A Taste of Japan

The last two days have been full of Enkai's (work parties). Nearly every meal has been celebrated with my co-workers...all paid for by someone other than myself. All you can drink, all you can eat, all the fun you can possible have. The food has been adventurous. Raw shrimp, a boatload of raw fish and seafood, raw horse, and certainly last but not least, a live squid... we've eaten it all.

Regrettably, I haven't taken many photos, but today I got a few shots of a lunch I went out to with some random lady. It was a nine course meal, here are some of my better photos:

Started off with this little dish - some raw fish with some delicious sauce...

Next, good ole fashion sushi. Didn't recognize most the fish, or the sauce on top, but it was truly amazing...

This was some sort of cold potato soup, with locally grown fresh peaches underneath it. Sounds distgusting, but it was actually a pleasant combination.

some cooked fish, with an edible rose.

One of the main courses, spinach, some home made dumplingish thingy, and a tasty local tomato on top.

Pear mint jello.. mmm

Meatloaf-ish thingy. with some complimentary horseradish sauce, and garlic chips off to the side.

Pasta...ish?

We had the choice of pasta or rice for the next dish. I chose pasta, seeing as I think im gonna get enough rice these next few months, anyway... Wonderful choice...and that tasty looking green leaf wasn't edible...as indicated by the chef laughing at me when I spit it out on the plate... I was slightly worried it was rude...but then I thought to myself, "I guess its not rude if you spit something out that shouldn't be eaten in the first place, right?". Right.

Desert.

Funny, how any Japanese person's idea of a good desert is mysteriously nothing but FRUIT, with maybe a little sweet sauce on top. This was pretty cool though - the chef said that all the fruits were grown in the neighborhood, and the area we live in is famous for grapes. While being a bit thick skinned for my liking, they were indeed delicious.

Good ole fashion Tiramisu.. did I say Japanese couldn't make good deserts? I was wrong...

Mmm, Oishii...