Bento BreakTime #26: McDonald's Masala Burger (Mild) and Basil Mayo Dip for McNuggets

It's actually a chicken burger with Masala curry sauce. There's cheese, too, and, I forgot what else. A little bit spicy - this is the Mild variant. They also have a Hot variant. If you like curry, you might like this.

The Basil Mayo dip isn't great; I wouldn't have one again.

With "L" coke and fries, this is all 800 yen.

Bento #36: "Kissaten fuu no Naporitan"

Napolitan (spaghetti), coffee-shop-style. (Kissaten = coffee shop; ~fuu = ~style, although the same kanji and sound also means "wind" in some instances, such as fuudo = wind tunnel) 360 yen and yummy from 3F. The spaghetti sauce is probably a little sweet, but it was perfect for me. I honestly just love tomato-based spaghetti sauce. It came with some eggs, ham, mushrooms, and onions. Also had cucumbers (190 yen) that surprisingly complement it very well. The cucumbers are salted, possibly lightly-pickled, sprinkled with some white sesame seeds, and also doused with a few chili flakes but it's far from spicy. Overall, it was perfect, and in fact makes for a good (but expensive) snack by itself. The Japanese could and would eat "pasuta" (pasta / Italian noodles, which most often means spaghetti) with chopsticks, but they of course know how to use and actually use forks as well. When I ordered these, I was given a choice whether I wanted chopsticks ("hashi") or a fork ("fooku"). Honestly, I don't mind eating spaghetti with chopsticks.

Bento #35: "Buta Sutamina Don"

This is the pork equivalent of the "Pawaa Don" (or "Power" Rice Bowl). Buta = pork, sutamina = stamina, don = short for donburi which means bowl (in this case, a bowl of rice). This one is 460 yen from 3F, delicious but not the greatest. I guess it's the egg that makes this a "stamina" don. Before you eat it, you have to take out a sheet of plastic that separates the pork+egg from the rice.

Bento BreakTime #25: "Karaage to Hambaag"

Karaage (Japanese-style fried chicken nuggets/balls) and hamburger (pork) with some shredded cabbage, 294 yen from the cafeteria. I used pickled plum salad dressing, which is interesting. I dipped the karaage in J-style mayo. Together with the L-size rice, this is 441 yen and over 1000 calories totally. Shoved it all down with free, drink-all-you-can tea as always. I should mention that I love the cafeteria karaage much much more compared to the konbini or suupaa (convenience store or supermarket) version.

Bento #34: Bibimbap Chicken + Chicken Sanzuku Yaki

Thanks to Rei for the photo!

This one is a special "bento" from 3F, selling for 490 yen. "Bibimbap" is actually a Korean dish as many of you might already know. There's lots of stuff in there, like carrots, bean sprouts, spinach, mushrooms (or seaweeds?), and the red spicy sauce on the chicken. There's also some nori to top the bibimbap. Oh and did you notice the packaging itself? It tries to resemble a sizzling plate on a wooden platform! This dish is quite delicious, but I did order a kind of yakitori (chicken barbecue) to go with it - "chikin sanzuku yaki" - with the chicken peppered with.. black pepper. :D

Bento #33: Cabbage Fried Rice

Or "Kyabetsu Chaahan" in Japanese. 460 yen from 3F. There's 3 pieces of shrimp and some small pork bits. "Chaahan" is similar to "Chow Fan" in Chinese, which basically means fried rice. Obviously "chaa" means fried, as in "Chow Mien" which is essentially fried noodles, and "han" means rice. Delicious in a Chinese kind of way. Little bit oily, but I guess you get what you asked for. Not enough though, so I ate this with a chicken-egg-cabbage salad with sesame-miso dressing. Oh and notice the Chinese-style soup spoon that is served with this dish? That kind of spoon is called "renge" in Japanese. They call the "normal" silverware spoon as "supuun."

Bento BreakTime #24: Teriyaki Sauce Katsudon

Sorry for the blurry pic!

"Teriyaki Sauce Pork Cutlet Rice Bowl," or "Teriyaki Soosu Katsudon" in Japanese, "L" size, is I think 441 yen from the cafeteria. Comes with some shredded cabbage which I poured some "Chinese-style" salad dressing on.

Bento #32: Chicken Katsu Bento

498 yen from Lawson. A bit expensive, but it's a rather large portion of chicken so I had me another batch of rice after the one here. Came with some soba, rice sprinkled with some green herbs, and pickled radish. Oh, and this came with Katsu Sauce and a bit of Lemon Juice which I poured over the chicken katsu.

Bento #31: Roast Chicken Bento

The roast chicken included here sells for around 250 yen if bought separately, but this whole set is just 398 yen, from the supermarket. There is so much of the chicken that I had another batch of rice that is equal in amount to that already included in the bento. With the rice and roast chicken, there's also some sotanghon-like vermicelli noodles and mushrooms and carrots siding, some cabbage and lettuce, pickled plum, rolled fried egg, that pink and white thing that I usually find on some ramen and that is usually made from egg as well, and some sesame seeds and a "protective" plum on the rice. For around 465 yen (including the cost of the extra rice), it was a very good meal.

Weather right now in Atsugi

I found this nifty weather widget that could show the weather right now in Atsugi. Come back here if you're interested to find out what it is like in Atsugi right now. You can also move around to see the forecast for the next few hours, or for the next few days. Of course, it's not always accurate. If you want one for your own website or for your own city, click the link to the widget's developer's website. Actually they also have a Google Chrome browser extension that I highly recommend as well.

At around this time, it's way hotter and just as humid in most of Japan than in the Philippines.

YoWindow.com Forecast by yr.no

Bento #30: Onigiri Set

360 yen. Onigiri is that triangle-shaped rice+something wrapped in nori on the left, which you can usually find in convenience stores for about a hundred each although slightly larger than the ones in this  picture. They're the equivalent of sandwiches in the western world in that they serve as quick lunches on some occasions. This one's not a quick lunch though, as the 3 pieces of onigiri come with an assortment of stuff: small (pork) burger patty, squid, fish, chicken, hotdog, and egg. The 3 types of onigiri have a mayo filling, tuna, and… plum? or some other kind of seaweed. Yummy, all around.

Bento BreakTime #23: Tomato-sauce-taste Yakisoba

Partly opened because I was already opening it when I thought, I should take a photo! This is just around a 100 yen, I think, from the supermarket. Tomato sauce tasting yakisoba? I'd just call this spaghetti, but here in Japan, they call certain noodles soba and certain ones spaghetti, even though they look almost the same to me.

Bento #29: Spicy Indian-style Masala Curry

460 yen, if I remember correctly, from 3F. It's actually "supaishi indo-fuu masara karee" in Nihongo. Chicken, some veggies (spinach?), pickled radish, rice, and the masala curry sauce - which tasted really a lot like Indian curry.

Bento BreakTime #22: O.M.G. Burgers, finally! (Photos)

I've been wanting to go visit O.M.G. Burgers for a long time now, but it's about a 45-minute, 4.5-mile, 7.24-km bike ride from school, plus there's a lot of steep slopes and rolling terrain along the way. And then you have to go back the same way. It's actually outside of Atsugi already; it's in the neighboring Aikawa City.

Obviously, burgers are their specialty, and they even have a 12-inch burger which you should pre-order a day early before going there. You can check out their menu below.

Bento BreakTime #21: Pawaa Don

That's Nihongo for "Power Don." Power Don is basically a rice bowl with beef toppings and an egg. The M-size is around 845 calories. I got the L-size though together with some okra in mashed radish, and it was close to 1000 calories and about 493 yen in total. It's quite a good meal for me. The Power Don also has some leeks and garlic stalks, by the way, and the egg is soft boiled and usually I'd mix it with the rice and beef. Yum, yum, yum.

Bento Series #28: Beef "Suji" Curry

The curry on top.

The rice below. Not so much though.

Everything together. Called "Gyuu Suji Karee" in Nihongo.

Close-up view of one piece of "suji."

A special curry dish from 3F - 498 yen! "Suji" translates to muscle or tendon, but the stuff in here felt more like boiled-until-tender ligaments. Quite an interesting and tasty dinner, but a little bit expensive as always.

Bento Series BreakTime #20: Yayoiken Breakfast

Yayoiken is a restaurant that's just a little bit better looking than the usual Yoshinoya, Sukiya, or Matsuya. Like many places here, you pay for your order at a vending machine right by the entrance. The prices are also just a little bit more expensive by about 200 yen, maybe. We usually eat at Yayoiken because they have eat-all-you-can rice and pickled radish. But for breakfast, they have really cheap offerings like the two above.

Bento Series #26 & #27: Beef Kalbi Barbecue Bento and Cabbage and Cucumber side dish

398 yen from 3F. "Gyuu karubi yakiniku bento" in Nihongo. Yummy in my vocabulary, though quantity-wise it's not so much. I forgot to mention that with the Pork Kalbi Bento I got earlier, there were some wheat grains mixed with the rice grains, so that was extra healthy, I suppose. This one just has plain rice.

I ate my bento with this Cabbage-Cucumber side dish with a miso-sesame-based dip. 158 yen also from 3F. Also yummy.

Bento Series BreakTime #19: Cafeteria curry flavor #3

Today, the school cafeteria had on its menu "Kanazawa sauce katsu curry," or Kanazawa-style Japanese curry with chicken cutlets. I noticed the chicken cutlets looked small so I got me a bowl of 3 pieces of karaage (Japanese-style fried breaded chicken bits/nuggets). Together with the spinach, this all cost me a whopping 640 yen and over 1200 calories. Pushed it all down with free drink-all-you-can tea as always.

Bento Series BreakTime #18: Pepsi's Salty Watermelon Soda

A "refreshing taste of summer," as Pepsi advertises. As we say in the Philippines, "lasang babolgam." Tastes like bubblegum. I think it's just the right taste for what it says it is (salt+watermelon+soda water), but definitely not at all exactly the same as fresh watermelon with salt. And I can definitely imagine some people not liking this because they don't like stuff like this, i.e. they expected it to probably taste exactly like fresh watermelon with salt. As for me, I'm not getting one again only because I like cola (Coke or Pepsi) better, and meanwhile this is just as (in)expensive. Just glad to have this on my "been there, done that" list.

Bento Series #25: Vegetable Tomato Soup

This one is expensive at 348 yen, from 3F. But it's packed. There's pork (maybe ham or bacon) bits, broccoli, carrots, those curly noodles, pumpkin, string beans, and soy beans ("edamame") all in an oily tomato-based soup. I don't know where the oiliness comes from but I'm hoping it's olive oil. This is definitely not Japanese.

Bento Series #24: Onion-Salt-Pork Kalbi Bento

Or "negi shiyo buta karubi bento" in Nihongo. 398 yen from 3F. Yummy like bacon. Oily like my face on this hot and humid summer day. Not so much to fill the "naka" (stomach) though, so with this I tried some of Bento #25...

Japan! Japan! is now on the Japan Blog Directory, which lists plenty of must-reads for first- and old-timers in Japan alike

More specifically the Japan! Japan! blog is now listed as one of the "Green Belt" blogs under the "Foreigners in Japan" category. As of today, I am currently a featured "new" blog on the Japan Blog Directory (JBD). If you have a blog about Japan, too, you can register your blog to their listing as well.

JBD basically has three categories of blogs:

• "Black Belt" blogs are the veterans that have been established for a while now and are also recognized as top blogs by other bloggers and the media.
• "Green Belt" blogs are the challengers who have blogged for more than a year but have not yet received the public recognition to become a black belt.
• And finally, whereas some blogs are only maintained for a year and then abandoned, "White Belt" blogs are blogs that have not yet seen their first anniversary and therefore still have to show that they will last. Visitors to the Japan Blog Directory are encouraged to visit these "White Belt" blogs and give advice where necessary. After a year of existence, the white belts graduate to green belts.

All that said, JBD is a great place for reading about Japan from the perspectives of foreigners living in Japan, foreigners outside of Japan, Japanese in Japan, Japanese outside of Japan, blogs about Nihongo, travel and food blogs, and many more. If I were to add to my "Welcome to Japan" 2-part article series, this should be one of the top sites to check out. Visit JBD today!

Bento Series BreakTime #17: McDonald's Le Grand Sausage sandwich

Sorry for the blurry photo!

780 yen for an "L" set (with large fries and drink), this is a special limited edition burger sandwich at McDonald's here in Japan. They have a couple of other limited edition sandwiches which I hope to try as well soon.

Who is Jack n' Poy? [did you know?]

Image from Wikipedia

"Jack n' Poy. Hale hale hoy! Sinong matalo, s'yang unggoy!"
(Jack and Poy. Holly holly hoy! Whoever loses, he's the monkey!)

If you're Filipino, you know how that chant goes, and what we do while chanting it.

Yup, in English, it's actually called the Rock-Paper-Scissors (RPS) game.

Bento Series #23: Karaage Bento

Oops, this should be upside down.

398 yen from Lawson. Karaage is Japanese-style fried breaded chicken balls/bits, as opposed to the Chicken Katsu, which is flat and uses something more closer to tempura breading, or "Chicken Fry" which is more like KFC. Look at it as Japanese-style chicken nuggets, except it's not flat as well and the breading (made with a lot of eggs) is a little bit thicker. This bento is a simple one. Karaage, with mayo, rice with black sesame seed sprinkles, and yellow pickled radish.

Bento Series #22: Yakitori Bento

460 yen from 3F. Yummy but quantity-wise, not enough. Three kinds of yakitori (barbequed chicken), the brown one, the white one, and the skin only. There's also some ground pork, shredded scrambled eggs, nori shreds on the fried(?) rice, and pickled ginger and some wasabi. Yummy, tasty, but not enough, quantity-wise. Not for 460 yen!

Bento Series BreakTime #16: Weiner Bread!

This one is 130 yen from 3F. As you can see, it's not a sandwich. Right? It does come with mustard and ketchup, though. A very similar one except in sandwich form is 20 yen more expensive, and that one they call "Mustard Weiner Dog." Bread, by the way, is "pan" in Japanese. I bought this and some bananas to complement my Jambalaya dinner. Have you guessed where Jambalaya comes from? Here's a clue to make you more confused: it's almost like a derivative of the Spanish paella.

Bento Series #21: Jambalaya

398 yen from 3F. There's chicken and corn and bell peppers and flavored rice that has a little bit of tomato in it. You'll never guess where Jambalaya originated from. Anyway, it was yummy but it wasn't enough, so I got me.....

Bento Series BreakTime #15: Cafeteria Ramen

This one is just 346 yen! Far from being great, taste-wise, but in terms of bang for the buck, it is! There is just one piece of meat though. The one I got is a miso rahmen. I'll try other flavors and noodle types next time.

Bento Series #20: Unagi Bento

How much? Happyaku Hachijuu En. From 3F. Oishikatta desu yo. Very tasty. Ate it with a 170 yen pack of pickled cabbage (with some cucumbers and carrots). I'll probably not eat unagi (eel) again because it's happyaku hachijuu en. Takai desu yo. Unless it's free. :D

Bento Series BreakTime #14: Keema Curry using Summer Vegetables

399 yen for "M-size" Keema Curry with Summer Vegetables (mostly potatoes, cucumber, and some red bell peppers) at the cafeteria. In Japanese, it's "Natsu no yasai kiima karee." I also ordered an 84 yen serving of assorted veggies on the side: eggplants, spinach, and radish-carrot-tofu shreds mix. As usual, curry is eaten here with a spoon. But I got a fork as well, anyway, which I can use for the veggies as well. The chopsticks are there for decoration.

Thanks to Rei for the photo!

Bento Series: #19

Pork barbeque. Yum. 498 yen? I didn't mind. This one is from 3F and it is quite a rare one. Comes with rice of course, and rolled scrambled egg, pickled plum, and lotus roots + carrots mini-side dish. Yum.

Bento Series BreakTime #13: "Kougei Don"

It's practically summer vacation already for the students here so the "by-the-pound"/"buffet" cafeteria is now closed until classes resume in the fall term (September). So off to the old cafeteria where I had me this rice bowl ("donburi") dish called "Kougei Don." Kougei comes from the name of our school in Japanese, Toukyou Kougei Daigaku, which translates to Tokyo Polytechnic University. Kougei by itself actually means industrial arts. What Kougei Don actually is is "fuwa tamago katsu don," literally translating to "soft egg pork cutlet rice bowl." Served with some shreds of nori on top, I actually like this dish a lot. For my dose of "glow" food to complement the mostly "go" and "grow" of this donburi dish, I also got me some spinach on the side. The donburi is 399 yen for an "M-size" and 551 yen totally with the spinach. I washed it all down with the free, nomihoudai (drink-all-you-can) cold tea. Oh and by the way, if you're coming from the Philippines, all cold/iced teas here are natural - no sugars or other sweeteners included.

Bento Series: #18

"Special Hamburger Bento," only 398 yen from the supermarket. Quite cheap, right? It's one thick burger patty with demi-glaze sauce on a bedding of lettuce and Asian-style spaghetti (i.e. sweet, just like Filipino-style spag), microwaved egg?, a weiner, some pickled plum, and rice with some sesame seeds and another plum. That plum on the rice is placed there as it is believed to protect the rice. Not in photo (below the egg): vermicelli-carrot-garlic stalks side dish in light sour-sweet sauce. Yummy and filling.

Bento Series: #17

Chicken with chilis and onions on a bed of lettuce, with pickled radish and sesame-seed-sprinkled rice. It's a little spicy, and to me actually feels more like a Chinese than a Japanese dish. 498 yen from 3F. Oh and I bought some Dole bananas as well - imported from the Philippines - 5 for 168 yen, also at 3F.

Bento Series: #16

Something-Something Mayo Don. Sorry, I'm not familiar with the first two kanji on the label. It's basically a rice bowl dish topped with nori shreds and fried chicken with a sweet sesame-teriyaki sauce and mayonaise. Oh and there's some yellow pickled radish on the side too. 480 yen from Lawson. I really like the food at 3F better, price-wise, taste-wise, and in terms of the breadth of the selection.

Bento Series: #15

"Yokubari meat sauce," 450 yen from Lawson. Little expensive, spaghetti with meat sauce and a (pork) burger patty with, if I'm not mistaken, "demi" (demi-glaze) sauce. If it's spaghetti, they serve this actually with a fork. If it's curry or other non-East-Asian rice dish like taco rice, they serve it with a spoon. Most everything else here are served with chopsticks. This one I ate with chopsticks, which I put in the photo for scale.

Bento Series #14: Bacon & Chili Pesto Spaghetti

The picture says it all. 398 yen, and it's not exactly the typical pesto. I don't really know what kind of pasta recipe this is. And yep, bacon here is a little bit different; looks more like ham in color and texture and only bacon in shape, but still yummy nonetheless. And well here, in pasta dishes, they might call chilis like the Italians call them: peperoncino (pronounced pepperonchino). Did you know? The word "pepperoni" that we know from American English actually refers to some peppers (like red bell peppers) in Italian. The yummy pizza topping that we in the US and in the Philippines call "pepperoni" actually translates to something that means spicy sausage in Italian. And did you know? Here in Japan, green bell peppers are called piiman and red/orange/yellow bell peppers are called papurika (paprika).

Bento Series BreakTime #12: Sasami Cheese Katsu

For dinner, I went to the "old" cafeteria, and got one of their regulars, a "Sasami Cheese Katsu," where "sasami" is basically a chicken part that's perfect for filleting. I also had salad bar where I got spinach, broccoli, corn, and egg, and my usual M-size rice, almond jelly dessert, and hot tea-all-you-can. All under 500 yen.

Bento Series BreakTime #11: "Buffet" food

For my "buffet" lunch, I picked up a ham, cheese, and asparagus "katsu," and two slices of roasted chicken, the usual lettuce bedding and cherry tomatoes, and for the katsu and lettuce, I have ketchup and mayo as dip. There's also a ball of mashed pumpkin salad in there, which is a little bit sweet and definitely yummy in a pumpkin sort of way. No pineapples this time around because there were none yet when we got there.

Marine Day

A beach on Chigasaki, the nearest one to my place.
Never been there yet and I probably won't ever be able to go.
Photo from Wikipedia.

Last Monday was Marine Day here in Japan, a national holiday. This year, it was on July 16. I totally forgot about it this time, but now I know why one of my meetings were scheduled for July 17 (Tuesday) and not July 16.