Yokohama Chinatown September 27, 2008

I’ve been pretty busy lately, so I’ve been gathering a lot of photos, but I haven’t had time to post them. I’ll be trying to catch up with some posts about our summer adventures over the next few weeks.

a popular shop selling nikuman, steamed pork buns

A few weeks ago, Alex and I took the train down to Yokohama to check out the famous Chinatown there. Once you pass through one of the many gates marking the entrance to Chinatown, you will notice souvenir shops, Chinese groceries, tea shops, and arcades, but most of all, there are Chinese restaurants. There are probably a hundred or more Chinese restaurants packed into an area that’s just a few blocks in each direction. Many of the restaurants offered overpriced dim sum buffets, while others sold just a few specialties, such as dumplings, steamed buns, or ramen.

charshu-man, steamed pork buns filled with Chinese-style barbecued pork

Alex and I picked out a restaurant that had rows of glossy roasted ducks and chickens hanging in the window, and a substantial waiting list. We found, however, that the dim sum plates were small, even for two, and the service was often slow and forgetful, so we didn’t leave feeling like we had gotten our money’s worth. We did, however, leave with pretty full stomachs after trying a good variety of dishes.I think if we were to go to Chinatown again in the future, I would skip the dim-sum buffets and pick and choose dishes from the dumpling vendors that line the streets or the shops that let you order just one dish (for a lower price of course).

A popular ingredients in Chinatown is fuka-hire, or shark’s fin, but I’m not a big fan since it’s not very sustainable to hunt such a large fish just to eat the fins and throw the rest away. I don’t think it has much flavor anyways, it’s more of a texture thing I guess. So I was avoiding a fair number of items on the menu.

One dish that I was glad to get because I can’t seem to find it in Gunma was the charshu-man, steamed buns filled with charshu, Chinese barbecued pork. I think they’re much tastier than the regular niku-man that you can find at convenience stores. I also had my favorite dim-sum dessert of sesame balls.

Shark’s fins hanging in a shop window in Chinatown

After lunch it was raining, so we didn’t hang out for too much longer. We did take some time to go to a few of the Chinese groceries to pick up some ingredients so that we can try making our own dim-sum at home sometime. I got some dried lotus leaves and Chinese sausage for making lotus-leaf wrapped sticky rice and we also picked up a variety of seasonings like chili-garlic sauce, tobanjiang (chili bean paste), and fermented black beans. I’m looking forward to trying some new recipes soon!

This kitty know’s where the good stuff’s at, “Let me in…”

Copyright 2008 LMS

Kamakura April 23, 2008

March 28th, we went to the Hase area of Kamakura to see the Daibutsu. On our way there, we stopped at Hase-dera. Hase-dera has a beautiful garden and views of the coast and town below. The weather was lovely and we had a wonderful time enjoying the garden and temple grounds. Hase-dera was founded after the famous Hase-dera in Nara. It is said that the tree that the image of Kannon that is housed at Hase-dera in Nara was carved from was so large that a second image of Kannon was carved from it, and tossed into the sea, with the prayer that it would someday return to save humanity. Some years later, it washed ashore at Kamakura, and Hase-dera was founded near that spot.

On the way to the main hall, there is a smaller hall dedicated and garden area dedicated to Jizo. Here we saw the most adorable statues of Jizo.

There are many beautiful flowers blooming in the garden at Hase-dera. Of course, by this point, the cherry blossoms were blooming just about everywhere we went. In fact, this was the official opening day of cherry blossom viewing season in the Tokyo area. Here we also saw a beautiful bi-colored peach blossom. The same tree has branches with white flowers and branches with deep pink flowers.

Next we went to see the Daibutsu (Big Buddha) of Kamakura. The Daibutsu is one of the most popular attractions in Kamakura. The Daibutsu is 12.3 meters tall and is sculpted from bronze. On the wall of the temple is a pair of woven straw sandals that are sized to fit the Great Buddha’s feet. You can get an idea of the scale of the statue by standing next to these huge sandals. You can learn more about Kamakura Daibutsu, Hase-dera, and other sights in Kamakura here.

I stopped on the way to the Daibutsu at a small stand selling niku-man and other Chinese dumplings. The niku-man was 400 yen, which is a bit expensive for these steamed, meat-filled buns, but it was large enough to share, and one of the best ones I’ve had. I highly recommend it. It is the small, Chinese-style building on the left side of the street as you walk toward the Daibutsu.