56 posts tagged “japanese”
I've been reading about this place forever and every attempt to eat here has driven me elsewhere or to Mr. Ramen, home for waiting-in-long-line quitters. This time I had Him by my side and He wouldn't let me quit. So, we shivered in the autumn wind, huddling close to the glow behind Daikokuya's famous yellow awning with hopes of eating a warm bowl of ramen.
Standing outside we, well I, had the chance to thoroughly read the menu and decide on our orders. We were getting the ramen, gyoza for me, fried rice and sausages for him. The gyoza made me curious - they were rectangle and not the cresent shape I grew up with. Must. Have. Them.
Instead of gyoza a plate of green onions came out with a garnish of gyoza. There was so much green onion, I brushed them aside to save them for my ramen. I thought the gyoza and sauce was pretty weak. I'm used to more ginger in the dumpling filling and the ponzu sauce wasn't as citrusy. They were fried nicely though, so not a total fail.
The sausages (really hot dogs) were very tasty with the mustard on the side. Not cut into octo-dogs, but that's okay. I've never had Japanese fried rice. It just tasted like fried rice. I prefer my mom's version (I guess it's Vietnamese fried rice?) since it has Chinese sausage in it.
From where we were seated we got a great view into the tiny gally kitchen. It was cool to watch the cooks dance around each other in a flurry,hustling to get our order out. I noticed one guy at the wok and I knew he was making the fried rice order. Another guy was stirring a large stock pot with the ramen soup base in it. He was obviously preparing our Daikoku ramen.
Not my birthday, but K's birthday. Us ladies went to Musha, a Japanese izakaya restaurant. The only thing I've heard about this place is that they serve a cheese risotto in a wedge of Parmesan cheese. The bigger the order, the larger the cheese wedge/wheel.
My friend and I were in search of Beard Papa's, one of the only thriving businesses in the Little Tokyo Shopping Center. We saw an interesting sign for a
Shojin is a traditional vegetarian Buddhist cuisine loosely translated to "devoted cuisine". The restaurant was elegantly decorated with wonderful art on the walls.
Only one more week for everyone to see Sweet Streets, the Harajuku inspired art show at Nucleus.
Last month I drove all the way down to my old 'hood of Long Beach to visit a gallery I've been meaning to visit for a while. DDR Projects is a little space on Broadway and Redondo, right across from the Reno Room. I spent a good time talking to John, the curator of the gallery, about bringing art to the community and creating a space to feature new, upcoming artists, like this show in particular about new Japanese and Japanese-American artists.
John makes art approachable and his passion about it is contagious. I was thrilled to meet him and make a new friend.
Well, it did and does. I just had to cross the street.
Now I love ramen and, while I'm not a Rameniac, I do know what's good and what I like.
I don't like Orochon.
I should have realized that it was going to be awful when I learned of Orochon's food gimmick. They serve the spiciest, hottest bowl of ramen in town. Some people are gluttons for spice, but I think those people are just killing their poor taste buds and can no longer experience real flavor. And vice versa, it's easy to hid something foul tasting with a lot cayenne pepper.
I guess I made the mistake of going to a spicy ramen place and asking for no spice, but I think a ramen shop serving gimmicks should at least get the base right. It's like that one cupcake shop that has great frosting, but dry gravel cakes underneath. You know what I'm talking about...
Happy International Sushi Day! Not sure who or what group decided this, but in honor of this day of one of my favorite treats, I'm posting about some good sushi I found in a landlocked state. Can it be? Miles from the ocean and I didn't get sick eating sushi in Colorado?
It's true.
Tomo Sushi is in a strip mall, but what fun sushi find isn't these days? The decor is bizarre, remains of the previous restaurant (apparently frontier themed). I was going with a sushi lover and a sushi novice. I ordered the agedashi tofu to start. I actually can't remember what sushi rolls we ordered, but they all had some combination of spicy tuna and cream cheese. The BFF loves spicy foods and cream cheese together.
I think their izakaya dishes are much better. I want to try their homemade tofu. Oh and apparently they serve macrobiotic meals here, so if you have one of those friends bring them here.
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