seen. They grilled a squid, then turned the sauce into an ash/sand looking dry particulate matter with liquid nitrogen.  They spooned it over the hot squid and it smoked dramatically as it became liquid, which I admit is thematically genius.  However, there was a lot of it, which cooled the squid quite a bit, and I'd prefer my squid warm.  The squid also didn't have a whole lot of flavor - were I in charge I would have stuffed it with something and tried to punch up the sauce's taste a bit.  10/10 for presentation, 5/10 for taste.

 This bread they fermented and then cooked over a candle at the table.  It was very tasty.  The presentation on the butter there was fun as well.

 Crab and daikon soup - simple flavors, very good, enjoyed it thoroughly.  Not particularly surprised and delighted by it, which is really what you're looking for at this level.

 Excellent langoustine, tender and delicious. Broth was not that exciting.

 Fluke and mushrooms steamed together in a bag - again with the tasty but not necessarily special.

 The beef was the best dish of the night.  It was crusted with charred leek powder but mostly the fact that it was amazing beef, perfectly prepared, made it great.

 I thought the dessert dishes were mostly pretty forgettable, though Ana ate the macaroons and raved about them.

Looking back through, there isn't a single dish that I could call bad.  It might go something like good, very good, OK, very good, good, good, good, awesome, meh, OK.  The wine selections were quite appropriate and in a few cases excellent.  If this sounds like damning with faint praise, it absolutely is.  Creations of Narisawa was, for us, merely professional.  When you're charging what they're charging, you are competing with the highest tier of restaurants around the world.  Service must be unimpeachable, and the food has to blow minds, or it isn't worth it. If you're in Tokyo looking for a world-class culinary experience, our experience suggests Creations of Narisawa is not quite playing in that league. We had fun and a lovely evening, but we'll not be going back.

/End food snobbery (you were warned - I'm looking at you Nunu)

There will be more blog entries coming soon and they won't be restaurant reviews, we promise.

DISNEY!!!

Yes, all-caps and three exclamation points. It IS that exciting. If you're not a fan of Disney, feel free to skip this one, as it covers my sisters and I visiting Tokyo Disney!

In my family, Disney is kind of a big thing and my two visiting sisters were very excited about the chance to visit the Tokyo Disney parks. This was also my last chance to visit the parks while living in Japan. I went with them to visit Tokyo Disney Sea, a really amazing park I visited once with my mother and once with Lee for quite a few enjoyable days. Same park, still love it, but didn't quite love the crowds or the temperature this time. It was cold! We started the day with a non-working alarm. This didn't delay us too much because the anticipation of the parks and jet lag had my sisters up and moving since about 5 AM anyway. This being Disney, there's always a reason for extra special thematic decorations, and the beginning of 2012 is no exception. There were quite a few displays to celebrate the New Year and the coming Year of the Dragon. Mushu, the "dragon" from Mulan, was the character of the hour, decorating all kinds of souvenirs and displays including the monorail tickets and a stand to get your picture taken that had long, long lines the whole day (hence the night-time picture):

Disney Sea was still celebrating its tenth year, as it was when I visited with my mother in July, and there were quite a few reminders of this fact:

I'd like to think we were, in fact, magical.

Each of the areas had their own thematically decorated wizard hat to celebrate. I took pictures of every one I saw.

Obligatory carousel shot

We spent the day seeing the the park, eating strawberry popcorn (the only one without a huge line that wasn't curry or black pepper flavored) and Duffy taiyaki (seen in the last post). Aside from waiting far too long for a few rides, we had a very enjoyable time. We had pancakes for dinner, the hallmark of any successful day:

The next day I bowed out, now that my sisters knew where to go and what to do, and they visited Tokyo Disney Land on their own. Luckily, they showed up back at the apartment on time as expected, no late-night calls trying to figure out where they went wrong or anything. They got to see the Haunted Mansion in a Nightmare Before Christmas revamp:

They also got some pretty striking pictures of the Electrical Parade:

There are a whole bunch more pictures that you can see over at Flickr, if you want. Next up, what Lee and I did while my sisters were at Disney for the second day.