teamEggers

Who Goo? FUGU!

For two years, we’ve been talking about it. When we came home last year, people asked us… so, did you do it? And we had to quietly say “no” to each of them. It’s not the fear of eating something that will kill you in a few minutes, but rather… the reviews of those who had made it out alive.

Okay. Okay. I’m being dramatic. Hardly anyone dies from eating fugu these days. The fatalities you hear about are generally in back-ally sorts of establishments or from fishermen who think they’ll probably be fine just hacking the little fishy to pieces right there on the boat.

It’s really hard to become a certified fugu chef. And when someone dies in your establishment, you lose your license forever. (Historically, a sushi chef was supposed to commit honorable suicide by his fish-knife, should his sushi kill anyone else.)

So what did it taste like? You’re dying to know. It sounds funny, perhaps a little lame, but… it tasted a little bit like chicken. Sometimes. See, we had it a few ways.

First out came our mandatory appetizer, which was thickly cut fish skin (very gelatinous. not very much flavour) and green onions. Meh.

Next up we ordered it breaded and fried, which tasted almost exactly like chicken wings. I was searching for the bleu cheese dressing. Fugu even has a really strong bone that was left in, which made the chicken wing comparison that much more appropriate.

Time for the main event: fugu sashimi. It was incredibly light, almost too delicate to taste. A squeeze of lime was really all the sauce you wanted, because it was so easily overpowered by the ponzu or scallions that they served it with.

And it’s not like it was cheap. I want to taste it, you know?

After this, we did yaki-fugu, and they brought out a set of hot coals to grill our fish on. The fish was so fresh it was twitching. Twitching. Please watch this:

The grilled fugu was our favourite by far. It started to take on the soft, melty attributes of halibut. Really nice!

Sake was copiously poured throughout the night, and I swear… one of these times I’ll learn my lesson not to drink so much on a school night. There was sake with fish-tale on the menu, which a couple people opted for. I’m so glad I stayed away from that. It was the foulest smelling thing evar. EVAR. yuck.

The last thing we got was fugu nabe, which is a stew of the fish in fugu-broth. There’s something really spectacular about julie schooling us all on the magic-that-is-induction and how we could stick this bamboo and paper basket onto the heating element but it didn’t catch fire. Which is kind of fantastic.

The nabe was kind of fantastic too. While fugu isn’t in your future, I think we should have a “japanese stew” night at our house sometime soon. They’re really easy and really tasty.

And that’s it! This is the core of our group, people you’ve seen around teamEggers for the past few months: Jon, Emi, Brian, Me, Julie, Will.

Have a great night. Thanks for tuning in.

Yakiniku in Spring

There’s a yakiniku (think: korean bbq) place that we’ve gone to about three times now. It’s a great place to go with a group, and at $30 for all-you-can-eat and all-you-can-drink, it’s not a bad deal. So when Dana got into to town, we were all really excited to take her there. After all, it’s a really cool Japanese experience in a little spot that we had found ourselves.

Remember the first time we were there, the boys dubbed jon “the grill nazi”, because he was so adamantly regulating the height of the flames? It looks like the restaurant could have used a few more jons in its midst. That night we found nothing but an empty plot of gravel where the building once stood. Did it burn to the ground?

In our shock and disbelief we set off in search of dinner.

Even though it’s slightly more expensive and infinitely more corporate, we were happy to have thought of Gyu-Kaku: It’s large enough to fit our group of 8 and essentially the same as our original plans.

Doesn’t jon look like a dirty hippy with his bonaroo shirt and face-scarf? That thing is so many different colours, it makes me giggle. Someday I’ll take a close up picture of it for you. I can’t imagine that he’ll be interested in that though – I might have to do it stalker-style, while he’s sleeping.

Dana’s so adorable. Look at her new glasses? Aren’t they stylish?

I love this picture of emi. She’s so goofy…

…and I think Brian Reece was trying to intimidate me because I had spent the past five minutes making fun of how super-gay he looked. Which isn’t a big deal, but come on. He was wearing hot pink with teal sparklies.

Yakiniku is so entertaining, even if you’re not traditionally someone that loves to chow on lots of meat (read: that ex-vegetarian here). It’s an experience. You know, like… the experience of burning off all your arm hair as you’re cooking dinner.

It’s a way to interact with your dinner pals and take part in your meal. There’s something to be said for not eating passively; for not scarfing a hamburger on your car ride home from work, for not shoving a candy bar in your face as you’re watching Glee. But I suppose that’s a post for another day.

Can someone remind me that I don’t do well with “all you can drink”? My hair looks like I just had a little tousle in the broom closet! I show you this picture just because the sakura tree behind us is SO pretty. You hear me? Don’t look at my head – look at the pretty tree BEHIND my head.

And two more things. 1. Did someone forget to tell dana that we were being fierce? Or…. dana, is that the fiercest you get?! and 2. why does my “fierce” face look like “car sick”? Sigh. Anyhow. Fantastic evening. Reminds me why I should stay up past BedTime sometimes.

Barraca – Yokohama

I found a place in yokohama to get sparkling wine and paté. This might not excite you, but for me, it was the silent apex to an already cool day.

After watching the F. Marinos rock their soccer-ness earlier in the day, we headed back to Yokohama for some drinks and eventual dinner. I recognized Barraca, the Italian sister to the Spanish Bar that I love so much (Chabola in Motomachi), and convinced the group that we should give it a go.

They have a fantastic patio table that was great for watching passerby, and also for not disturbing the serious diners with our giggling. (That’s Dave, to the right of Jon, and Will’s friend-of-a-friend Phillip?)

This is Julie. Julie is quickly becoming a regular guest on the teamEggers show, and we’re happy to have her. She can match me bite-for-bite and is always up for trying something new. Oh, and she’s hi-lar-ious.

I’d love to come back to Barraca to see how they do with a more serious dinner (and not just snacks). They just might be the shining star in the otherwise shoddy Japanese-Italian dining sphere. Which is to say… they didn’t suck. And my other experiences with Italian food here haven’t been… good.

(For those of you in the area, Barraca is located on the Isezaki pedestrian street, near Kannai Station in Yokohama)

Yokohama F. Marinos (Soccer)

It’s Soccer DAY!!

But first, a very happy happy birthday to our Mother (in-law), Ann. I hope you had a great day and did some special things. We’re thinking of you!

Back to Soccer. We got a good sized group together to check out the first F-Marinos (home) game of the year. So much fun! (left to right: Will, Ian, Dave, Jon)

(left to right: Julie, Michelle, Sayo, Toshi) It’s always good to see Sayo & Toshi. They’re good peoples. And I got a new coat!

There are two things that I find fantastic about soccer in Japan. Number 1. The beer-kids have KEGS in their BACKPACKS. How do i get this? Seriously.

Second, the stadium food is SO much healthier than American stadium food. Garlic fries, anyone? no go. How about some pretzel sticks & edamame?

A pickle? Look at that head! Those crazy Js.

Speaking of those crazy Japanese, they really know how to put on a good show. Way to be superfans, yokohama.

Sports are always better when your team wins. Our team, in this case, was The Awesome-O with a 3-0 game. Victory lap!!

You know the phrase about how you should follow the rules until you know them really well, and then you’re sometimes allowed to break them? I don’t think the Japanese have earned the right to make up words with the English language yet. I just don’t trust them. It seems so much more likely that this was an instance of poor spelling rather than wit. What is dynamism, anyways?

That’s all I’ve got for you today. Thanks for tuning in!

Yakiniku w/ Friends

We loved the All You Can Eat / All You Can Drink format of this yakiniku place so much, that we came back on one of Phil’s last days in town. It was kind of awesome.

I love it that we have a group of friends here. There’s an awesome built in network in Yokohama, because you all are in the same circumstance, and because you’re brought together with people that you might not ordinarily live so close to. Also, I’ve been using the word “awesome” an incredible amount today.

Phil’s an awesome guy, and I’m excited to have gotten the chance to hang out with him for a bit. Since he lives on the other side of the pond (in Washington), it’s a rare day that we all get to hang out stateside. We’ll miss you, Phil!