Restaurants in Kochi and Tosayamada, Japan

The one place I have visited most frequently is a ramen shop (豚太郎 宮ノ口店) that is just a short bike ride north of the Kochi University of Technology along the main road. The miso ramen is absolutely lovely and flavourful.The logo is a pig with a ramen bowl and I get the impression that it belongs to a chain of restaurants so you might be able to find this other places in Japan as well.

豚太郎 宮ノ口店

Miso Shatsu Ramen (lots of meat)

All Izakayas will serve food and drinks. There is usually one one type of beer on tap and the food is delicious but typically snack food for sharing rather than a full meal. They can look very small from the outside but somehow are actually bigger on the inside by making use of space very well. Typically they are signified by a yellow sign.One in Tosayamada that has good food and an all-you-can-drink plus a set menu of 6 dishes (with large servings) for 4000 Yen is Izakaya Akashiya.

Izakaya, Tosayamadacho, Japan

Izakaya, Tosayamada, Japan

Another great ramen shop was a bit further away but had some spicy options on the menu. I love spicy ramen! It is by no means unbearably spicy but has so much flavour. This restaurant also appeared to be a chain and all of the ramen on the menu was miso ramen. Both these ramen restaurants have amazing service and extremely friendly staff and I am sure I will frequent them for the time I am in Japan. I hope I can learn how to cook such rich and yummy ramen!

Ramen shop roughly translates to 'World of noodle'

 In Kochi-city I have most frequently been to an area near Kochi castle called Obiyamachi. Here there are shops under a covered walkway. Many restaurants and bars line the alleys on either sides of the covered walkway area. So far my favorite has been all-you-can-eat and all-you-can-drink at an "Izakaya" or a small Japanese pub.  After a few drinks your bills can get quite expensive but all-you-can-eat/drink is usually around Y3,000 per person making it much cheaper than the alternative. Food does come in small portions and can arrive slowly but is very very good. Menus have so far never been in English and had almost zero photos. Google translate can only do so well at this so ordering is a bit challenging.

Obiyamachi

Obiyamachi

Easy Teriyaki Sauce Recipe

Here is my simple and easy teriyaki sauce recipe that actually turned out amazing:

Ingredients:

1/2 cup sake
2 tsp sugar (option to replace a 1/4 cup of sake with 1/4 cup mirin instead of the sugar)
1/4 cup soy sauce
few slices of ginger (or to taste)
1 clove of garlic (or to taste)

Makes enough for cooking two chicken breasts with some sauce left for rice.

Step 1: Mix sake, soy sauce and sugar.
Step 2: Mince ginger and garlic and add into mixture.
Step 3: Cook mixture on medium heat to reduce amount of liquid a little bit (maybe 5-15 minutes). It is optional to add starch if you want to make a thicker sauce.

You can save sauce for other uses or make Teriyaki Chicken  or Teriyaki Stir-Fry with a few extra steps:

Step 4: Cook chicken in separate pan until mostly cooked through.
Step 5: Add chicken to sauce and cook while stirring and spooning the sauce over the chicken.
Step 6: Add other veggies to the pan and cook together until the liquid of sauce is mostly gone to make a stir-fry.

DONE!

Exploring Kochi Japan in Spring

The Sunday Market in Kochi City is just a short walk from the train station. They close down two lanes of a four lane road going towards Kochi Castle. There are all sorts of stands selling things like fruit, veggies, fish, knives, flowers, potted plants and occasionally but rarely clothing or small crafts. I imagine the market is very seasonal and what is for sale likely depends on what is in the growing season.

Kochi Sunday Market

Knives for sale at Kochi Sunday Market

 Kochi Castle is one of the recommended spots for viewing sakura blossoms. Although it is a very short season they are very lovely. They even have pink lanterns that come on at night to light up the gardens for people having evening picnics or drinking sake.

 The castle is pretty typical of most Japanese castles with a large number of the buildings having been destroyed already. The watchtower with a few attached buildings is the main building that remains as a tourist attraction.

Kochi Castle

Kochi Castle

 The view of the city is always somewhat foggy despite any weather conditions. It gives the mountains a hazy look in the background. The gardens and forest around castles in Japan are quite old but historically the area surrounding the castle would have been cut down fully so you could see any enemies approaching the castle. It is a bit ironic now that these are some of the lasting green spaces in the cities.

One of the most common birds in the city are Eurasian Tree Sparrows, House Sparrows and Barn Swallows. They build their mud nests on the sides of houses and parking structures.

Barn Swallow

Makino Botanical Garden is another one of the places for viewing sakura blossoms in Kochi. The garden is not the easiest to get to by public transportation but it is a place where you can easily spend a full day. The gardens are set out into various sections including one section showcasing native flora of the area. Other sections are specific to rose garden, sakura garden, etc.

The event we went to see in the botanical garden was a traditional Japanese music event. At first it was very very lovely when the flute started softly with a nice relaxing melody but then something like a kazoo started and I don't believe the music was to my taste. It is possible I just am missing something that I don't understand about the song or type of music.

Concert in Makino Botanical Garden

 The scenery in the garden is very lovely and it includes some higher points with views of the surrounding area as well as some ponds with small waterfalls. You could hear a few frogs calling but I was unable to find any of them. I think they were Japanese Tree Frogs. I did find a Fire-belly Newt in one of the smaller pools.

Makino Botanical Garden, Kochi, Japan

Makino Botanical Garden, Kochi, Japan

 Most of the plants are labelled nicely so it is a great place for any botanist or nature lover to visit. But I will admit that it is very very different from other Japanese style gardens. This garden appears to be very much designed to have a lot of various species and diversity whereas other gadrens in Japan are more simplistic with more open space.

It was a lovely day to visit the gardens and I very much enjoyed seeing some familiar genera of spring flora.

Pulsatilla cernua at Makino Botanical Garden, Kochi, Japan

Arisaema rigens at Makino Botanical Garden, Kochi, Japan

A Gaijin Grocery Shopping in Japan

I really do love to cook and I was very much looking forward to going grocery shopping in Japan and finding all those unique ingredients that I would need to make Japanese food with. I imagined the adventure of looking through countless isles and finally finding that one thing I needed.

Reality was a bit different. I had no clue how to look for miso of other countless ingredients. I had no idea which of all of the sauces on the shelf were actually soy sauce. It took me incredibly long to even find salt and pepper!

I found it a bit frustrating at first but this is just part of acclimatizing to a new country where you can't read the language. Even with the language barrier everyone in Japan is extremely helpful. I frequently went to the counter asking in terrible Japanese "is this right for making ____?" and usually I was met with the person taking me around the store to find the proper ingredient since I had grabbed the wrong one.


Since then I found a lot of very helpful sites with recipes explaining what  ingredients are and what they look like in the store and advice for grocery shopping including the kanji and how to say ingredient names:
https://blog.gaijinpot.com/supermarkets-shopping-japan/

I wrongfully assumed that I could get away with making delicious Japanese foods without things like fish paste or algae but I must admit that this is a huge part of the flavor in so many of the soups. So here is my grocery shopping list of unique ingredients I use in some basic Japanese recipes:

Shoyu (Soy sauce)
Miso /Shiromiso (white fermented soybean paste)
Bonito flakes/ Katsuobushi (dried pieces of tuna)
Konbu (seaweed for making dashi)
Negi (a type of leek, you can also use green onion)
Sake (rice wine)
Mirin (sweet version of sake used for cooking)

Kombu, Miso and Bonito Flakes

Sansho (Japanese pepper)
Yuzu or other citrus fruit
Shiso (leaf herb used like basil)
Daikon (really big radish)
Katakuriko (potato starch)

At least eggs, peppers, carrots, onions, mushrooms and cabbage look the same wherever you are! I use these pretty much every day. I love the diversity of mushrooms in Japan.

Chiang Dao, Thailand

Chiang Dao is a very small village with very beautiful temples set into the mountains, including a cave temple. Coming to the end of the three week trip in Thailand I was very tired but the birding was so fantastic here that I was still waking up early to get out at sunrise. But that also meant less herping at night. Chiang Dao Nest is a very nice accommodation and there are a lot of birds just on the property at Chiang Dao Nest 1. Chiang Dao Nest 2 has better food though but it is just a short walk down there for dinner.  I heard that Malee's Nature Lovers Bungalows right beside the Nest are also very good and cheaper/more likely to have rooms.

Little Spiderhunter

Many Spotted Skink

The day we arrived we went to the cave temple. They had natural health remedies for sale outside the temple grounds fresh or in liquid form.

The temple entrance is quite built up with donation boxes everywhere. The pond before the cave entrance is said to contain sacred fish and had a statue of Phra Mae Thorani (mother earth)at the entrance. In legend mother earth wrung water out of her hair to drown the demon Mara, who was trying to tempt Buddha.

Phra Mae Thorani (mother earth) statue at Chaing Dao Cave

The temple itself is free to walk around and the cave temple has no entry fee to access the section of it that is lit up and paved, however if you want to go deeper into the cave where there are no lights you have to pay a guide. The cave is very expansive and they have no route markings to show you were to go so they do force you to pay for a guide. The guides don't speak much English but they point out a few rock formations for you and take you around a set loop. The tour is quite short and there is so much more to the cave that they don't show you.

Statues inside Chiang Dao Cave

 It is probably for the best that they don't allow you to enter all of the sections of the cave since even the sections on the tour had a lot of wildlife including bats, spiders and insects that would be more disturbed by tourists wandering aimlessly and for longer periods of time.

Bat in Chiang Dao Cave

 A trail exists from Chiang Dao Cave (Wat Tham Chiang Dao) to the temple in the mountains (Wat Tham Pha Plong). From the Chiang Dao Cave you go to the left of this golden buddha statue that is higher up and the to right of the cave entrance and built up temple grounds.  The trail is difficult and not very well maintained but it is a very clear path and you won't get lost. If it had been wet the slopes going up the mountain from the cave side would have been impossible to climb. I wouldn't recommend it as a leisurely trail but it was a very lovely hike that takes you through somewhat young forest (appears to have been a fire some time ago).

Trail head from Chiang Dao Cave to the temple

Trail from Chiang Dao Cave to the temple

Trail from Chiang Dao Cave to the temple

 The birding along the trail was very good with many of the typical bulbuls we frequently have seen around town but also with some new species and one of my favorite birds that I have seen in Thailand.

Black-headed Bulbul

Scarlet Minivet

Puff-throated Babler

Wat Tham Pha Plong is set in serene mountains surrounded by forest and accessible by a long staircase. The steps are not hard to climb even though there are many steps they are not high ones. Birding along the staircase is fabulous and you can see so much just by walking slowly along the path. My favorite were a Sultan Tit, Grey-backed Shrike, Crested Serpent Eagle and some of the blue flycatchers.

Grey-backed Shrike

Crested Serpent Eagle

Great Myna

Coppersmith Barbet

Sultan Tit

Eventually you are treated to a scenic view of the temple. It is very spectacular and stands out brightly against the forest. There is a little place to rest here as a midway point of the 510 steps.

Wat Tham Pha Plong

 The temple is simply but still intricately decorated. It doesn't have the bright flashy mosiacs and pagodas as in Bangkok but the staircases have carved dragons and the top spire is gold. All of the rocks and statues in the temple are scrubbed down so they don't have any lichens or moss growing on them and I am sure it looks deceivingly newer than it is. At the top you have a view of Chiang Dao National Park, which lies behind the temple.

Wat Tham Pha Plong with Chiang Dao National Park behind

Peaks in Chiang Dao National Park viewed from Wat Tham Pha Plong

 I really loved Chiang Dao. It is a very scenic, quiet and relaxing place. In contrast to the rest of Thailand is was actually a bit chilly at night and regular temperatures during the day. I do regret that when I visited Chiang Dao the National Park was closed because of a fire and that I didn't have as much time as I would have liked to enjoy this place and really relax here.