Otani Noodle

 Steve, Marie, and I went to Otani Noodle in University Circle this past Wednesday.  Otani has a couple of Japanese restaurants on the east side that serve sushi and the works.   I've seen them at the Cleveland Asian Festival too.   This hip little place specializes in ramen, and I can honestly say that it is the best I've had in the city to date.   They just opened this week.  Pictured above is the shrimp tempura ramen that I ordered.

The tempura was well done, crispy at the tail.  The servers were careful to not saturate all of the shrimp.   There are some mushrooms and broccoli in there too.   What amazed me was the broth.  It was savory and only a bit salty.   I am definitely going to go back.  

Ninja City

Last Friday we finally had dinner at Ninja City.  It's a neat Japanese fusion place not far from University Hospital and the museums nearby.   They have various types of ramen, small plates, and steamed buns.   

I had the Bacon and Egg ramen.  It was tasty, but I'm not a huge fan of kimchi.  It made it more spicy.   It was still good.

Steve had the Shrimp Nachos.  It had these crispy wonton pieces with loads of toppings.  You can get bacon guacamole on the side for two dollars.  It really isn't needed because the nachos are flavorful enough.

Again, we didn't have room for dessert.   They recommended the fried ice cream.  Maybe next time.

Belle's Bread

We were in Columbus yesterday and decided to check out Belle's Bread.  When I lived in the area, it was a smaller Japanese bakery that had melon soda and curry bread.   This place is much larger with a full lunch service available.  I was not disappointed.  It has many foods pictured in anime and visual novels.

I had a melon sodal float.   Wonderfully delicious.

Steve had a Calpico float.   Not as flashy as my melon soda but still tasty.

This is a ham and cheese sandwich.   It comes crustless with lettuce and mayo inside in perfect proportions.   I saved half of mine for later.

I also got to try this avocado and tuna sandwich.  I like avocado but wasn't wild about the tuna salad.   

This was Steve's coffee pudding.   Two different layers of creamy goodness.

I went with the mille feuille, which is another name for a neopolitan.   It was ever so decadant.   I really look forward to being in Columbus next to try their lunch menu.

Try The World: Japan

Hi everyone!   I know it's been a while, but our new Try the World Box arrived and we finally had time to eat some of its contents!  This time, the country is Japan.  Admittedly, it's a little less exotic for us because we are already familiar with many foods from Japan.   Still, it's worth the purchase price.

I love the packaging of the boxes.  It's like getting a present.

The playlist for this box was already up and running on Spotify.   Nice mix of modern music and traditional melodies.

The first item, okonomiyaki flour!   I've made it a few times with standard flour, but this was a real treat.

Steve and I buy these gummy candies regularly.   Yummy!

Ginger paste.  I'm not sure what I'm going to do with this.  I usually toss out the ginger when I have sushi.

Soba noodles.   I'll probably go and purchase some cold dipping sauce for these.

Seasoned seaweed snack.  This will go nicely on its own or with some rice.

These are soft caramels.  I've never had these before.

Lastly, blueberry matcha tea.   This dissolves completely in hot water.  This will be different.

We decided to have the okonomiyaki.   Here are the instructions in the packet:

It comes with tempura crunchies, seaweed garnish, and the flour and yam paste.

I forgot to buy the scallions, but the recipe still turned out delicious.   We used bacon and mushrooms as our toppings and garnished with spicy mayo and hoisin sauce.   Next time, I'l going to purchase soup stock, standard Japanese mayo, and okonomiyaki sauce.

The instructions ask for a pan with a lid.  Fortunately, we have one.

This is the finished product:

It's not that difficult and very delicious.  Infinitely customizable, a Japanese pizza as it's often called.

Noodlecat and DeliverMeFood.com

I had been wanting  a bowl of ramen since early this morning.   Specifically, I wanted to try one of the ramens from Noodlecat, but I didn't feel like driving downtown, paying for parking, and waiting at the restaurant.  Enter DeliverMeFood.com.   I went to their website, selected what I wanted from the restaurant, picked a time for delivery, and my food arrived right on time.   It was convenient, and not too pricey considering all I got.

I ordered the Mazemen Ramen, with parmesan, rice, dashi, garlic, tempura egg & spinach.   It arrived with the noodles and spinach in one container and my tempura egg and crispy bits in a smaller container.

Please note that this ramen doesn't have broth in the description.   I liked it.  Cheesy noodle goodness with a yummy tempura egg.  The inside was medium,  so not entirely runny.

I also decided to order the Japanese Chopped Salad.  It has iceberg lettuce, choi, tofu ranch dressing, a soy braised egg, bacon, avocado, smoked tofu, and crispy ramen noodles.  I really liked the soy braised egg.  It was very savory.

I'm having leftovers for lunch tomorrow!  I'm going to call this two meals.

Arashi Japan

After our show today, we went out to Arashi Japan.  I was really craving a bowl of ramen.  The owners of the restaurant had a place closer to our home called Sakura, but changed locations a couple of years ago.  I don't get to go there as often as I'd like, but it's definitely one of my favorite Japanese restaurants.

We had some Alaska rolls as an appetizer.

The meal came with salad and soup.  This is the house salad.  We chose the onion soup, which was quite tasty.  I forgot to take a picture of it.

I liked my spicy shrimp ramen, but I accidentally deleted the picture.  The restaurant was nice enough to split it into two bowls for us. We even had some for leftovers.

Steve had the shrimp hibachi.  The fun part is watching them prepare it (pictured at the top of this post).  They do this cool flaming onion volcano trick.  It's all very theatrical.  It comes with vegetables and rice, and a shrimp appetizer, which just happens to be the hibachi shrimp we ordered.   In other words, this dish was finished cooking when the other people were just getting their appetizers. 

All of this food was really easy to share.  If we had wanted to, we could have added additional vegetables and rice to Steve's meal for an additional 4 dollars splitting charge.   It was a fun night!

Benihana

Today we went out to Benihana with family.  We had never gone before.  Admittedly, sushi is one of my favorite things to eat.   My husband was also curious about the chain because it was heavily mentioned in Chuck, the television series.  Apparently, one of the main characters has a dream to be a chef at Benihana's.  We saw it at the mall, and we just had to go.

We just happened to arrive during Happy Hour.  I thought Happy Hour only happened on weekdays.  The rolls we ordered were about half price due to the Happy Hour specials. 

The picture above is a Dragon Roll.

Here are some California Rolls.

The tray above is a Rainbow Roll.  The other one is the Crunchy Shrimp Roll.

I also ordered a Salmon Hand Roll.

The prices were extremely reasonable.  I highly recommend going during Happy Hour, which goes until 5 pm on Saturday.