Ramen, Kutchan

Well this has to be probably one of the slackest efforts we've done so far.....We had ramen recently, good ramen in fact but we ate with no regard to providing just about any futher information than that... still here goes.

On the main road in Kutchan is a ramen shop that has a sign out the front saying open since 1991 or close to (told you, fuzzy memory) at first I was unimpressed but then I realised it's now 2009, did a quick count and and went ooooooh.

Inside we were given the gaijin menu (I had a quick peek at the Japanese one to see if we were being stiffed on any of the good stuff but it was all front and present).



Kat went for the Hokkaido specialty - butter corn, and I for the tonkotsu, a collagen thick broth of long simmered pork bones. The soups were quick to arrive and we were glad we had stuck with the regular size, they were massive enough already.

The butter corn was full the the rim loaded with pork, corn and what looked like half a block of butter on the side.....seriously.

My tonkotsu was super rich, with the pork, egg and all the collagen, amazingly delicious but I felt I was on the verge of congealing, I managed to struggle through for the cause though.

We topped it all off with a small plate of gyoza, crispy and fragrant.

I'm sure we'll be back one day to get an address and give a few different types a go.

If you do manage to find it between now and then don't forget to grab you complementary vanilla and red bean ice cream on the way out. Yum.

Could really do with an aero bar about now.......................

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Bagus Cafe, Kutchan

Kutchan is a little haven of all things food .... Well, perhaps so when you're living in Hirafu, anyway. There's quite a varied array of food to be had, and it's our mission to try it all!

After a recommendation from Y & A from work we headed in. It's true Japanese style, the way it's in a rather large almost office-like building. The building doesn't look much from the street, it's only thanks to the neon lighted sign out the front that we eventually find it.



When you arrive, open the door, it just leads to a long white sterile corridor ....



Then venture down the corridor and right at the back on the right hand side is a little doorway with the words "Bagus Cafe".



We walk on in, it's surprisingly full... and feels like you could be in a little warung in Bali. It's decked out with batik, bottles of Indonesian and Thai beer and the type of music that could drift you away to Dreamland Beach .... We are led around to a table and stunned to see Y & A eating there. They were there just 2 nights ago, so it must be good! (That, and in Autumn most things in Kutchan close around 8, Bagus is open much later)



The menu is a combination of Indonesian, Korean, Thai, Vietnamese and many other South East Asian offerings. We start with an order of spicy beef fresh spring rolls. The beef is spicy and full of flavour, wrapped in a rice paper casing with crisp lettuce and vermicelli noodles. To the side is a lightly spiced vinegar dipping sauce and a pile of wafer thin fried potatoes. A very nice start to the evening.



Next is a Thai style salad of vermicelli, pork and prawn. It has a nice pungent dressing with a little kick of chilli. There's crisp lettuce, mitzuna, red onion, chilli, peanuts and generous juicy chunks of prawn and pork throughout.



Then comes out a terracotta soup pot, sitting over a burning fire. This is their tom yum. It does smell good! We leave it to simmer for a few minutes ....



It's not got the hot we expect, but maybe we've spent too much time in Thailand. (Japanese are crazy for their wasabi, but they're not big on chilli-hot) but the flavours are still there. The sour is added from a bottle of Thai vinegar that's bought out with the soup.



We finish with a big stone bowl of Korean seasoned rice, braised pork & beansprouts. The pork belly has been braised for hours, and is deliciously tender. The seasoned rice starts to crisp on the bottom of the stone pot, and this stirred through gives each bit a nice texture. The wok-fried beansprouts and little bit of mitzuna balancing it out nicely.



It's all delicious, and we've been able to take a little trip around South East Asia by only travelling about 10km from home.



Bagus Cafe
North 2, West 1
Kutchan-Cho
Tel: 0136 23 1118
Open 6pm-11pm

Bistrot le Cochon - pig out on fine French food in Kutchan!

This is for all you powderlife readers .... We've included the phone number, and a nice little map at the bottom of the page, so you know where to find cochon. There will be photos coming soon, or check out our review in Powderlife this weekend, or on the web-page....

9325.33 kilometres. That’s the distance between Kutchan and Nice, France, but step out of the snow and into this cute little 12 seat bistro and you could be in either. French wall hangings, water served out of Ricard bottles, beautifully hand written menus and food that’s timelessly classic and yet at the same time Japanese modern. It’s all thanks to former auto mechanic, Kazuhiko who decided one day it wasn't quite for him, put down his wrench, picked up a knife and hasn't looked back since. Working extensively in Tokyo he also travelled to Nice where despite being unable to speak English he was taught a lot of the classic skills he now so deftly wields.

We first wandered in for lunch which is an amazing value ¥900 for the pasta set or ¥1000 for the main set. Both come with a starter, bread and tea or coffee. We started off with a generous slice of pork terrine with nicely dressed and seasoned mixed leaf. We then moved on to the pasta (which changes daily depending on ingredients and whim) today’s was a fantastic spaghetti with braised lamb ragu, a rich tomato lamb sauce clinging to the perfectly cooked pasta, very hard to share. We then shifted our attention to the main from the other set a very clever tongue in cheek dish of braised pork cheek and tongue.

The cheek just falling apart at the approach of our fork and the tongues offaly flavour cooked away, with the addition of a few textbook turned vegatables this was a superb, witty dish. After such a great meal we want just a smidgen of something sweet to round it off, asking about dessert we are rewarded with a blancmange with champagne sauce, wow, again the classic style shows in a perfectly cooked and set pudding sweetened just so with the sauce. All this and a couple of drinks for under 4000 yen for two people, amazing. So amazing in fact we returned for dinner that very night only to find the place full (with only twelve seats we shouldn't have been surprised).

Another night we shall return we said, and have many times… Dinner is a mere ¥2800 for 3 courses. Recently we’ve had pate; rich, smooth and creamy with a rich prune jelly and pickled local veg. Fromage de tete - pigs head terrine, rustic and full of flavour. Pan roasted organic pork, sweet and juicy and slow braised beef cheeks with a rich red wine sauce. The desserts make you want to visit just for them.. Banana frangipane tart, dense rich chocolate cake, wild mountain grape tart and a wildly flavoursome lavender and honey ice-cream.
With food this good, and polished serviced delivered by Kazuhiko’s wife, Tomoko is there any wonder we can’t keep away?

Have we mentioned that there’s only 12 seats? You need to book early!

Bon appetite.

Bistrot le Cochon, closed Tuesdays

1-9, nishi 1 cyo-me, kita 3jyo

Kutchan-cho

Abuta-Gun

Hokkaido

Ph: 050 3549 0034

Mob: 080 5494 0966

Graubünden, Hirafu East Village

Living in a strange land is exciting and well, a bit strange sometimes. Sometimes you can end up longing for a little taste from your memories unable to find a cure. And so it is with Japan, within minutes you can always be snacking on delicious sushi, ramen, soba and the like, but, it can take quite a bit of effort to get a good sandwich (especially not one made of the ubiquitous should-be-a-dessert sweet bread). To our delight located within a brief five minute walk of our house, named after a region of Switzerland, it’s a cute little brick house all warm and cosy inside.



The menu is the famous sandwich (seriously, people drive two hours just to come for one) Once you finally make a filling choice you then have further agony deciding the type of bread; baguette, soft baguette, rye bread, or bagel all baked by the fantastic White Rock bakery in Kutchan so you know it’s going to be the real deal.

Today I go for the Graubünden original, omelette with bacon egg and cheese on rye.



Kat has the chicken, cream cheese and tomato also on rye.



In the brief wait we take the time to look around, there’s a showcase filled with fantastic cakes and a small shop selling herbal teas, cookies, candles and a good range of organic oats, maple syrup and other gourmet treats.



The sandos arrive and they are every bit as good as they sounded, the rye cut thick, the filling fresh and generous, mine full of just cooked omelette, grilled bacon and melty cheese is the perfect breakfast as far as I’m concerned and Kat’s piled high with chicken and slathered with cream cheese is a classic classic, on the side of each cute as a button cherry tomatoes a few sticks of cucumber a little carrot salad and a good blob of mayo with a potato salad, whipped to make it creamy.



They do some great home-made soda's.



And stock a full range of Dr. Stuarts teas, also available to take home.



Seeing we’ve being making eyes at the cakes a massive slice of banoffee pie is soon organised, and again it’s as delicious as it looks and prompts yet another fork duel (chivalry smivalry).



How does that song go? The one about the weather outside being frightful but inside delightful? That’s how I feel sitting here in Graubunden, content and relaxed and toasty, I don’t want to leave…..I think we have time and room for a maple hot milk.

Let it snow let it snow let it snow....

Graubünden
Hirafu East Village
Tel: 0136 233371
Open 11am - 7pm
http://www.graubunden.jp/

Jo Jo's, NAC, Hirafu

Jo Jo's is located within the Niseko Adventure Centre. You walk up a spiralling staircase into the big open room. There's a reasonable sized climbing wall occupying the back half of the room which works it way up from the lower floor .....



We sit down and order drinks. I go for the melon soda. My first impression is "Yike's, it's really green!" but it doesn't have that sickly syrup sweet that I though it would judging by the colour. It's actually a really mellow melon flavour, mixed with soda. mmm



Kim try's the Heartland Beer. This is made by Kirin. It's a well-rounded larger and very easy drinking beer.



On this occasion that we're here, it's rather quiet. This makes the very large open room almost a little lonely .....



But we place our order and within moments we here rustling, but it's not coming from the kitchen! Someone is getting kitted up downstairs to start climbing. Cool! So we just sit back and watch them, which is a rather unusual, all be it rather cool, way to pass the time while waiting for dinner.

Then the food arrives. Kim's gone for the cheeseburger. It's nice and generous, a plump meat patty topped with melting cheese, a bit of lettuce and the additon of a fried egg. There's a few hand cut fries on the side.



I get the BBQ chicken wrap. There are tender pieces of marinated grilled chicken, with loads of lettuce and tomato. But the real surprise was the delicious wholemeal flatbread in which it was wrapped ... this is made on site, and it was really really good! It had great flavour, and a wonderful texture. It was thick enough, but still thin enough to encase the chicken just nicely.



All this was enjoyed with another side order of hand cut Hokkaido potato wedges.



Have I said the potatoes are good here in Hokkaido?

Jo Jo's
NAC - Niseko Adventure Centre
179-53 Yamada, Kutchan
Abuta Gun
Hokkaido, Japan
T: 0136 232 093



Opening Times
April - October 9am - 9pm
November - Mid December 11am - 9pm
Mid December - March 11am - 11pm

Eff Eff, Annupuri

On our first visit to Annupuri we tryed to go to Eff Eff with Sh. We got there a bit late, though... Ever since then we'd been meaning to get back there. Here's a little old cottage tucked away at the base of Niseko Annupuri. The little sign on the front boasts "Ham & Sausages", awesome!



Walking in it feels like Grandma's house .. The fire was going, there's little vase's of flowers and plenty of knick-knack's lining the walls.



But then there's a small little showcase at the front filled with packets of house cured meats, hand-made sausages and ham. I believe it's all produced down below. We want to get a few things to go to take back and have a look out, but there's also a small little menu that you can sit down and enjoy.

Firstly comes a plate of sliced speck. It's nice and salty, with a good firm texture. It smells amazing! The 7 slices are draped over a little salad of crisp lettuce and tomatoes with a nice vinegary dressing. Yum!



As we're enjoying this, we see our selection of sausages being grilled over a little charcoal grill.



Then they arrive, hot from the grill. There's a weisswurst - a German style white sausage, a spicy pork sausage and a few little weiners. They are served with a good whack of mustard, ketchup, potato salad, sliced gherkin pickles and 2 lonely little beans .....

It was all delicious! Everyday we are amazed at what this little part of the world has to offer ......

Eff Eff
Annupuri Village
Hokkaido, Japan

Getting ready for winter ....

Since arriving in Hokkaido in October, we have wanted to take advantage wherever possible of the amazing local produce. We have been busily bottling and preserving whatever we could get our hands on to get us through the long, cold winter.

Wandering to work one day, out the front of the Reading Room was a table covered in amazing baby Roma tomatoes and white eggplants. After arriving at work and expressing our excitement to M1 we were back with a handful of ¥ ..... there's a great little sign advertising "Locally grown Organic Niseko produce" and an honesty box, asking you to pay what you think the vegetables are worth to you... How cool! But as we arrive back, a little truck pulls in unloading more veg. Conveniently it's the farmer himself, so here the relationship begins with Dennis.

We buy the entire contents of the table, and have arrangements for delivery of whatever else he can spare for us.... There's white eggplants,



& Mini red & yellow Roma's.




We made a delicious eggplant, chili & fig chutney. (Which we're now using on the charccuterie plate) and did some tres cute little jars of pickled eggplants. This recipe was found in Stephanie Alexanders the Cook's Companion and is so delicious. It says they will keep for a few months, but ours are disappearing at an alarming rate on antipasto, panini's, pizza's and everything else!



Pickled Eggplant
adapted from Stephanie Alexanders the Cook's Companion

1kg eggplant (we were lucky enough to have organic white Hokkaido eggplants)
¼ cup kitchen salt
100ml red wine vinegar
about 200ml extra virgin olive oil
For layering1 hot chili, sliced finely or chili flakes
2 garlic cloves, peeled and halved
mint leaves or thyme sprigs
fennel seeds (optional)

Slice eggplants into 5mm thick rounds. Spread out on a tray, sprinkling each layer with salt. Place another tray on top and something quite heavy, like a large jar of olive oil, and leave in the fridge overnight. This is to remove excess moisture from the eggplants.
Rinse slices very briefly in cold water, and the dry really well.
The slices can then be grilled with a little olive oil. We don't yet have a grill so we fried them in a pan until they were nicely golden on both sides. Remove from the pan and allow to cool a little.
Transfer the eggplant to a stainless bowl or tray and drizzle over the red wine vinegar. Leave the eggplants for 1 hour, to absorb all the vinegar.
Layer the eggplants with tongs or a fork into hot, sterilized jars adding the chili, garlic & herbs alternately. Press down very well and cover with olive oil. Release the slices from the side of the jar with a fork to remove any trapped air. Press down once more and fill to the top with oil.
Seal the jar and leave for at least a week (if possible :)) before eating.
If air has been correctly excluded and the jars are perfectly clean this pickle will last for months. Keep in a cool dark cupboard to prevent deterioration of the olive oil.
Makes 1 x 500g jar.

Then with the tomatoes, 80kg in total, we were constantly drying and semi-drying. Our combi oven certainly had a workout .....



We would love to be using these super sweet dried tomatoes for so many more things, but they only have about a 10% yield after dried, so they've been saved exclusively for our salad on at Sekka. Next year we just need to get in much earlier and have Dennis grow us about 500kg :)