Description: I am told that we had some killer meals in Japan. I have to take the word of my traveling companions since I am not a fan of sushi, even after spending 9 years in LA. Thank God for Japanese street food.
On our last night, we found dozens of street food stalls outside one of the train stations, cue chorus of singing angels. It could be that by this point I was nearly starved, but Japanese street food is absolutely awesome! My favorites were the yakitori and takoyaki.
Traditionally, yakitori refers to grilled chicken. However, it now covers a large section of meats and vegetables grilled and served on a skewer, with a minimum of two skewers per order. The distinct taste comes from dipping the food into either a sweetish soy-based sauce called tare or salt before grilling and the quality of the charcoal.
I had wanted to eat at a yakitori-ya filled with office workers grabbing a quick snack before the train ride home, the type that are made up of a few stools pushed up against a counter and identified by small red lanterns out front. Please note that the lanterns should be marked with the character for tori, or bird. Otherwise, you can end up in a place not fit for mixed company, as we almost did.
My other favorite was takoyaki, fried or octopus dumpling. The round dumplings are made up of batter, octopus, tenkasu (the batter left over from tempura cooking), pickled ginger, and green onion. They are cooked in a takoyakiki, a special cast-iron frying pan with hemispherical molds, and topped with okonomiyaki sauce. It truly is an amazing sight to see the cooks using toothpicks to turn the dumplings in the takoyakiki to give the dumplings their round shape. You can usually spot these places by the cartoon octopus on their sign.
We then topped off the whole affair with cream puffs from a place called Beard Papa's. I was now a happy and well-fed camper.
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