Eat! Kyoto! - Part I

Let me start this post with breakfast. We stayed at ryokan - traditional Japanese hotel in Kyoto for few days, breakfast was included and it was served in the room. It was relaxing to have breakfast in pajamas, but we had to wake up early as the breakfast will be served between 7am to 8.30am. The housekeeper will knock at the door half an hour prior to the chosen breakfast time to store away futon (traditional Japanese bedding).

Dishes served were almost the same each day. There were eight small dishes and fruit in the box plus miso soup, tofu hotpot, egg dish, pickled vegetable, salad and rice at the side. We were told that most of the dishes were prepared with local vegetables and products. The poached egg was beautifully done as in its shape and a slit on the egg white revealing the yolk.

When we back to our room in the afternoon, we found this ginger flavour ship cookies on the table.

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Pufferfish!! Yes, we had pufferfish (fugu) set meal for dinner as requested by T's colleague. Without him, I would never thought of trying it. There were five of us, and all of us except T tasted the pufferfish for the first time. We ordered both BBQ and steamboat set meal. Set meal comes with appetiser - boiled fish roe, salad made with pufferfish skin, sashimi, BBQ/steamboat, rice/porridge, and fruit.

Personally, I did not like pufferfish sashimi that much because of its texture. It was very chewy if compared to salmon or tuna sashimi, I put them in the steamboat instead. The fish had firm texture, it tasted like crocodile meat I had in Australia. After having the steamboat, steamed rice and lightly beaten egg were added into the soup to make porridge. The porrige tasted so good when eaten with ponzu (citrus-based soy sauce). As for the BBQ set, steamed rice mixed with tinny pieces of pufferfish cooked in sauce was served.

This pufferfish restaurant is located in the heart of city and it claimed to have the biggest pufferfish fish tank in Kyoto. If you are interested to visit there, I think T will be able to provide you with address.