Sunflowers

I’ve been meaning to post this for a while now. Back in September we took a drive to nearby town Marumori to check out a sunflower festival. The festival was quite small, but there was a ton of sunflowers everywhere.

What was also interesting was for just a few hundred yen they would let you pick as many flowers as you wanted. We got a total of six.

BBQ and Bacon

The new burger at McDonald’s this month in Japan is the relatively simple sounding “Quarter Pounder Bacon & BBQ”. It actually starts today so I haven’t had a chance to try it yet. I’m sure it’ll be good though, it’s a Quarter Pounder with bacon on it. How could that be bad?  Everything is made better with bacon.

Oishinbo

I’ve been reading this great manga lately called Oishinbo. It’s all about food and cooking. Each book focuses on one type of ingredient, like the one pictured above is “fish”.  Each book also has a couple recipes in it. You can actually learn a lot about Japanese food by reading these so check it out! There’s already 5 volumes available in English.

Pig or Not Pig

I was pretty sick this past week (still am). Seriously pondering whether I had “swine flu” or not. A few kids in my classes at work came down with it right after I had them for class. Being fearful of spreading it I went to the hospital to find out the verdict. To do this they had to stick a Q-tip so far up my nose that I thought my brain would get poked. The test results came back negative, but the doctor said it only recognizes 60% of the people who actually have it. I seriously hope I’m in the 40% percent and actually have it, because I’d like to not have to worry about catching pig flu anymore.

You Gotta Be Kidding Me!?

Who ever thought that this would be a good idea is probably crazy! Check this out, to promote the release of Windows 7, Burger King decided to serve a special seven patty Whopper.

Surely anyone that decides to eat this is shortening their life by a few years. The ad states that it is 13 cms tall, and contains seven patties each weighing 113g, a grand total of 791 grams of beef! I won’t be trying this for two reasons, we don’t have Burger King in Sendai, and it’s just bloody wrong. My heart is thanking me. Remember kids don’t break the one Whopper rule. It just leads to an upset stomach. I poached the picture below from a Japanese blog.

In order to actually bite into it the guy had to remove a few of the patties and eat them on the side. Not all food is healthy in Japan. Crazy!!

American Street

Here’s a couple strange Pringles flavors of late. They’re supposedly inspired by large American cities. The first being called “New Yorker’s Street” Cheese Dog flavor.

I basically tasted like cheese flavor Pringles. The other is “Los Angeles Street” BBQ Chicken.

I had no idea Los Angeles was known for BBQ chicken. I visited there a few years ago and never once had BBQ chicken. Lots of Mexican food, but no BBQ chicken.

Hilarious!

Check out this video of a practical joke probably gone too far. They fake a sniper shooting. The poor guy looks like he’s going to die. The result are quite funny.

Latest Sandwiches

Here’s my quick round up of the latest sandwiches to appear at McDonald’s. The last one was the “Chicken Tatsuta”.

It super delicious. It’s like a Japanese style fried chicken sandwich. Very very good. Unfortunately it was too popular and it’s already finished early. The whole supply was eaten. Maybe they should consider making it a permanent menu item.

It’s replacement is the “Gracoro”. Which is short for Gratan Croquette.

I’ve actually already tried and wrote about this one last year when they had it. It’s pretty good. Nice and creamy inside.

Strange Kit Kat

A little while ago I found this strange Kit Kat at the super market. It’s Ramune soda flavor. Ramune is a unique flavor that from Japan. It’s kind sweet and syrupy.

The strangest part was the actual chocolate bar was blue. The flavor wasn’t bad though. It actually reminded me of some white chocolate easter candy I had eaten before.

I also spotted another strange flavor. Vegetable juice flavoured Kit Kat.

I don’t think I’ll be trying this one. as it sounds quite gross!

I Saw Subway

You know you’ve been away from home for too long when you get super excited seeing a Subway restaurant. If it had been a Quiznos, I might have died on the spot!

This was at Narita airport. I was so happy. It had been over a year and a half since I had a submarine sandwich. I proceeded to gobble one down with gusto! (I got a 6 inch tandoori chicken and a 6 inch roast beef in case anyone was wondering. Delicious!!)