STEAMED HOKKAIDO YUMENO DAICHI PORK & NANKO PLUMS Due to Aomori city’s close proximity to Hokkaido (with Aomori prefecture and Hokkaido separated by 20km of ferocious sea), it’s easy to stumble across Hokkaido dishes in the streets. I saw a rather fun looking dish that I had to try, involving a steamed basket full of…

APPLE KUCHEN “Apple kuchen” is named after a German pastry modelled after an Apple – the word “Kuchen” means “cake” in German. The apparence of this snack is far different from any apple pie you can find in shops. The Japanese Apple Kuchen is made of “apple butter” and “soft apples” and comes in the…

MISO CURRY MILK RAMEN Yes, that’s actually a real dish. Hokkaido is a land originally known for its good seafood but also for cows that produce top quality milk. A few decades ago a family moved to Aomori from Sapporo and brought a special recipe with them, that’s gone on to become Aomori city’s local…

Eels, Unadon One minute walk from Aomori station, along the main street, you’ll come across a bustling looking traditional restaurant called “Osanai”. We were surprised to even see a few foreign faces in there – although we shouldn’t have been given the restaurant’s popular reputation as a place to enjoy fresh seafood dishes. When I…

APPLE CHIPS, in Aomori If you like apples, Aomori is the place to be. The region is well known for it’s apple orchards galore and nearly every shop you enter will be bursting with apple related products. One of the better apple-related snacks we tried were “Apple chips” – pieces of dried apple that make…

HACHINOHE, TEMPURA Given that Hachinohe is a fishing port, you’re absolutely spoiled for choice if you enjoy eating fresh fish. However, if you’re not that daring when it comes to eating varieties of fish, Tempura is always a safe choice. Tempura is a light, crispy batter that is very similar to the kind of batter…

HACHINOHE-SENBEI-JIRU Hachinohe’s most famous dish is arguably rice cracker soup. I won’t lie, it’s one of the strange dishes I’ve come across on my travels. Walking through downtown Hachinohe, I noticed various restaurants advertising it on their signboards, and wandered into a busy looking izakaya to try it firsthand. A few minutes after ordering it,…

APPLE MOCHI, in Aomori Aomori is a region famed for it’s apples and as soon as you set foot into one of the prefecture’s shops, you’ll find store shelves lined with numerous apple related products, from apple ciders and apple jams, to apple pies and apple chocolate. However, the confectionary that caught my eye was…

HACHINOHE DUMPLINGS One of the best things about ordering ramen is getting a side order of gyoza (dumplings). Gyoza are created from a fine dough and usually contain a mixture of ground pork, nira chives, green onion, cabbage, ginger, garlic, soy sauce and sesame oil. Whilst they’re sometimes boiled in water, the most common type…

Maesawa Wagyu Beef, in Iwate I’ve found it. The best steak in the world. In the last year I’ve been lucky to try both Kobe beef and Yonezawa beef, famous throughout Japan for their rich taste and marvelling, whereby the beef contains a great deal of fat streaked throughout. The dashes of fat through the…