The obligatory post about dining in Japan this trip! Well, what I had for grub varied widely, since it ran the range of hosted multi-course dinners at restaurants, conference banquet, committee buffet dinners, lunch bentos over working meetings, and finding my own grub during the days when I was not having meetings or conference activities. So here we go: there are a lot of pictures in this post!
Day 01: hosted dinner at a Japanese restaurant in Nakasukawabata Station.The food was marvelous. And also likely because this was the first day, we’d had a long business meeting in the afternoon right after landing into Fukuoka, and I was hungry!Scallops… I think!Stripes of Kagoshima beef (I think) done medium. Super yummy!Day 02: bentos over a lunch meeting.Day 02 dinner at Fukuoka’s Canal City. I’d visited this Saboten outlet at this mall during the 2019 trip and loved the tonkatsu sets there.Saboten’s tonkatsu sets are so much cheaper compared to their outlet in Singapore, and they offer free flow of cabbage, miso soup, and rice too. I still think Katsukura @ Kyoto does my favorite tonkatsus, but Saboten’s are a close second!Day 03: lunch at Ippudo Ramen @ Hakata JR Station City, and after visiting Daizufu in the morning.I typically visit these two Japanese ramen chains whenever I’m in the country: Ichiran, and Ippudo. More people prefer Ichiran’s ramen and also its dining concept for anti-social people (haha). I’m the odd ball who prefers Ipudo though!Day 03 dinner, and at Ramen Stadium at Canal City. There were a lot of ramen restaurants clustered together here, so I just randomly chose this outlet.The set I opted for had a fried rice set. It was a lot of food. The tonkatsu soup ramen was so-so. But this was also already my second ramen on the same day, so it really did feel a bit much!Day 04 at Hakata Station: a quick lunch at Doutor cafe inside before boarding our Shinkansen ride to Okayama Station. This is a teriyaki beef sandwich that cost just under 600 yen. Very averageDay 05 Monday and a free day just before the start of conference: there really wasn’t much to do in Matsue itself. This one is a small restaurant inside Matsue Station, and I had cold soba noodles (around 780 yen) for lunch. Very average tasting.Day 05 dinner inside Matsue Station, and at Naseba-Naru Kakeru ramen. The station had about half a dozen restaurants. There are more dining options at the Aeon Shopping Mall about 10 minutes walk away, but I opted for this joint out of convenience.I had the Kiwami-aji ramen. The soup was extremely salty: I had difficulty finishing the bowl.Day 07: committee meeting and buffet dinner at the Matsue Excel Tokyu Hotel. I normally don’t eat a lot of beef, but the steaks here in Japan were too good to pass up.Day 08 hosted conference dinner banquet at Yuushien Garden.Sashimi plate as appetiser.The only thing I recognized on this plate was the sliced duck meat. LOL. According to the course menu, the other items were – I think – Wood Ear Mushroom, Stripe of leek, and Sansho pepper.Tempura, Ginseng, Kakiage, and Green Chili.Crab Rice with “three sorts of pickles” [sic], as said on the course menu.Cheese cake and green tea ice-cream for dessert.Day 09 lunch and during the fourth conference day excursion to Izumo. Had the tempura with cold soba noodle side at 1580 yen.This restaurant. I don’t see it on Google Maps though, but this is what it looks like from the outside.Day 09 and back in Matsue after the day excursion. Had dinner at Aeon Shopping Mall, and also a tempura with cold soba noodle set.Day 10 dinner and after our relocation to Osaka. I hunted for a tonkatsu restaurant near the hotel, and found this restaurant at the 8th floor of Links Umeda. Or rather, the floor just beside the hotel.Had the Rosukatsu at 1480 yen. Save money!The restaurant’s tonkatsus are rated higher than Saboten. But I found the latter still better after this dinner.Day 11 and at Tenjinbashisuji Shopping Street. The humid weather saw me ducking into this random cafe to escape the heat.Where I had a pretty much forgettable pesto pasta for lunch. The float drink was a different matter though: anything icy cold in this weather was a lifesaver! Lunch was 1,400 yen – rather expensive for somewhat bland food.Day 11 dinner back at Links Umeda and at Porchetta Pizza.Had the onion and mushroom pizza (1,380 yen). It was pretty big at 30cm width, but the pizza needed to had been baked a fair bit longer. It felt almost watery!Day 12 lunch at Links Umeda: and at the Hawaiian Pancake Factory.Opted for the hamburger with pancake set (1280 yen) and kept my fingers crossed!It turned out… extremely ordinary. And the waitress forgot to bring out the syrup too. Compare it to the menu picture above. Bleh.Day 12: Ichiran Ramen Umeda, which was just across the road from the hotel at Yodobashi. I checked out the place for lunch but there was a long queue then. So, I returned for an extremely 4PM dinner: and found a seat without having to queue.And comparing Ichiran’s ramen to Ippudo, my vote goes to Ippudo!Day 14 lunch after hotel check-out, and back at the Hawaiian Pancake Factory. Had the Eggs Benedict at 1,180 Yen.Day 14 dinner: we’d finished our last day of business meetings, so headed back to Links Umeda. Ducked into Ocharanya Yodobashi-camera ramen restaurant for a quick dinner.Had the pork bone broth ramen, with a half-portion fried rice side, and extra noodles at 1270 yen.
