food-tabi --- culinary adventures!

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Sunday, August 27, 2006

nagasaki tabi food

travelling always brings you face to face with new and exciting food. so my recent travel to kyushu, the southernmost island in japan got me some interesting finds. nagasaki has a varied history compared to the rest of japan, since many foreigners made it their home way before it became fashionable for westerners to come as english teachers. let's just say that it's a very international city. however, quaint japanese things still surface, such as this interesting concoction called soba ice cream.

soba, or buckwheat noodles are a favorite among japanese people. but to turn it into ice cream! i was wondering if they have this flavor at baskin robbins! it's mildly sweet and creamy, and the red bean paste complements it perfectly. i say, its quite good! and yes, id want to eat it again.

since we're on the subjevt of ices, if you happen to visit a park in nagasaki, you'll notice these bent old ladies pushing wooden carts, selling... ice cream! they basically only sell vanilla ice cream, which is more like sherbet but the expreience of buying icre cream from a little, old ambulant vendor in japan! priceless.


pipot's homestay family reccomended turkey rice as a must-try in nagasaki. intrestingly enough, we found a store that sells the famed turkey rice just before we headed out to fukuoka station back to tokyo. we don't really know if the "turkey" in turkey rice meant the tukry bird or the country. either way, the dish is a far cry from anything turkey. it's a disappointing dish that's really more like kitchen leftovers thrown together. yuck. once is enough!