UA1148 BOS ORD 0901 1059 739 4A I got dropped off at the airport at 7 so had a good long visit with my friends at the UC before going to the gate. This was the first time I'd used the autogates in Boston. Of course, there were many glitches, not caused by the equipment as far as I could see but by the passengers not being able to see the big 3 or 4 on their boarding passes, whereupon of course they complained and held up the line, and, guess what, the automated system doesn't look like such a great idea any more, does it. A quick pleasant flight with relatively fresh flight attendants; we ended up early enough so I had an hour's layover at the B club for a banana and the e-mail. UA 881 ORD NRT 1210 1510 744 14B was 15B The end gates in the concourse are the only ones that can accommodate the big planes, but the seating area, despite the extra square bit over to the side, is constricted by the curve of the building. Translation: more people milling about even than normal. As the crowd and I milled about, my sharp ears picked out my name from the din, and I hied to the desk thinking, ooh, upgrade time, but in fact it was just a courtesy call to inform me that a party of 4 had wanted my beloved row 15, and I was being moved forward a row, not a whole cabin. Pooh. So grumpily upstairs I went (this is a nice and comfortable place in any position, truth be told). I was settling in, when a rather superb woman about a decade younger than me excused herself and slid into the window seat next to me, so this was an upgrade of sorts after all. We got to talking, and though any scanty charm I may ever have possessed has abandoned me, we got on reasonably well. Paula is an artist turned social work professor, going on to Osaka to see her son; and though we knew nobody in common, we did share a lot of attitudes, past haunts, and interests. It was a very nice, chatty flight, and I got less sleep than I had planned on.
UA 04/15 DEN/EWR/IAD/IAH/LAX/ORD-NRT, SFO-HND/KIX/NRT (LD81-R87-B87) 260C001-4 TO BEGIN Chilled seafood appetizer - California sushi roll This was a slice of a very thick rice roll with bits of okay if slightly rubbery avocado, crab- shaped surimi, and some extraneous vegetables. Edible but somewhat chintzy. Fresh seasonal greens - Tomatoes, cucumber, Kalamata olives and croutons with your choice of honey peppercorn dressing or GF balsamic vinaigrette MAIN COURSE Short rib of beef - Red wine sauce, aji amarillo mashed potatoes, fine green beans and carrots Okay. Nothing to write home about. Oh, yes, there was a decent line of fat in the salted and somewhat mushy meat. I think the characterization of the beans must have been an artifact of the translation process, because there was nothing fine about them. No aji amarillo in the potatoes, either. Tamale-filled breast of chicken - Creamy corn sauce, grilled yuca and tomatoes My seatmate got this and was reasonably pleased but surprised to find this to really be a breast of chicken-filled tamale. She had expected a piece of chicken with a cornbread-like stuffing. Fillet of salmon with lump crabmeat - Beurre blanc sauce, barley with vegetables, collard greens and tomatoes Japanese selection Appetizers of green tea shrimp sushi, fish cake skewer, nori-crusted chicken, squid, broad beans and asparagus A main course of deep-fried fish fillet with soba noodles, shiitake mushroom and carrot in gin-an sauce, clear soup with bamboo shoots and seaweed, squid with plum dressing, vinegared fish salad, simmered vegetables, steamed rice and Japanese-style pickles TO FINISH International cheese selection - Grapes and crackers served with Port Dessert - Ice cream with your choice of toppings I asked for and got one small scoop of vanilla. My seatmate got the Buddhist sundae - one with everything. MID-FLIGHT SNACK Assorted sandwiches - Turkey with cranberry cream cheese Spinach tortilla wrap with cheese and vegetables Red bean rice cake Yay for red bean mochi. PRIOR TO ARRIVAL Swiss cheese omelette - broccoli-potato gratin and turkey sausage Chicken katsu - curry sauce, steamed rice and vegetables I don't know why I expected a katsu to keep its crunch through 10 hours of sitting under foil before being reheated; anyhow, it didn't. The curry sauce was like S&B but less tasty. Still, I think, better than a cheese omelet. Cereal and banana served with milk Fresh fruit appetizer, yogurt or savory salad, and breakfast breads
JL3057 NRT FUK 1930 2135 738 1K AA/US had not sent me a new Sapphire card (still haven't 2 months later), and I wondered if my make-your-own would work for lounge access. It transpired, though, that lili was on this flight (not totally coincidentally), and the easiest way to get seated together was to upgrade. Mine was eight bucks, hers ten (different original fare classes I guess, or it might have been that she paid in dollars on credit and I in yen in cash). And of course now the Sakura lounge came with, so ambiguity avoided. I was raring to go, but Paula was having issues with her ticket, so I stayed in the neighborhood until she was squared away. For some reason United had issued both of our tickets as interlines with JAL rather than booking us on the partner airline, not that that would be any better except that her flight was full, and she was in danger of being bumped, which would have mightily messed up her plans. Luckily a seat was found. JY1024 was already at the Sakura lounge, and we had a good chat about manufactured spending, about which I know next to nothing, and the history of air travel bargain hunting, which I have lived pretty much through all of so actually could carry on a conversation about. Other than two iterations of the Amazing Beer Machine, serving two different kinds of beer, Asahi and Kirin I think, the lounge is quite ordinary, with seats and food that easily qualify for that description. Newbie Runner had warned me beforehand, so expectations were not deflated. After sufficient snacking and chatting we went down to the gate and loaded up - people looked with awe and wonder and I believe no resentment as the silly Americans filled up far more overhead binnage than we were entitled to. The flight itself was apparently fine - I slept through it. As there were three of us, and it was kind of wet out, a taxi to the rather beautiful Grand Hyatt was a no-brainer. I wasn't going to the Pre Drinks event but was convinced by my travel companions to accompany them to Good Beer Faucets, where we encountered a load of hearties in the midst of their sampling of the nation's best. Having spent most of the last 24 hours partaking of free alcohol and/or in a slumbrous state related thereto, I decided to pass this one time; instead lili and I accompanieded Newbie Runner and beckoa to a yatai conveniently located in a knot of stalls along the river halfway between the bar and the hotel, where I got a respectable tonkotsu ramen that I ruined or enhanced by adding more ground red pepper than normal people do. For the table, a yakitori assortment of gizzards, thigh meat, and skin found universal favor; there was also a hot dog arrangement that Newbie appropriated, whether out of polite self-sacrifice or because she likes hot dogs I don't know. Her main meal was an assortment of oden that got shared around - pretty good. The hotel room, though closer to the elevator than I would have preferred, was pretty nice, with pluses and minuses: bed comfort was good, bathroom was average in a Japanese way, which means excellent; the light and heat controls were very wonky.
The day dawned wet and crappy, and I put a toe out, and it came back soaked, so even though I'd planned on joining the crew on its field trip to Dazaifu, I decided to stay closer to home and visit the city's most relevant (to me) landmark, Raumen Stadium, one of whose attractions is that one can get to it all under cover from the hotel; it's on the top floor of the Canal City shopping center, so once one tumbles to the fact that it's upstairs, it's easy enough to find. It was hard to choose among the eight restaurants; we decided on Menya Houten, which is said to have a Chinese accent, because it offered stuff that lili would enjoy. As I am both sight and insight impaired, I spent way too much time puzzling over the meal ticket machine, during which I managed to buy 3 beers and no food. Luckily, a young employee with excellent English came up to help me buy a bowl of Hakata black ramen; of course he recommended the special with chashu, pork fat, kamaboko, a braised egg, scallions, bamboo shoots, and nori, which turned out to be a large, complex, satisfying bowl despite there being only the standard 3 oz serving of meat. I'd expected from the Hakata appellation that this would be a tonkotsu broth varied with dark soy and burnt garlic oil; in fact, the broth was a thinnish one though well endowed with the expected blackeners. Very firm noodles, which I went through in a jiffy and got our helpful friend to teach me how to buy a second serving (used to be that seconds on noodles were free, but no more) for Y150. The seconds were even more al dente than the first. The chashu, excellent. Pork fat, Y50 extra if not on the special, is merely a ladleful of bits that float on top of the broth: I like this a lot, many people go eww. The braised egg was very like a Chinese soy sauce egg, but the Japanese do these so that the whites are set and broth-colored while the yolk is still a bit runny. Very tender braised bamboo shoots. I could have done without the seaweed. For lili, fried chicken, crunchy, well flavored, excellent. We had been given the option of having one of the beer tickets refunded, as I was clearly an addled tourist who didn't know any better, and the young man was a little shocked when I said, no, we'll just drink more. The offering is called Suntory Premium Malt's, a pleasant nondescript lager of the sort that is taking over the world. The glasses are I guess 10 or 11 ounces, and three for two pax is by no means a stretch, even though I drank more than half. Okay, more than three-fourths. We resolved to come back later to try another stand. My next choice was going to be the beef tongue place, or maybe the kurobuta black pig place. But as it turns out, other deliciousnesses obtruded and we didn't get to do so. The sky had begun to lighten, so we figured on an afternoon lull and started westward to the Fukuoka Castle ruins, I forget what the area is called. lili had rain gear, and I had a Ted jacket that looked waterproof but really wasn't, but what the heck, nothing ventured, nothing gained. As soon as we got to the point of no return, around the Tenjin station, the heavens of course opened up, and it ended up a bit of a slog with frequent ducks under awnings and pauses for me to wipe my glasses; but we got there, and, yes, the rain hadn't taken away all the cherry blossoms, and the park was gorgeous. Note: for the less stubborn, there are plenty of buses that one could take for a buck (most of our adventure was within the Y100 zone). There was more to see at the site, but it was getting lowery again, and my wet jacket was beginning to get irritating, and dinner was coming up, so back to the Hyatt.
Friday - Main Do Dinner at the quite a mouthful Yanagimachi Ikkokudo Haruyoshi-ten, a wet half mile from the hotel. It's lucky the turnoff had been pointed out to us the previous evening, because it is somewhat obscure in the dark, and others had a hard time finding it. The Do took up the back building of the restaurant; I made my way to the back back, where the bar is, to which somebody made a perhaps good-naturedly snide remark. Our first course was a beautifully plated series of four morsels - sugar snap pea, pickled sardine on shiso leaf, tamago, and marinated baby squid, in order of presentation and my preference both. I thought on initial inspection that the egg and the fish might be profitably switched, but after eating I agreed that two fish tastes together was properly avoided. Then a sashimi course, with octopus, the usual; two white fishes, ?some kind of yellowtail and ?some kind of snapper, both mild whitefishy but one with a stringyish texture; nice though mild slabs of tuna; and uni that I'm pretty sure came from west coast USA, as it was bitterer and less sweet than what I'm accustomed to (which comes from east coast USA, flown to Tokyo, and then boxed up in nice cedar boxes and flown right back to New York or Washington. The next course, in order of presentation as well as my preference: mountain yam in all its gelatinous glory, broccoli rabe with bonito flakes, quite nice, and inarizushi with shiitake, a taste that reminded me of childhood, though my mother, being Chinese, used pork instead of mushrooms. A progression of tastes and textures from gentle (and weird) to robust, mild sweetness to mild bitter and salt to rich sweetness, gooey to crunchy to firm. Eggplant with ground pork and miso, a pretty simple dish pretty similar to what I do, was perhaps my favorite part of the meal - comfort food of a high order. The eggplant was softer and wetter than I make it, and I'm rethinking my approach because of this. Fried chicken thigh, medium rare when it came, on a sizzling platter with American-style mixed green salad (also on the sizzling platter); the meat was a bit chewy when it first arrived, but the texture became more normal as the heat of the platter did its thing. Unfortunately, the same physics applied to the salad, which wilted quite a bit in a short time. I had high hopes for the whelk, escargot style, which cried out for white wine (I had sake instead). It turned out to be very resilient bits of shellfish in a heavily garlicked buttered breadcrumb stuffing, sort of like Rhode Island stuffies but not as good. Additional cuts of baguette came for soaking up the excess garlic butter; I didn't bother, as fullness was approaching. Bamboo rice wrapped in bamboo tip outside and steamed in a bamboo steamer was a cute conceit but I thought a bit underflavored and rather late in the meal, when we'd already eaten enough. This was probably deliberate - you relax in a state of satiation and take some rice and ponder the quality of the grains and note how artichokelike the bamboo bits are inside the package, and if you still want more food, you eat the whole dish (which guarantees you will not be hungry for many hours). At this point we were served a disconcerting bowl of kelp in tepid water, whose flavor was fugitive if anything. I am still uncertain what the point of it was. There was dessert - a white custardy coffee-flavored concoction, I believe nondairy, likely made of almond milk or soy milk (though I took a precautionary lactase pill), very like a strange-taste Chinese hsin ren dou fu - some of us were very enthusiastic about it. The staff did a good job of keeping us watered without being overserved or overdemanding. I did mostly the draft beer, but someone offered me a cup of Michikasari daiginjo junmai sake, dry, aromatic with almost citrus notes, nice. Afterward, people went to an afterparty someplace. I didn't.
While the others went on their trip to Nagasaki, We deviated firmly and finally from the plan and decided to do our own day tour of the city, focusing on the Hakata district, which is of some historical importance and also is conveniently located within easy walking distance of the hotel. The atmosphere was a little misty to begin with, but without the aggressive rain of the day before. And it did clear up and warmed considerably as time went by. We started out walking north to look for a yakiniku place that I'd heard good things about but was detoured by lili's news that some famous shopping area, Kawabatadori, was nearby. It's a covered arcade a quarter mile long. When we found it, many of the stalls and shops were not yet open (I guess we were there around 10), but I imagine that it might get hopping at mealtime or in the evening. At the end of the street to the left is the Kushida Shinto shrine (founded in 757), a complex of buildings old and new, sculpture, and a place where you can cleanse your soul by drinking stagnant water out of a wooden dipper, I'm not sure what that ritual is called. The shrine precinct is dotted with numerous sculptures, some devotional or mythological, some, as in Fukuoka's own Mannekin Pis, just whimsical. Right nearby are the Hakata Traditional Craft and Design Museum and the Hakata Machiya Folk Museum. We decided that the former was too commercial and went down the street to the other, which turned out to be even more so, so back we went and are glad we did - though the downstairs is a salesroom with the token artisan working on a project, the upstairs is a nice little room that showcases the local crafts, from blown glass to fine fabrics to dolls and more specialized things, such as tops (the first in Japan to have a metal axle) and ... scissors made by swordsmiths. You are asked not to photograph the exhibits, something I got around by taking shots from a couple of the quite interesting videos on offer. To get to the temples we wanted to see we had to walk past the Folk Museum, so we poked our noses in and decided that we'd seen more interesting elsewhere. The Tocho-ji temple with its gigantic wooden Buddha was our next stop. Founded in 806, it is the headquarters of Shingon Buddhism and boasts one of the largest wooden Buddha statues in Japan (perhaps THE, but sources are confusing on this). The grounds, behind an unpromising driveway gate, are lovely, with ancient cherry trees that just happened to be in bloom and a striking red five-story pagoda. To find the big Buddha, follow the sign that says "The big Buddha is upstairs." It's big but otherwise not remarkable. Turns out (this is not emphasized) it was built between 1988 and 1992. You are requested not to photograph it, so I didn't. Down the way and past a busy intersection is the Joten-ji temple, founded by the famed Enni Ben'En, revered for having brought the art of noodlemaking to Japan as well, they say, as yokan and manju and Hakata-ori, the textiles that we had seen at the museum. Busy guy. The current complex is said to date from 1242. For some reason, though important in culinary and cultural history, it isn't the tourist magnet that Tocho-ji is, and we had a good visit with few others around. The worship places were closed, but the grounds and monuments are the draw here anyway.
We were getting peckish, and the choice was to find the yakiniku place way up north there, find something in that arcade, also retracing our steps, or there was this other yakiniku restaurant at Hakata station that was said to offer excellent wagyu. Yakiniku Champion is known for being hard to find (how can something be hard to find in a shopping mall attached to the biggest train station in town?) and for offering certified A5 Mishima beef at a reasonable price. As Bourdain would say, I'm all over that. It's on the top floor of the complex, off on the far end from the elevators, with a smallish door next to a big door that goes to some other very popular restaurant. Quiet, no sign that I could recognize. We were seated side by side at a booth with a charcoal brazier set in the table. Service was friendly but slow; first by a woman who had no English, then by a young man who had a little, then relieved by the woman again. English menu with pictures. Our selections: choice grade short rib, sankaku (sometimes represented as tri-tip, which is part of the round, but apparently actually a triangular muscle from the short rib), and harami (skirt). By gesture we were asked how we wanted our meat, sauced or salted, but apparently the English- speaking contingent was off, it being lunchtime and late at that; eventually I remembered the right word, which is "shio." Ah, the order-taker said, shio, and grinned. So we got our meat gently salted rather than coated with a sticky sweet sauce (which we got on the side anyway). The "choice grade" referred to the fact that our cut was mostly fat, which was fine with us but slowed the pace of our eating. I did these cuts medium, which brought out the savoriness of the fat. Really good, but hard to make a meal of. Sankaku is reputed to have the most delicious balance of lean and fat - ours was in fact perfectly marbled, the fat in a beautiful net around pink meat. It cooked up a bit chewy, but the flavor was extraordinary. The harami was the most like American beef, with an intense beefy flavor, though tenderer than anything I've ever had stateside. I did these last two rare. On the side - a lettuce salad with red and yellow pepper strips and the usual dressing; a couple of banchan - napa kimchi and beansprouts; seaweed soup; and rice. Condiments - sauce and lemon. Beer for me, a seriously mediocre red wine for lili. I've had beef of this richness only a few times in my sixty some years, and we left fat and happy. Past the train station, eastward, and back we were at Canal City and home. Freshened up and had a brief nap, and for some reason we didn't want to go out for supper. The club at the hotel provided plenty of snacks and Vichon Cabernet for her, Remy Martin for me.
JL3052 FUK NRT 0720 0905 738 3C We upgraded again for the Y1000 or $8. It was as expected and hoped for a nothing flight. We took off and landed if anything a tad early. So what to do for 8 hours? Visit Narita Town, which some say is a huge waste of time, but others find it wonderful, which we did, even though it was drizzling and cool the whole day. From the airport station it's a 10-minute train ride for two or three bucks (day pass is something like $4); coin- operated lockers in the airport so we didn't have to lug our luggage on our adventure. The local train is appointed more like what we would think of as the subway, with hard bench seats and straps for rush hour. Overlooking town is the temple complex built atop Narita-San mountain: you walk up the main road past shops, restaurants, and the Jet Lag bar, and in ten minutes you're there, if you take the right road, which I initially did not (a helpful policeman helped us get on the right track). When you get there it's really quite extensive and busy as anything, with hordes of tourists from the city and actually not too many foreign gawkers such as we. We spent maybe four hours in the soaking mist-rain, my shoes squishing as I walked, but I didn't notice, the architecture was so wonderful. At one point we walked in on a wedding in one of the temples, augmented by tourists crowding in to get out of the rain, which was kind of interesting, though I saw little or nothing of it. When our stomachs started rumbling we decided to head back down, and as we went past all the little restaurants, numerous smiling touts came out to greet us, but we figured we'd get a better deal down by the train station. Oh-Sho is a slightly ratty little place, but when we passed it something told me this was the real deal. Little did I know that it is an outlet of a chain - didn't look chainlike to me, and in fact each of the restaurants has considerable leeway in presenting itself, both in appearance and menu. Speaking of which, there's an English (sort of) menu with pictures, very helpful. It's a Chinese restaurant. After we were greeted, it was quite a long time before our order was taken, and quite a long time before we were served. I think my comical lack of Japanese might have had something to do with it - some big Dutch-looking guy and his party were served in half the time, but then he was speaking what sounded like fluent Japanese. Anyhow, our food was eventually ordered and delivered and was very good. For a special treat I ordered hormone with miso. This is pig intestines and uterus chopped into bits, cleaned, boiled, and then stir-fried in brown sauce with, in this version, onions both white and green. The meat was tender - too tender for my preference - and totally clean-tasting - perhaps too much so for my preference, as part of the appeal is the, er, gaminess that almost inevitably escapes, though not apparently in the Japanese version. Nonetheless, I ate most of it happily enough. lili's treat was fried chicken, six boneless nuggets three or four times the size of fast-food nuggets, served with a sort of slaw dressed with pink stuff and corn kernels. The chicken was fresh and tender and didn't have a lot of distracting flavors to put her off. And of course gyoza, which were excellent - thin wrappers pan-fried just so, the filling fairly plain, pork, soy, and chopped scallions, just the way my mother used to make it. A wonderful goodbye to us from this town, which is lovelier than its reputation. Three minutes through the drizzle from the restaurant to the train, which took us to the airport a little before 3. As she was flying American and I was flying United, there was no chance to have parting drinks together, so we went to our separate clubs. I thought of the more glamorous options, but there wasn't all that much time, so I just went to the United Club, which was not hugely crowded, so I had a shower with no wait and then settled in for an hour with a glass of mediocre Kirin brandy and some quite pleasant cream-filled sponge cake things in various colors. Boarding was fairly orderly, that's to say not the usual rest of the world scrum but then not the normal Japanese straight queueing up either. UA 882 NRT ORD 1730 1510 744 15A I was fairly late to board, so my bag wasn't all the way back in the closet. Some mechanical weirdness, and we were delayed half an hour taking off. My seatmate was a young Japanese fellow whose taciturnity was agreeable to all.
UA 04/15 NRT-DEN/EWR/IAD/IAH/LAX/ORD/SFO (LD81-R89-B87) 261C001-4 TO BEGIN Chilled appetizer - battera sushi roll and smoked salmon with wasabi mayonnaise Fresh seasonal greens - pumpkin, tomato and croutons with your choice of creamy coriander dressing or sesame vinaigrette The sushi tasted like kind of nothing; the salmon was pretty good. MAIN COURSE Tenderloin of beef - Red wine sauce, Asiago potato pie, green beans and bell pepper Breast of chicken - Rosemary sauce, pistachio risotto, broccoli and carrots Fillet of salmon with shrimp - Teriyaki sauce, steamed rice and bok choy with vegetable julienne I said I'd take anything. I got the fish, which was of course way overcooked but reasonably fresh and decent to the palate. The teriyaki sauce had a curious empty taste, so I didn't eat all my rice. Japanese selection Appetizers of salmon roll, bamboo shoot with pepper, grilled chicken, bracken and scallop with spicy cod roe A main course of sauteed pork with potato and bell pepper, simmered cabbage-wrapped chicken and bamboo shoot with seaweed, marinated radish and corn, vinegared crab meat with mustard, miso paste and Chinese matrimony vine, miso soup with seaweed, simmered vegetables, steamed rice and Japanese-style pickles TO FINISH International cheese selection - Grapes and crackers served with Port Dessert - Ice cream with your choice of toppings I had a glass, no, two, of Port, followed by a Courvoisier nightcap. MID-FLIGHT SNACK Fruit and light snacks are available at any time following the meal service. Please help yourself or ask a flight attendant for today's selection Not sure what there was. I did check, but there was no red bean mochi left, so I lost interest. PRIOR TO ARRIVAL Cheese omelette - Chunky tomato sauce, potatoes, mushrooms and pork sausage Udon noodles with pork - Sliced pork and vegetables Cereal and banana served with milk Fresh fruit appetizer, yogurt or savory salad, and breakfast breads The udon were salty and peculiarly dehydrated from their long travels but tasted pretty good. The pork was excellent. A fair amount of sleep; I dreamed of the good olden days when I spent so much time in this seat's ancestor, which my memories tell me was even more comfy and conducive to rest, and why the heck change to these coffins? Oh, well, the new digs are not unpleasant if a little cramped. I woke for meals, plus something kind of disagreed with me, so also for several trips toward the flight deck. We landed a bit late, having made up some time en route. GE didn't work for me, as usual, so I had to go to the regular line, where there's an automated system installed that works to all intents and purposes the same. I was quickly shooed back into the US.
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