My Egg Noodles

There’s a little random story on how I ended up coming over to Japan. I stumbled upon the Sapporo Snow Festival’s web site a few weeks ago and sent the link over to a buddy while we were communicating  on chat. He thought it looked cool and within the hour we had both booked our flights! So basically the whole purpose of this trip was to come and check out the Sapporo Snow Festival – And boy am I glad we came!

The Sapporo Snow Festival, an annual event that attracts snow artists from all over the world for the last 61 years, is truly under way. There are 3 main areas spread out over town and last night I decided to check out the ice  sculptures while they were all lit up. It was freezing (Google said it was -8oc) with snow coming down so I didn’t take that many images (I preferred to keep my hands in my pockets lol)… and unfortunately the images I did take just doesn’t do them justice.

These guys are so talented!

This ice sculpture had fish and crab in the ice slabs!

Then it was time to get into somewhere warm, drink some wine and have some food. Here we have cheese, tomato and pesto – 3 simple ingredients that when eaten together are outstanding.

Cheese and bread with red wine – A winner every time.

I am so impressed with the Sapporo Snow Festival that I know I’ll be back next year with my girlfriend. It’s perfect for couples in that the whole event with the snow thing is just so dam romantic! Trust me, you guys should put this on your list of things to do!

After arriving in Sapporo to check out the Snow festival and do some snowboarding on my last leg of the Japan trip, I stayed in a capsule hotel due to not booking any accommodation in advance. I thought I’d write down some notes on my experience of staying in a capsule hotel. First up, it’s weird. Fucking weird.

Upon checking in ($¥2,800 / $31), you are given a shoe locker to store your shoes which sits beside the reception area. Next stop was down to the lockers located in the basement of the hotel to store my belongings (the lockers here were so small/narrow).

The locker room in the basement where you store your gear.

Then it was up to check out the capsule. Rows of 2 capsules high running down both sides of the room. Each capsule had a TV (porn was an optional extra at ¥1,000 / $11), radio, lighting control and an alarm clock. The hotel as a whole was really well kitted out with vending machines for all sorts of stuff including hot food. Extra facilities included washing machines, sauna, hot tub and free tolitories.

Fast food vending machine. I’m sure you, as I, can imagine how good this stuff must be ;)

After a few beers out on the town, I feel asleep straight away but woke up a few times due to my little capsule heating up… which was a let down. Overall, I think the concept is a good idea, in that they are normally used by Japanese men who have been out on the town and want a place to crash before going into work the next day. But for me, I’m not going to go out of my way to stay in one again.

The chill-out room

I have been waiting to try Kobe beef for years, and at last I was going to try it in the most authentic place on earth; Kobe in Japan. The special night started with a bottle of wine in the hotel room while listening to old school hip-hop. A sure way to get me into a good mood.

As I stepped outside into the cold, a nice warm buzz come over my body from the red wine. I was getting excited. It was time to find the perfect restaurant to sample arguably the best beef in the world. After poking my head into 4 or 5 Kobe beef specialist restaurants, I finally found one that was full of locals, a sure way to know it’’s good, no matter where you are in the world.

I was expecting steak cooked behind the scenes; however most of the Kobe beef restaurants here have Teppanyaki set up, where the chef cooks most of the meal in front of you. After glancing over the simple menu – which consisted of sirloin or tenderloin, either as a set or by its own, I decided to go for the 160gram tenderloin set.

The set included a few veggies, a croissant (which was labeled as bread on the menu), soup, salad and the star of the show… 160grams of the best beef in the world.

The chef started by frying up some garlic.

Kobe beef; 320grams of the stuff! (to be split between me and Matt)

I ordered my kobe beef very rare (The waitress didn’t understand “blue”) but was lucky it did turn out to be blue. Just lightly seared on an extremely hot surface, with the meat warm on the outer layers and cold in the middle. I couldn’t imagine eating this kind of beef any other way (although, I could have easily eaten it raw).

How did it taste? Fucking amazing. Unreal. So soft, yet full of flavour. It met my high expectations!

Me and the chef!

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The set, along with 2 glasses of red wine cost ¥7,500 ($85) which is unbelievable value in my opinion. Defo one of the highlights of the Japan trip so far!

Have you tried Kobe beef before? If so, what did you make of it? If not, are you keen on trying it?

It was time to move on from Kyoto and head down to Kobe, which is probably most famous for it’s extremely tender beef from cows that drink beer for most of their lives (this helps them relax and sleep a lot)!

Kobe is a beautiful city, with a strong mix of architecture influences from many countries over the world. Here are a few images I took while wondering around Kobe’s streets over the last couple of days.

China town

The aromas from this place smelt so darn good!

A restaurant in China Town

A 2 headed horse – Anyone know what this means?

A shopping center that just kept on going and going and…

Kobe beef at 1260 yen per 100 grams. As expected, there are some luxury butchers scattered around town that specialise in Kobe beef.

Love the hill at the end of this street!