I was in Tokyo for 6 days recently. Had a terrific food and enjoyed myself very much. If you love Japanese food, you have to visit Japan one day to try them in their home country! Below are my top 5 favorites.
Takoyakis from a small stall called Minatoya in Ueno. The stall doesn't look fancy at all and the lady who cooks the takoyaki takes her time in opening the stall, sometimes she doesn't even open! She doesn't have that sense of urgency because people keep coming! The first day we were in Ueno, is was closed! On our final day in Tokyo, we had to walk around to kill time in order to wait for her to open. We had takoyakis previously at two different places but this is no comparison. It is so good. The seasoning (fish flakes, sauce, mayo and spring onion) is self service.
Wheat soba in simple hot soup with seaweeds. It's one of the cheapest item served at this noodle shop at the Ikebukuro Station but it's really just delightful. The soup is clear and the texture of the noodle is perfect. They don't provide spoons so drink up from the bowl after finishing the noodles!
Tenya tendon and tempura. The cold tendon (like udon, only more springy) is just yummy even though it is plain. Dip it in the sauce provided and it already taste so good. The tempura prawns are also nice but easily available everywhere. The ones in Malaysia also taste as good. The tendon was so good, we had it for lunch and dinner on the same day.
Sushi! Although there aren't as many sushi varieties served as compared to Japanese restaurants in Malaysia, I can just eat the same sushi multiple times (because I don't eat the raw ones and don't take wasabi.) The sushi rice is freshly hand pressed, so it is still warm as the chef just scoop it out of the rice bucket. As you bite into one sushi, you can feel how soft and warm it is as the pressed rice breaks apart because it less compact (unlike sushi at some places like Sushi King whereby the rice is so compact and cold, after one bite and the rice still retains its shape.) If you go to Japan, try the standing sushi bars. No chairs, order and eat standing!
Peaches. As some of you guys know, peaches are my ultimate favorite of all fruits. The saddest thing about peaches is that it is seasonal. In Australia, I can only get them in the beginning of the year. So when I was in Japan, perfect timing! Peaches were on sale everywhere! but very expensive. During the my first day in Tokyo, each peach cost about 1000yen = $15 = RM45. Crazy you might think, RM45 for a piece of fruit. As days past, the price dropped to 1000yen for 7 pieces! I was so tempted to get some more during the last day but there was no way I can swallow down 7 peaches in a couple of hours considering that I still want to have other Japanese food before I leave. But the sizes of the peaches were huge and very juicy!
