{"id":657,"date":"2010-03-07T18:52:48","date_gmt":"2010-03-07T09:52:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/?p=657"},"modified":"2010-03-07T18:52:48","modified_gmt":"2010-03-07T09:52:48","slug":"yummm-%e2%80%93-monja","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/2010\/03\/07\/yummm-%e2%80%93-monja\/","title":{"rendered":"Yummm \u00e2\u20ac\u201c monja!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last weekend, while in Tokyo, Tomo and I went to \u00e6\u0153\u02c6\u00e5\u00b3\u00b6 (Tsukishima<\/a>, another reference here<\/a>) in Tokyo to meet up with a couple of his high school classmates for some \u00e3\u201a\u201a\u00e3\u201a\u201c\u00e3\u0081\u02dc\u00e3\u201a\u0192\u00e7\u201e\u00bc<\/a> (monjayaki). That had not been our plan at all. As a matter of fact, I was hoping to go to Gonpachi<\/a>, where the big restaurant brawl from “Kill Bill<\/a>” was shot. OK, touristy, but still I have wanted to see it. As we were heading to the subway, Tomo got a text saying, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Where are you?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Oops. So we had a decision to make \u00e2\u20ac\u201c go with our plan or take the same subway line a different direction. Since Tomo recalled that he had made the tentative plan he decided we would redirect to monja.<\/p>\n

Tsukishima is famous for monja. If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve never had monja, imagine someone puking on a teppan and then scooping it up with a little spatula and eating it. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the visual. Sound appetizing? It actually is really, really good. And like most Japanese food, it is very social and very interactive.<\/p>\n

You basically have different ingredients, usually including some cheese, cabbage, veggies, and meats, all in a brothy bowl. You put the hard stuff on the teppan and start grilling it. After it is sufficiently grilled, you make a ring out of it and then pour the broth in the middle. The broth bubbles and congeals a little bit, and then you mix in the previously grilled stuff. It is sort of runny, sort of not runny, and you use a little spatula to scoop it up and then pop it in your mouth. Of course, none of this could be accomplished without the help of draft beer.<\/p>\n

\"Monja<\/p>\n

The ring with the broth bubbling in the middle.
\n <\/p>\n

\"Monja<\/p>\n

Monja getting mixed and almost ready to eat.
\n <\/p>\n

\"Monja<\/p>\n

One bowl prepared, and another one sitting in the queue
\n <\/p>\n

\"Monja<\/p>\n

Tomo prepares dessert. Somehow he poured the batter and spread it like a crepe. His friends were impressed. The filling is sweet red bean paste, a favorite Japanese dessert ingredient. To finish the dessert you flop the side over, roll it up and then slice it. Very good.
\n <\/p>\n

You leave the restaurant feeling very good, step outside, and realize, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Oh my God! My clothes and my hair have absorbed every smell in that restaurant.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Tomo and I went to an onsen afterwards and got the smell off our bodies. A very Japanese evening.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last weekend, while in Tokyo, Tomo and I went to \u00e6\u0153\u02c6\u00e5\u00b3\u00b6 (Tsukishima, another reference here) in Tokyo to meet up with a couple of his high school classmates for some \u00e3\u201a\u201a\u00e3\u201a\u201c\u00e3\u0081\u02dc\u00e3\u201a\u0192\u00e7\u201e\u00bc (monjayaki). That had not been our plan at all. As a matter of fact, I was hoping to go to Gonpachi, where the big … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Yummm \u00e2\u20ac\u201c monja!”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-musings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.triplefstudio.com\/yokoso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}