Lunch

[dr4b]

There is no official school lunch today because it is midterm day. The kids are supposed to go home and eat lunch now... though I bet half of them went to McDonald's or Mos Burger together instead :) I'm actually a little scared of the rest of this month's school lunches -- oden is listed on one of them. And one seems to be all Korean food, which is also a little scary.

But today around 10am I overheard people talking about ordering bento, so I'm like "hey! me too!"

Which was a good thing -- Matsui-TA ended up having to go fend for herself, as she somehow didn't get in on the order. We got like 20 bento boxes for most teachers.

Even better, the bento box was 400 yen -- 420 with tax, so that is like $4.50 or so. And it included a box of rice, a croquette of some sort, a piece of grilled pork, two pieces of karaage (kinda like chicken nuggets but not exactly), some pasta salad, and some pickles. That plus the cookies Miyazaki-sensei gave me and I am STUFFED! Seriously!

(And the school is like "Sorry you have to spend so much for lunch today as opposed to the normal 315 yen for school lunch...")

You know what? I feel bored with the Japanese food choices around where I live these days, but I think the actual problem is that I am bored with my regular haunts in Akabane, not with Japanese food, and I should try some new places. The other problem is that I haven't properly shifted my brain into winter mode yet. What I *need* to find is a good ramen place near where I live, honestly. The cheapo one by the station is alright, but I have actually been tempted to go all the way the fuck back to the middle of nowhere where I lived in Warabi to go hunt down Old Man Ohtori and his Yomiuri-Giants-infested ramen shop and eat some freakin' delicious miso ramen again.

Shit, while I'm at it I ought to print out some nice photos of Meiji baseball players from this year and go down to Mayatoku for some Hiroshima-yaki. I'm a little scared to go alone but I hope he'd remember me as Pau's crazy baseball friend...

Comments

[februaryfour]

Oh god. Whenever we finally entertain you, there is this amazing Kyuushuu ramen place and OH GOD FOODGASM.

[isamum.livejournal.com]

The absolutely best ramen place in Akabane is called Mangetsu. The noodles and everything else is made by the people who own and manage the shop (a family business). (Most ramen places use noodles produced at a local noodle producer - not necessarily bad, but the best places make their own.)

In addition to the regular, shoyu, shio and miso ramen types, they also have quite a few original recipes, all of which I find extremely good. My personal fav is the shiro-miso ramen, but it has lots of fried garlic chips and some hot Chinese bean paste (豆板醤） in it, so you have been warned. They also introduced this year a "Carbo ramen" which is a cross between ramen and carbonara pasta. Sounds weird, but this is also good. :) They also have つけ麵 in most of the same flavors if you want to go that route.

Directions: Walk down the La La Garden mall until you come to the first street on the right and turn there. There is another street on the left next to the MacDonald's. Turn there and about 20-30 meters down that street on the left is ラーメン満月.

Mangetsu is not cheap, but the ramen is really, really good. Oh, the gyoza is also great, too,

[hillsy2k.livejournal.com]

Woo...I loves me some karaage. Did you ever eat at Ft. St. George in the ID, Deanna? Really good karaage. Decent omurice, too.

[dr4b]

Uhhh... wait a minute, you've been to Japan and you still like the food at Ft. St. George? Ugggggh I have really bad memories of eating there. I used to work at Amazon in the ID, so I'd go around to the restaurants on a regular basis... they were much better before I took a bunch of trips to Japan, seriously.

[dr4b]

Oh! I've walked past that place before, usually on my way back from Daiei, but never gone in. I should try it. I think one of my coworkers at GEOS mentioned it, but since she was a total flake, I ignored her at the time, especially since she was like "I found a great ramen shop! It's on a side street near the Daiso!" Helpful. :)

[dr4b]

I'm actually not so much into the Kyushu ramen style, tonkotsu or whatever. Miso is my favorite kind. Is the place a branch of Ichiran or something?

[hillsy2k.livejournal.com]

Well, of course the first choice would be to eat Japanese food IN Japan, but since I don't live there and beggars can't be choosers...;) FSG isn't THAT bad.

[februaryfour]

Gakkin (if I'm reading 学金 right). No clue whether it's a branch or an independent, but if they have a ticket machine I suppose it's probably a branch of some sort. I love tonkotsu, but it's the _noodles_ I mean. Except I don't know whether these noodles are standard Kyuushuu fare or if their noodles are special.

[guitarcries.livejournal.com]

Argh, now I really want some miso ramen. Have a bowl for me. :(