Tag - kyoto-restaurants

 
 

KYOTO RESTAURANTS

Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Nov 27, 2022
Noma sets sights on Kyoto, and diners bite in droves
The acclaimed Copenhagen restaurant's second extended residence in Japan shifts to the country's ancient capital.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jan 13, 2017
Gi Han Ebisu Do: a window on Japanese-inflected dim sum
Restaurateur and chef Yoshiyuki Gi has spent a lifetime working in Chinese restaurants. He grew up in the kitchen of his parent's eatery in Yokohama's Chinatown before working his way through Chinese restaurants in Japan and onto China. When he returned to Japan, he settled in Kyoto and opened upscale...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jan 13, 2017
Suzuya: one of the old capital's oldest coffee shops
Last year, Suzuya celebrated its 70th anniversary, making it one of the oldest kissaten (traditional coffee shops) in Kyoto. To the best of my knowledge, only Salon de The Francois — which opened in the interwar period — pips it for longevity.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Dec 9, 2016
Izuju: A hidden home for sweet 'Kyozushi'
When you live in a tourist mecca like Kyoto you tend to avoid the major attractions. However, having a visitor in town provides a good excuse to join the horde and get into tourist mode: taking over footpaths, meandering slowly along backstreets and taking photos of everything, especially photos of yourself...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Dec 9, 2016
Togenkyo: A return to Japan's traditional coffee-shop style
Togenkyo is a cafe curated to the nth degree. Being so self-conscious, even self-indulgent, could be a turn off, but Togenkyo has its charms.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Nov 11, 2016
Ajiro: Vegetarian 'shojin ryori' in a Buddhist temple complex
I ate my lunch at Ajiro in the company of a bewildered farmer with a comical Donald Trump-like mop of hair. But looks were the least of his concern; rather it was a bull that had got the better of him, escaping from the herd and hightailing it to the hills. Luckily he finally found the animal hiding...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Nov 11, 2016
Soba Dokoro Sasaki: Traditional soba sets worth lining up for
Soba Dokoro Sasaki is worth a stopover if you're heading north into Kyoto's hills to catch the trees in their autumnal colors. It's billed as a soba restaurant, but there's plenty of udon and tempura dishes on the menu, too. Your best bet is to opt for one of this restaurant's substantial set menus....
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Oct 7, 2016
Sarasa Nishijin: A curious cafe in the bones of an old bathhouse
Sarasa Nishijin is a sentō (bathhouse) — well, it used to be. But using the past tense here belies how much of its old spirit still lives on. The waters may have drained away — replaced by sofas, tables, chairs and people lounging about fully clothed — but the sentō's old life is revealed in...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Sep 9, 2016
Moriwaki: Blissful sashimi in a compact family-run eatery
One of my favorite occasions to eat out in Japan is after returning from a long trip abroad. I have learned to empathize with those Japanese tourists who can't wait to get home and eat Japanese rice after a whirlwind tour of Europe.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Sep 9, 2016
Hyakushokuya: The wagyu joint that only makes 100 meals each day
Hyakushokuya, "100 meal shop," makes 100 meals a day — and that's it. The daily challenge for staff is to make and serve them as fast possible, so that they can take the rest of the day off. It seems that this is typically accomplished by the end of lunchtime, at which point a chalkboard is placed...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jul 8, 2016
Sara: Where daintiness gets a good grilling
Midway through lunch at Sara, a family-run restaurant in northern Kyoto, I started to suspect that the chefs subscribed to a philosophy of daintiness. The food was as pretty as it was good to eat, but the portions were decidedly petit.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jul 8, 2016
Chocolat Bel Amer: Head-turning desserts in an old wooden town house
First established in Tokyo, Chocolat Bel Amer has now opened a boutique in a gorgeous traditional machiya (town house) fronted by a Japanese maple tree. In a rather bold move, it is directly opposite Inoda, an institution among Kyoto's cafes. What connects both these places — besides the street —...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jun 10, 2016
Okina: The intangible joys of heirloom eggplant
In 2013, UNESCO gave Japanese cuisine, or washoku, Intangible Cultural Heritage status, an unwieldy mouthful that left some people wondering, "What's that?" A recent lunch at Okina, near the tourist mecca of Arashiyama in northwest Kyoto, provided a clear path through the official language.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jun 10, 2016
Ichikawaya Coffee: A young cafe inside a 200-year-old wooden townhouse
Many of Kyoto's traditional wooden machiya townhouses are being renovated, and one of the most enchanting ones that has recently opened to the public can be found a few minutes walk from the endless stream of tourists visiting Kiyomizu Temple.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Apr 8, 2016
Godan Miyazawa: Traditional multicourse cuisine unsettled by a wild bear
Regrets? I have a ton. Here's one: I didn't get to eat bear meat at Godan Miyazawa. Perhaps one of the drawbacks of the omakase (chef's selection) here is that there's no actual menu to provide information about what's being served. Trusting your chef is a small price to pay for an elaborate multicourse...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Apr 8, 2016
Nick Stock: The steaks are high but the muzak is terrible
There is elevator muzak and shopping channel muzak, but combine these two subgenres and you'll have a type of muzak so bland that even a computer would be embarrassed to claim ownership of it. Yet there's no avoiding this banal background music at Nick Stock, a steakhouse and cafe just west of Kyoto...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Mar 11, 2016
Ajikyu: A tiny izakaya squashed inside a family home
Reviewing restaurants is a slippery slope to overindulgence. That's why opting for lunch can be a safer bet than dinner. Not only are lunch reservations easier to come by and the bills easier on the wallet, but midday meals help to ensure you getting home before sunset, or sunrise. That didn't happen...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Mar 11, 2016
Miyako Yasai Kamo Nasu: All the locally grown vegetables you can eat
Miyako Yasai Kamo Nasu — a mouthful if ever there was one — is a chain of buffet restaurants offering all-you-can-eat vegetables for breakfast (¥490), lunch (¥880) and dinner (¥1,350).
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jan 15, 2016
Rikichi: Bowling and the art of traditional Japanese kaiseki
In 2000, Harvard political scientist Robert D. Putnam wrote "Bowling Alone," a book about the decline of community and rise of individualism in the U.S. I thought about the title of that book over lunch at Rikichi — indeed there was plenty of room for thinking. Not only was I the only diner, but chef...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KYOTO RESTAURANTS
Jan 15, 2016
Kobushi: Ramen with spinach, chicken and a motorbike
One of the differences between a restaurant chain and an independently owned restaurant is that the latter tolerates — even encourages — eccentricity.

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