From Dusk till Dawn in Japan

Welcome to our first announcement in Cooking with Naiara´s blog. This time we are going to talk about the food culture in Japan, one of the most astonishing countries in the world. When it comes to food, the Japanese are among the most enthusiastic and passionate of any race. Although It isn´t the only interesting thing, when we arrived the people was very hospitable and friendly.

To sum up, we are going to introduce you in five general topics. Rice, Fish, Meat, and Local Food.

Rice.
Rice has been a fundamental food for over the history of the country, and still accompanies and forms the base of many meals. The Rice Harvest is an intensive activity that the Japanese people respect and care. Aprox, a japanese eats 60 kilos of rice for a year. This food is an important part of the japanese gastronomic culture. Popular dishes include:

• Donburi (simmered fish, meat or vegetables served over rice)

• The famous Onigiri (small triangles of rice wrapped in dried seaweed)

• Kayu (a rice porridge)

• Mochi (pounded rice cakes)

Fish.

Fish is an integral part of the Japanese diet. Sometimes japanese people eat it almost live! Forgetting about that, there is a lot of methods to prepare fish. It´s possible that having breakfast with fish sounds weird, although in this country it is very common. These are the most yummy dishes that we have found...

• Sashimi (pieces of raw salmon with some rice).

• Yaki (grilled onigiri with salmon inside) 

• Tempura (deep fried shrimp or vegetables)

• The famous sushi (there is no reason to explain it)

Meat.

Now. we are going to show you the most delightful meat worldwide. The famous Kobe beef, is produced from cows raised according to strict tradition and provides a wonderful flavor that melts in your mouth. It is a delicacy, valued for its flavor, tenderness, and fatty. Kobe beef can be prepared as steak, sukiyaki, shabu-shabu, sashimi... Of course the food offering in Japan extends to far more than just fish and meat. Japan has a huge variety of fruit and vegetables, a whole host of noodle dishes.

• Steak. (normal pieces of kobe beef)

• Sukiyaki (bowl of beef with bean curd and vegetables cooked in soy sauce and then dipped in egg)

• Shabu-shabu (very thinly sliced beef pieces, in different sauces)

• Sashimi Kobe (pieces of kobe and rice)

Local Food, Eating out.
The city life is a perfect place to form crowds of different restaurants and others, include the ones that specialise in skewers (kushiyaki), ramen (noodles in a broth), tempura (deep-fried fish or vegetables), teriyaki (marinated beef/chicken/fish seared on a hot plate) The list goes on.

Festival food have an important part in the local experience, which offers such an interesting eats including 

Takoyaki (small pieces of octopus cooked in a bread dough like dumpling)

Kakigori (shaved ice with different flavors that is very famous in the summer festival)

If you want an specific good place, then the best place to go is an Izakaya (Japanese pub) where you will find an extensive and pretty cheap choice of food and drink, like tabehodai or nomihodai deals for a cheap price you get an hour to eat or drink as much as you like.