Okinawan Food

Beach scenes plus lots of food in one place...not good for your spring breaking sorority girl, but for a hungry traveler, absolutely perfect.

Okinawa received a ton of influence from other cultures that are not Japanese. It was separate from Japan for many years. Most of its history has it associated as a semi-province of China under the Ryuukyuu kingdom. Japan then came in, then the United States during WWII and the American army still maintains a huge presence on Naha, Okinawa's main city. Throw in the fact that it is a tropical island, the food is very different from mainland Japan. I ate, alot. Not shown here was a 30 dish breakfast that I just gave up on as far as pictures go. Just too many. It was good.

Okinawan sweets. Any restaurant had some form after the meal. The ones on the left are a dark, almost burnt sugar confection. Sugar grows everyone on Okinawa and you can but and taste test these blocks of raw, dark sugar everywhere. Sugar ice pops, raw sugar cane...lots of it around. Right hand side are Chinsukou, a type of biscut made with a ton of butter, some times the dark sugar, but milk, slightly salty and chocolate varieties were also available. Very flaky, beautiful coffee time cracker. Would definitely look for these in America. Surprising elegant for Okinawa's cruder style of food.



Okinawan pork...the Aguu Pig. Host mother went nuts over this stuff. Like most famed Japanese meat, incredibly fatty. I believe this is n uncured, undried bacon portion so mabye comparing fat content isn't fair. What struck me was how white even the lean parts were, not because of fat, just very light flesh. Despite the fat, had a very fresh taste. Tried a bit raw and was probably the best pork I've had. Flavor certainly different than American or other Japanese pork. This went into a nabe with shaved negi (green onions)
Also at the negi nabe place, we got Koimo tempura with green matcha salt. They are fried sweet potatoes on steriods essentially. Can't go wrong with fried sweet potato but I wanted to point out the contrast between the green salt and purple potato. This is what Japanese food is about...color, presentation. The food looks like a painting, art, and also tastes good.
American influence. Taco rice is a staple on most menus and you can buy the stuff as a mix. Spam also came over in the war and the Okinawans have a hawaii-like fascination with it.
Okinawa grows many varieties of beans, not soybeans. As a result, their tofu is from sesame or peanuts. This one is peanuts. Peanut tofu tastes somewhat sweet, like peanut butter but not as overwhelmingly oily or strong. The texture is not like soy tofu. It is a bit stretchy, falling close to mochi for elasticity. It is not easily divided with chopsticks like its soy cousin.
After a long price negotiation, host mother bought this bad boy at the market. Like my own mother, kind hearted by a vicious shopper. Market had some of the strangest seafood I've seen. Reds, blues, orange colors. Most still moving since Okinawa is a major fishing port. I think this market was like the Tsukiji of Okinawa. A feeder for all the restaurants. Now what to do with raw fish when you have no fridge. ..
Bring it upstairs to the restaurant that you know (more host mother connections) and turn half into a soup and half into a grilled dish. This "Ebi" (pacific lobster) is all tail meat with the miso (brain and stuff). From the standpoint of a Japanese person, the best you can get. Most americans wont argue with te tail portion either. For claw people...better stick with the atlantic. Meat was incredibly firm. Freshest lobster/shrip I've eaten.
This is my new favorite vegetable...gouya. A bitter, lumpy, green squash that looks sort of like a misshapen cucumber. The preparation is called Gouya Champaru and is Goya sliced thin sauteed with egg, pork, tofu. Sometimes fish is substituted for pork. I had it about 4 different times and if done right, all the bitterness goes from the gouya and you are left with a delicous, although somewhat sloppy dish. It stays firm when you cook it, a little crunchy. Hope to find it in the states, this would be a fun and easy dish to make.
Okinawa is tropical and has its share of tropical fruit. Pinapple, passion fruit, mango, papaya were all available, although at extravagant prices (not in season...it is winter after all).
Dragonfruit. Most expensive fruit avaiblable. 1500 yen each. Wnated to try but couldnt justify 1500 yen for a piece of fruit.
Not the first time I saw snake alcohol. Saw about 4 throught the trip. A snake is put in okinawan whiskey until it dies. Then every day you are supposed to drink a little bit. No samples were available.

COSTCO

Yeah, its here. I've heard it blows away BJs. Actually never been to one in the States but had a good time in the one in Japan. This place was BIG and WIDE, things that you dont see in Tokyo. Everything was efficient of course. To enter the building from the parking deck there is a system of conveyor belts for you and your cart. There were items from all over the world, mostly american and Japanese. It had the feel of BJs and I felt like I was back at home in yorktown heights. They do TVs, tires, the usual. Because its Japan they sold tremendous amounts of booze at cheap prices. Beer, wine, as well as hard stuff. The seafood section was also tremendous. One of the big hits in Japan are rotissere chickens. They cost twice as much as in America but are so good. I was happy that host mother agreed and grabbed two for dinner.

You don't see these bad boys in American Costco. If you think about it, Japan is a heck of a lot closer to King Crab territory than NY.
Christmas Cakes
HUGE wine selection

Bakery section looking the same
Imported booze. Hope prices are visable. The bottom row holds my favorite gin and vodka to date. The gin is recognizable, vodka is a polish import that Max brought back from his time in Poland. It's all over Japan for some reason and dirt cheap.
Welcome to a wholesaler. Same look.
Conveyor belt
At the end of the line there was an ice cream that came with a strong recommendation: hokkaido cream. Hokkaido is the far north island of Japan and is known for its food, especially milk products. There is a special raw milk caramel that comes from hokkaido, as well as butter. This ice cream fell into the same category. It was just vanilla flavored, no other choices but probably didn't need the vanilla flavor to be the best soft, custard style ice cream I've had. I don't know the butterfat content and don't want to but it was worth whatever it was. Ice CREAM. Sugar was kept pretty low and you could taste and feel the raw cream and butterfat that makes this so good. I would love to just a plain, milk flavored ice cream in this style. The cup I had cost 200 yen, putting it as probably the cheapest calorie per yen food in the world. Anyone who gets the 300 yen cup has a death wish. It's that good. Japanese have a word for such food...yabai.

Christmas Cruise

So we boarded a boat. 4 courses, red and white wine options. The meal called for both. First two courses went white, main course went red. Intersting combination of stuff. The first and last dishes were very spring, light, fruity dishes. The second dish was somewhere inbetween, a seafood cake, heavy on the seafood, light on the cake, and sauteed mushrooms. The third dish was definitely wintery, with roasted and stewed items in red wine sauce. The whole meal seemed to have a french influence, the chef probably trained there.

Place settings...they made the napkins look like boots. Pretty sweet. Don't know how they did that but they were wrapped tight and looked like it took a while. We used all the utensils on the table so we did lots of eating. My kind of meal.
Course 1: Cold Plate
Shrimp, scallops, asparagus, prosciutto (parma). The whitish sauce on the top and bottom is a yuzu mayonaise. I don't go for mayo but I loved this one. I don't know if they made it completely in house or not, but the yuzu flavor did not come from a jar. Tasted they used just the skin of the yuzu, no juice in there. Yuzu tastes somewhere between a lemon and grapefruit, tart, definitely not sweet, but also definately not overpowering. Having that in the mayo tempered the nasty, mouth and gut covering flavor subsititue and made a very nice sauce. The yuzu worked with everything but the Prosciutto, that was best left alone. Scallop was raw, a little ginger, and very sweet. Scallops have become my favorite shellfish at this point. Can't wait for hte spring...supposedly they are best then. The dish was light, not wintery at all, but niether was the weather.
Second Course: A seafood cake with sauteed mushrooms, lemony sauce. Seafood cake sounds creepy and probably doesn't do the dish justice but I am translating from Japanese. It was some type of white fish, not caked, more assembled than anything else. There was something holding the chunks of meat together but it was not very bready at all. As for the mushrooms, they were not sauteed in butter which was odd, probably just oil, garlic, lemon. Fish and shrooms aren't a common combination but because both parts of the dish were done well, the dish worked. The menu was clear to point out that these were champagnon mushrooms, which is just your ordinary mushroom so I dont know why they did that. They must have gotten some special ones or used the name to cover up a Japanese variety. Probably sounded great to Japanese to get some french 'shrooms but just about everything is more excitiing than a champagnon.

Main Course: Roasted water fowl, deer meat and potato stuffed onion, some kind of seaweed that was fun to eat.
Second time I ran into this type of bird that I don't know. First time was as an appetizer with the fugu meal. It goes down like steak, all red meat. I would say osterich but they don't have that here. It is very lean all the way through but has about an 8th of an inch uniform fat cap on it. The meat is great, wish I knew what this was. It is not goose, duck, or pheasant...looked all those up.
This was a winner. An onion stuffed with deer meat and potato. Really solid winter dish and I love the idea. I would change up the onion a bit though. Seems like it was boiled or steamed first to get the onion flexible, then wrapped around a seperately cooked meat mixture, then served. I'd find a way to bring the ingredients together more and get some color on that onion. Inside was finely shreaded meat, braised for a while, and a mashed potato mixture. Potato was light on butter and milk, may have just been plain when it was cooked with the deer meat.
Seaweed I think...only way to get those bubbles. I don't think there is an earth plant that grows naturally or that can be prepared in that way. It was bubbly. Flavor was light and clear. Just interesting food item.
Dessert: Vanilla and berry ice cream with a tart cherry sauce. I'm not big on desserts so I don't have much to say. Tart sauce and creamy vanilla worked well. Japanese know balance in their food. I was talking to host sister about different desserts and how the Japanese react to sweet things differently than Americans. Pretty interesting that we have different conceptions of sweet that I don't understand yet. For example, I had my little bro try banana and peanut butter together. He thought it was horrible, too sweet. But this is the same kid that sucks down mochi covered in Sugary syrup and azuki sweet beans. Host sister is the same way, loves anko which is probably the sweetest thing I've ever tasted. Can't stomach it. They also werent big on the pumpkin pie I made with the other host student which wasnt sweet at all. Other than aquired tastes and all that, she explained it in terms of balance. When you eat sweet mochi or anko, you drink a green tea that is slightly bitter. American sweet does not have that balance...like cookies, cake, etc. I still don't get the banana peanut butter aversion since that is the best combination in the world but balance makes sense. Back to dessert, this was balanced.

Kaiseki Ryouri (会席料理）

Some meals are special. There is a lot of delicious food out there that fit in countless categories. I've eaten many many good things but there are a few meals that stand out. There was a meal I ate in Rome off Piazza Novona that I won't forget. The night I ate at Morimoto's in NYC was another one. Kaiseki Ryouri in Atami falls into that category. It embodied all that I've learned about Japanese cuisine so far. This is one of note and I hope there are many more ahead.

So a little background about Kaiseki...It is a very traditional and elegant way of Japanese cooking and eating. A variety (typically 7 or more) small courses are prepared and presented one by one. Fresh, local, seasonal ingredients are used. Preparation varies from course to course. There are grilled items, steamed items, stewed items, raw items, warm, cold, hot, all presented to look beautiful and give the eater a variety of tastes and textures so their palate doesn't get stale eating a big plate of the same thing. Dishes are typically decorated to resemble nature. So we begin.

First course: Kabocha (Pumpkin/Butternut Squash-type) chawanmushi.
Chawanmushi is a steamed egg custard. It's not a solid custard because it has some other kind of liquid with it. The regular version just has dashi broth and eggs, so it tends to run after you start eating it. This one was squashed based and probably just had egg yolks so it was sweet and rich. The liquid did not separate as easily which was a bit nicer. On top is a sweet Chinese fruit and there were also pieces of squash in the bottom of the dish. This was an appetizer in every sense of the world. Just big enough to get an appetite going for the next dish ahead...

Second course: Sashimi, 3 ways. From here on, all the courses came with keigo-laced instructions and descriptions from the server. After picking out the nouns and verbs from "Would you please allow me to introduce to you...I think" mess that is keigo, I figured this out...

3 types of sashimi here: Maguro (lean tuna) Hamachi (Yellowtail tuna) Agi (under the carrot, small fish) Flavors incredibly clean and fresh. I wish there was some more contrast presented in types of fish, the one fault in the whole meal. The Aji contrasted but the Hamachi and Maguro were much to similar to eachother...lean meat from the tuna family. The Agi was a bit different and sprinkled with some green onion. I enjoyed that one alot. Also look at the flowers and leaves carved from vegetables, totally edible.

Also on the sashimi plate was this salad of white tuna wrapped around a thin slice of cucumber. We were actually instructed to eat this first. Then finish with the Above sashimi.This one was interesting, the second sashimi portion on the palte. It was a cooked shrimp in two halves in a connsome and fish egg jelly. The bottom of the cup was filled with a type of white soy product. Not firm like tofu, not a jelly, a bit more stretchy than a pudding. The tail half of the shrimp was shrimp, but the carpace portion, legs, head, and all were deep fried and lightly sweetened by the bath it was sitting in. It was cruncy, briny, and sweet at the same time.

Clockwise from top is Aji, Hamachi, Maguro
Clockwise from top: Gaijin, sashimi plate, beer, chopsticks. Where's waldo?

Third Course: Soup (not miso) Citrus flavored broth. The Japanese use lemon or yuzu rind often in soup that is not miso based. Soup is a major part of Japanese cusine and is eaten with all dinners, sometimes twice as in this case. White miso is the staple accompanyment with the maincourse. This is a course on its own. In the soup was a piece of Tamago-dofu, tofu made with an egg base, a Japanese bitter green, and chicken meatball. The soup was citrusy and salty but balanced. It seemed like the chicken meatball was cooked by steam right in the bowl. These bowls come covered and the guest opens it up. Not sure if its just to keep it warm or the actual preparation. Course four: This is Aji, a very local ingredient. It was just salted and grilled, served with lemon. Fish was not served right off the grill, it cooled a bit before it was served. It's a white, slightly oily, not that flaky fish. Much more interesting than flounder, we took this one apart ourselves. We were also reminded that the best meat is the cheeks and inside the head. I don't disagree. This was the oiliest, most tender part.


Course five: Nimono (stewed preparation) This was like a mini sukiyaki, no meat. Inside the pot were hoshimeiji mushrooms , green onions, and cabbage. You remove the veggies and dunk them in the soy sauce, chive, spiced daikon mixture at right. Out of all the courses, this was the least delicous, but still the best sukiyaki I've had. Vegetables were tender and the broth was flavored with dashi and a bit of soy sauce and sake.
Sixth (and best) Seafood stewed/grilled course. Three small portions. This one, a conch concoction, was grilled in its own shell. The base had rocks and a sterno and was flaming when it was brought to the table. The top was capped when it came out and we were instructed to leave it for a bit. It was worth the wait. It tasted like the ocean. Inside were pieces of tender conch, a piece of mushroom (shiitake) and some greens. The broth picked up the flavor of the ocean, salty and slightly mineral. After scouring out all the pieces I drank every last drop. There was also a little esgargot inside along with the bigger pieces of conch. Completely different flavor, first time I had anything like it.
Yaki-enoki. Grilled mushrooms with some of the same bitter green. Grilled mushrooms are always excellent. They tasted like steak they were so well cooked.
Here is the set of three of the grilled items. The conch still has the cap on when I took this one. The long plate has a piece of grilled fish called カレー。Don't know the name in English. It was just an accompanyment to the first two. This grilled fish was served chilled in a ponzu sauce.
７: A grilled (at the table) set. This is a metal plate with a big sterno underneath and some type of leaf. On top of the leaf are mushrooms, tofu, rice, thin slices of beef, and a miso mixture. This was all cooked together for a few minutes on the plate, then we mixed it all and ate it from a separate plate. Whatever was in the miso mixture was some of the best seasoning I've ever tasted. The beef was not overwealmingly marbled so it actually suited my American tastes a little better. As opposed to the 6th plate, this was very much a land course. Rice, mushrooms, beef, soy.

Shiro Miso soup. A must with every main course, Japanese custom. This one was very elegant for miso soup. The white object was a very light soy biscut. Iniside the soup were green onions and a type of stringy green seaweed.
Tsukemono with the main plate.
Dessert was a mango cream (more like a blended fruit compote) and fresh fruit. This was chilled, very simple. The mango cream tasted like mangos, not cream or butterfat so after a pretty long dinner went down easily and didn't leave me feeling like I had to go for a jog. This was really a fresh fruit dessert in disguise. Just to show how good the chef was in planning the meal, take a look at the color of the mango cream and the red fruit on top. Same design and texture as the first course. I really liked that.

This was so Japanese and wonderful. Everything was fresh and clean. Nothing was overly seasoned, sweeted salty, greasy, fried, all of the things that make food taste good. It was a clean delicious. Balanced. Looking at the food was almost as satisfying as eating it. There was a range of textures and temperatures so that you could look forward to each course. American/French high cuisine could learn something from this. Cream, foie gras, caviar is not needed to hit the top of the food world.

Okay, now they have everything

My one food gripe in Japan is that they don't have enough cheese. I got corrected today. The ICC was doing a french week and today was a french cheese tasting. They brought in a Japanese authority on French cheese who owned her own food import company. I figured it would be alright, get a few shavings of cheese and leave. What I didn't realize was that they were going to go all out. It was incredibly well done and professional. There was a presentation on cheese making and tasting, then 7 types of cheese were portioned out for 6 people. Our "Cheese Sensei" was fluent in both French and cheese and guided us as we progressed through the 7 item cheese plate. Everyone got very sizable portions, probably an ounce or more per type which is more than anyone could expect for 300 yen. In addition to the cheese, there was crusty bread, delicious dried fruit (including a very natural raisin..still on the stem), walnuts, and and water crackers to use with the cheeses and to cleanse palate between them. The cheeses progressed in the logical order or mildest to strongest then finished with a 70% butterfat monster of a dessert cheese.



Two plates of cheese, later to be divided up. There was Roquefort, Toma(!), Comte, 70% Australian soft sweet cheese with apricots and mango.

Camembert, Epoisee, and an amazing goat cheese that didn't come out right in the katakano so I coudln't recognize the name the name.
TOMA!! After searching for it all through the summer I found the Piedmont cheese that is Italy's answer to brie. Not as soft and runny, not ammonia-tasting at all. Just a deep, creamy flavor. Slightly mushroomy. For some surprising reason it went best with dried mango slices. According to everyone at my table this was the winner. Comte!! Similar to Gruyere but with higher production standards. It was very nutty and the flavor got more intense as you got closer to the rind. It actually tasted like walnuts at some points. Wish I had an apple to eat this with. Or a fondue.
Part of our groups cheese plate. There was another half to this. Our group was 6 people. I was very full. From top: Toma, Comte, Goat, Roquefort
Camembert (Raw milk) Japan doesn't have the same pasteurization laws as America and consequently this was the real stuff. No unpasteurized milk product aged under 60 days can be imported into the US, ruling out AOC Brie and Camembert. This cheese was creamy as ever with no hint of ammonia. You could taste the milk that it came from because it was raw.
Amazing goat cheese. Usually goat cheese has a distinctive tartness but this was more sweet than anything. Like most aged cheeses, the middle was hard and chalky with the outer portion softer and more ripened. Excellent spread on bread.
My camera has a nasty habit of lying to be about how full the battery is. No more pics from here. The Roquefort was very stong and smelled just like a mushroom...thats how ripe it was. By then the fruit and bread were gone. It could have used something to balance its flavor. The Eppoise was an experience in its own, calling for a spoon rather than knife. Another cheese that when alone, isn't going to show its best flavors. I've heard that it is amazing with grapes and I got some commentary from the Cheese Sensei that it is commonly eaten with potatoes.