Dinner Time

"If you are ambitious, you WILL accidentally order chicken skin, liver, cartilege, squid suction cups or something with a fish head. Try some then move on."

e-mail from a co-worker giving tips on food in Japan.


The MHI guys took us out to dinner and ordered beers and a bunch of snacky dinner-ish foods to go with it. A plate of skewers came out, with skewers of beef, chicken, some kind of meat ball, what looked like some kind of fish cake, grilled onions and leeks. The onions looked really good, all golden and crispy, cut in big thick slices. I picked one up with my chopstick and popped it in my mouth. Just as I was thinking that it was a pretty firm onion, I bit down and winced. Kevin’s e-mail came to mind. Chicken cartilage. Tanaka-san looked at me and asked if it was good. I half smiled and tried not to look completely repulsed. You can't even take a huge swig of beer and try to wash it down. You have to keep chewing otherwise you'll choke. It sounds like the first bite of cruncy celery only it never gets softer…it just keeps loudly crunching and crunching. Later on I reached for the beef, then had a second thought. Suspicious, I asked what it was. Chicken liver. This in itself isn’t really that bad but the taste of any liver makes me gag. The whole plate was chicken: liver, skin, a wing (a real wing not the kind you get with buffalo sauce), cartilage and a few gristly chunks of dark meat. Lovely. That was only day two. Fish head's I'm used to, now I'm waiting for the squid suction cups. I'm really hoping that I can't top chicken cartilage.