PHOTOS: JAPANESE CUISINE
PHOTOS: PEOPLE OF JAPAN
PHOTOS: NATURAL BEAUTY OF JAPAN
This morning was our last day in Tokyo. We toured some Japanese retailers and supermarkets and then took our last domestic plane ride up to Aomori at the north end of the Main Island near Hokkaido where the scallop farms are. Today was our easiest day which we thankfully welcomed and needed. Six days here, seven different domestic airports, five different hotels, and what we've seen and learned has been very enlightening and awe inspiring. The stores we visited today were large format supermarkets, not up to Wegmans' standards so I'm posting some of the nuggets I've learned while traveling here that don't really apply to retail but are more travel and cuisine related that I found interesting. I hope you do too.
GEOGRAPHY: Japan is made up of 4 large islands, surrounded by over 4000 smaller islands. The terrain is very mountainous with thousands of dormant volcanoes which makes less than 20% of the land suitable for habitation. There are over 1500 earthquakes a year here! (we didn't experience one). We even flew over an active volcano a few days ago, Mt. Aso on our way to Tokyo from Kagoshima. The landscape is striking outside of the cities and very beautiful. Japanese are very proud of their country and embrace all things in nature with a passion that's unmatched anywhere I've been.
CUISINE: Food is an important part of the culture here. We've eaten many dinners Kaiseki style where you sit traditionally on a tatami mat and are served many different courses. Portion control is a religion with many courses only 1 bite but they are meticulously prepared and presented, and served beautifully with formal precision. The dishware themselves and the food displayed on them are truly separate works of art. Typically we would have 30 - 34 different items each meal.
Sushi - Most of the sushi is sashimi which is fresh raw fish thinly sliced. When you eat sahimi, you never put your wasabi (ground horseradish) into your soy sauce (I've been doing this wrong for years). You spread it out individually on each slice of fish first, and then dip that into your soy sauce. The reason is that the wasabi melts and you lose some of the pungency.
PEOPLE: Japanese are some of the friendliest and most humble people I've ever met. Families are very close knit and parents are extremely attentive to their children who are very polite and respectful themselves. There is little traditional religion in Japan as we practice in the western hemisphere. Buddhism and Shinto on the most prominent one practiced, but there aren't churches or temples, mostly nature shrines where people go to pray and meditate. Many couples hold Christian weddings, but this is just so the brides can wear a traditional wedding gown and have a large party afterwards. Most of the weddings are held in large hotels that have wedding rooms right in them so that you can have your wedding and reception right there. One stop shopping! Our last night in Tokyo featured 5 weddings in our hotel.
I've attached a couple of photo links above to illustrate some of this. Hope you enjoy. Most likly this will be my last post until back in the states.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Saturday October 17, Tokyo
PHOTOS: Tsukiji Market & Uoriki Retail Store
VIDEO - Tsukiji Fish Market Tuna Auction October 17, 2009
VIDEO - Uoriki Fresh Seafood Store October 17, 2009 Tuna Demo
Today was a very exciting and educational experience! Seafood on steroids is the only way I can describe it. We woke up at 4:00 am in order to be at the Tsukiji fish market and the daily 5:00 am tuna auction. Tsukiji (pronounced Sukeegee) is the largest seafood market in the world, and like the city of Tokyo, it is ENORMOUS and full of electricty as hundreds of people race past you in all directions. It seemed there were more workers driving electric fork lifts than cars on 490 on my normal commute to work. When we arrived and I commented to our host, Masayuki Yamada how impressed I was with the number of trucks loaded and running ready to deliver, he laughed and remarked that probably twice that many had already left!
The market is housed in 3 large, semi circular buildings that are as long as 4 football fields each. 800 wholesalers have booths here, operating 5 days a week, excluding Sunday and Wednesday. The selections from what little we covered in 4 hours was very fresh, exotic and had thousands of items. There was so much fish, you could easily fill one of our stores entirely with pallets of seafood, all of which was expected to sell today!
We arrived right when the tuna auction began. This was held in the large tuan hall at 5:00 am as it has been 5 days a week for almost 100 years. Today's auction featured 600 or more Big Eye and Blue Fin tuna all lieing on the floor in neat rows based on species, size and area caught.
300 buyers roamed amongst the tuna, checking each fish for size, quality, and fat content to place bids on. They all had large canes with hooks and flashlights to move the fish around and take their notes.
The auction began and fish moved out quickly, some as fast as in 10 seconds. It was difficult to determine exactly what was happening at first. The auctioneer actually chants in a sort of sing song Japanese style, a price he is willing to start selling the fish for and then a flurry of activity begins as the buyers bid with gestures and grunts. There are 4 different auctioneers working different parts of the hall all at once. It really is fascinating to observe. As soon as a fish is sold, it's immediately tagged and carted out of the tuna hall to the prosepective buyer's stall or truck.
After the auction which only lasted about an hour and a half for all the tuna, we toured the market and saw many species we've never seen or heard of. Many didnt even have English translations. Our host, Yamada picked out about 7 selections he was going to prepare for our dinner this evening at his restaurant. I can't wait!
After our tour we met with Yoichi Imamura, Chairman of Daito Corporation which controls the Tuna Auction and is one of the top 6 seafood suppliers to the market. The market has a hierarchy structure where 6 companies control every single fish that comes in and Daito is the largest. Imamura told us that even though the market does huge volume, it is trending down in sales, about 5% per year as Japanese consumption on seafood, still very high at 77 lbs a year per capita, is losing out to more of a western style diet of chicken and beef. Still it is 5 times higher than what Americans consume.
After Tsukiji we went to the epitome of Japanese retail seafood stores, Uoriki Fresh. Our host Yamada operates this chain of 41 stores and 4 restaurants and took us to his premier shop located underneath the Ikebukuro subway station, one of the largest consumer traffic spots in all of Tokyo. Everyone we spoke with at the Tsukiji market paid homage to him and told us we were fortunate to be hosted by the best retailer of seafood in all of Japan. When we got to the store, it was easy to see the accolades were well deserved.
Japanese retailing out side of supermarkets is a bit different. Space is at a premium and for food shopping, it is like walking throug a mall with an open air food court and stands or counters for specific categories. Each counter is owned by a different company selling very focused items like a meat counter, a bakery, tea etc. The Uoriki counter here was about 2000 square feet and had 360 skus of seafood. All fresh, nothing frozen and 95% was packaged. Each package of filleted fish is beautifully presented, precisionally cut on a bias with very small portions. Service is also way over the top here. Even with 95% of the seafood being self serviced, there were 23 employees working this small stand while we were there, many of course behind the scenes cutting fish, but at least half that many on the sales floor sampling and hawking seafood. A highlight of our tour, Yamada purchased a 160 lb Blue Fin and had a master cutter fillet it in front of a group of excited customers who were in a frenzy ordering the fillets right from it being cut! I hope the video comes out!
VIDEO - Tsukiji Fish Market Tuna Auction October 17, 2009
VIDEO - Uoriki Fresh Seafood Store October 17, 2009 Tuna Demo
Today was a very exciting and educational experience! Seafood on steroids is the only way I can describe it. We woke up at 4:00 am in order to be at the Tsukiji fish market and the daily 5:00 am tuna auction. Tsukiji (pronounced Sukeegee) is the largest seafood market in the world, and like the city of Tokyo, it is ENORMOUS and full of electricty as hundreds of people race past you in all directions. It seemed there were more workers driving electric fork lifts than cars on 490 on my normal commute to work. When we arrived and I commented to our host, Masayuki Yamada how impressed I was with the number of trucks loaded and running ready to deliver, he laughed and remarked that probably twice that many had already left!
The market is housed in 3 large, semi circular buildings that are as long as 4 football fields each. 800 wholesalers have booths here, operating 5 days a week, excluding Sunday and Wednesday. The selections from what little we covered in 4 hours was very fresh, exotic and had thousands of items. There was so much fish, you could easily fill one of our stores entirely with pallets of seafood, all of which was expected to sell today!
We arrived right when the tuna auction began. This was held in the large tuan hall at 5:00 am as it has been 5 days a week for almost 100 years. Today's auction featured 600 or more Big Eye and Blue Fin tuna all lieing on the floor in neat rows based on species, size and area caught.
300 buyers roamed amongst the tuna, checking each fish for size, quality, and fat content to place bids on. They all had large canes with hooks and flashlights to move the fish around and take their notes.
The auction began and fish moved out quickly, some as fast as in 10 seconds. It was difficult to determine exactly what was happening at first. The auctioneer actually chants in a sort of sing song Japanese style, a price he is willing to start selling the fish for and then a flurry of activity begins as the buyers bid with gestures and grunts. There are 4 different auctioneers working different parts of the hall all at once. It really is fascinating to observe. As soon as a fish is sold, it's immediately tagged and carted out of the tuna hall to the prosepective buyer's stall or truck.
After the auction which only lasted about an hour and a half for all the tuna, we toured the market and saw many species we've never seen or heard of. Many didnt even have English translations. Our host, Yamada picked out about 7 selections he was going to prepare for our dinner this evening at his restaurant. I can't wait!
After our tour we met with Yoichi Imamura, Chairman of Daito Corporation which controls the Tuna Auction and is one of the top 6 seafood suppliers to the market. The market has a hierarchy structure where 6 companies control every single fish that comes in and Daito is the largest. Imamura told us that even though the market does huge volume, it is trending down in sales, about 5% per year as Japanese consumption on seafood, still very high at 77 lbs a year per capita, is losing out to more of a western style diet of chicken and beef. Still it is 5 times higher than what Americans consume.
After Tsukiji we went to the epitome of Japanese retail seafood stores, Uoriki Fresh. Our host Yamada operates this chain of 41 stores and 4 restaurants and took us to his premier shop located underneath the Ikebukuro subway station, one of the largest consumer traffic spots in all of Tokyo. Everyone we spoke with at the Tsukiji market paid homage to him and told us we were fortunate to be hosted by the best retailer of seafood in all of Japan. When we got to the store, it was easy to see the accolades were well deserved.
Japanese retailing out side of supermarkets is a bit different. Space is at a premium and for food shopping, it is like walking throug a mall with an open air food court and stands or counters for specific categories. Each counter is owned by a different company selling very focused items like a meat counter, a bakery, tea etc. The Uoriki counter here was about 2000 square feet and had 360 skus of seafood. All fresh, nothing frozen and 95% was packaged. Each package of filleted fish is beautifully presented, precisionally cut on a bias with very small portions. Service is also way over the top here. Even with 95% of the seafood being self serviced, there were 23 employees working this small stand while we were there, many of course behind the scenes cutting fish, but at least half that many on the sales floor sampling and hawking seafood. A highlight of our tour, Yamada purchased a 160 lb Blue Fin and had a master cutter fillet it in front of a group of excited customers who were in a frenzy ordering the fillets right from it being cut! I hope the video comes out!
Friday, October 16, 2009
Friday October 16, 2009 Amami Island
VIDEO- Japan Blue Fin Tuna Farm Amami, Island October 16, 2009
Wow I'm finally on Japan time! Doesn't matter too much as we only get 4 hours sleep a night if we're lucky. Every day starts around 5:00 with our schedule to see everything, and we usually end up going to bed around midnight.
We stayed in the village of Naza last night on Amami Island. It's a small village where we had a different type of dinner in a small restaurant that served basically sushi and pork. The whole place sat about 15 people and everyone gets the same thing, no ordering. The food comes out in stages, and even our hosts couldn't determine what some of the fish and vegetables we were eating. This morning we went back to the Blue Fin farm at the southern end of Amami. They were excited to show us the harvest of the tuna, but asked us not to photograph. Takayu has developed some proprietary machinery to make this process as fast and stress free as possible so I will have to explain. The Blue Fin are swimming in the ocean right up to the point that they are slaughtered so as not to get them stressed which is critical to maintain quality. From that point on, it's a race against time to get them bled out and chilled down to keep the meat as fresh and high quality as possible, and they do this with swift precision. We could only watch this for about an hour, but this took us through 18 Blue Fins from catching to storage. From there we had the 2 hour ride back to the airport and 2 flights to Tokyo and flew over Mt. Aso, an active volcano with the smoke plummet stretching up for miles. In Tokyo we met with Mitsubishi Corporation (yes the car company, but they are huge here and have many business including Tuna). They are very concerned with sustainability and are in contact with Green Peace as well.
Tomorrow brings us to the Tskiji market to the fish auction and other retail stores. It will be another early morning, being picked up at 4:30 am. I'm hoping for some great photos from there!
Wow I'm finally on Japan time! Doesn't matter too much as we only get 4 hours sleep a night if we're lucky. Every day starts around 5:00 with our schedule to see everything, and we usually end up going to bed around midnight.
We stayed in the village of Naza last night on Amami Island. It's a small village where we had a different type of dinner in a small restaurant that served basically sushi and pork. The whole place sat about 15 people and everyone gets the same thing, no ordering. The food comes out in stages, and even our hosts couldn't determine what some of the fish and vegetables we were eating. This morning we went back to the Blue Fin farm at the southern end of Amami. They were excited to show us the harvest of the tuna, but asked us not to photograph. Takayu has developed some proprietary machinery to make this process as fast and stress free as possible so I will have to explain. The Blue Fin are swimming in the ocean right up to the point that they are slaughtered so as not to get them stressed which is critical to maintain quality. From that point on, it's a race against time to get them bled out and chilled down to keep the meat as fresh and high quality as possible, and they do this with swift precision. We could only watch this for about an hour, but this took us through 18 Blue Fins from catching to storage. From there we had the 2 hour ride back to the airport and 2 flights to Tokyo and flew over Mt. Aso, an active volcano with the smoke plummet stretching up for miles. In Tokyo we met with Mitsubishi Corporation (yes the car company, but they are huge here and have many business including Tuna). They are very concerned with sustainability and are in contact with Green Peace as well.
Tomorrow brings us to the Tskiji market to the fish auction and other retail stores. It will be another early morning, being picked up at 4:30 am. I'm hoping for some great photos from there!
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Thursday October 15, 2009
PHOTOS: Japan Blue Fin Farm
Today was a long day. Got up at 5:00 to take a 2 hour ride to another airport and fly to Amami island, 300+ miles south of the main island of Japan in Kagoshima Prefecture, (which is the home of the best green sencha tea in the world!) Then another 2 hour ride down the coast line that rivals Route 1 in San Francisco, except that the road is at sea level and surounded by jungle 15 feet inland from the road for as far as you can see. The scenery and landscape is striking.
Finally at 1:00 in the afternoon we arrived at the Blue Fin Tuna farm on Amami Island and it is very impressive. They are in full production of Blue Fin, and are fully integrated. The process is very complex and labor intensive from every step. They clean the seawater and then grow phytoplankton in large tanks which will help them grow the fish stock used to feed the tuna. There are 80 pens of Blue Fin in the sea, some as close at 300 yards from shore, but 65 feet deep where the tuna are caged in a sea net and are organized by age and size. The tuna grow very fast here as the water temperature and quality is perfect for them. It's a vibrant green color that is crystal clear up to about 20 feet. Very beautiful and intense with the mountainous jungles butting up to the coastline. The other farm up north in Amokusa, Kumamoto Prefecture on the mainland works well, but the tuna are 12 months behind in the growth cycle there, even with the same diet and practices.
The comapany we are visiting, Takuyo is run by Hiroshi Yamamoto. He has been in the business for 35 years and ships 3000 tons of tuna a year throughout Japan. He has 200 employees and is very passionate about making the farm work to be sustainable. They are in full production of farm raised Blue Fin, which looks very promising. The pens are all full, and the tuna range from just over 1 pound up to 160+ pounds. It takes 3 years before they are harvested and ready for market. Up to now, all fish have been raised from wild caught babies. They are on the first set of fish hatched from eggs 6 months ago. It has taken 5 years for them to be able to get the hatched tuna to survive and the aggressive use of technology in the pens and in the feed have helped this.
Hatched tuna are still 2 and a half years away from being harvested, and this is still a research test in progress but it looks very promising for the sustainability of the species.
We're going back to the farm in about an hour to see a harvest and to taste some farmed blue fin. From there another 2 flights back to Tokyo and the Tskukji (pronounced Skeegee) fish market and auction 4:30 am Saturday. NO SLEEP AGAIN!
Here is a brief slide show of the tuna farm and the landscape in Amami. I have some great videos, but it takes too long to upload them and I will post them when back in the states next week. Stay Tuned for more, Domo Arigato!
PHOTOS: Japan Blue Fin Farm
Today was a long day. Got up at 5:00 to take a 2 hour ride to another airport and fly to Amami island, 300+ miles south of the main island of Japan in Kagoshima Prefecture, (which is the home of the best green sencha tea in the world!) Then another 2 hour ride down the coast line that rivals Route 1 in San Francisco, except that the road is at sea level and surounded by jungle 15 feet inland from the road for as far as you can see. The scenery and landscape is striking.
Finally at 1:00 in the afternoon we arrived at the Blue Fin Tuna farm on Amami Island and it is very impressive. They are in full production of Blue Fin, and are fully integrated. The process is very complex and labor intensive from every step. They clean the seawater and then grow phytoplankton in large tanks which will help them grow the fish stock used to feed the tuna. There are 80 pens of Blue Fin in the sea, some as close at 300 yards from shore, but 65 feet deep where the tuna are caged in a sea net and are organized by age and size. The tuna grow very fast here as the water temperature and quality is perfect for them. It's a vibrant green color that is crystal clear up to about 20 feet. Very beautiful and intense with the mountainous jungles butting up to the coastline. The other farm up north in Amokusa, Kumamoto Prefecture on the mainland works well, but the tuna are 12 months behind in the growth cycle there, even with the same diet and practices.
The comapany we are visiting, Takuyo is run by Hiroshi Yamamoto. He has been in the business for 35 years and ships 3000 tons of tuna a year throughout Japan. He has 200 employees and is very passionate about making the farm work to be sustainable. They are in full production of farm raised Blue Fin, which looks very promising. The pens are all full, and the tuna range from just over 1 pound up to 160+ pounds. It takes 3 years before they are harvested and ready for market. Up to now, all fish have been raised from wild caught babies. They are on the first set of fish hatched from eggs 6 months ago. It has taken 5 years for them to be able to get the hatched tuna to survive and the aggressive use of technology in the pens and in the feed have helped this.
Hatched tuna are still 2 and a half years away from being harvested, and this is still a research test in progress but it looks very promising for the sustainability of the species.
We're going back to the farm in about an hour to see a harvest and to taste some farmed blue fin. From there another 2 flights back to Tokyo and the Tskukji (pronounced Skeegee) fish market and auction 4:30 am Saturday. NO SLEEP AGAIN!
Here is a brief slide show of the tuna farm and the landscape in Amami. I have some great videos, but it takes too long to upload them and I will post them when back in the states next week. Stay Tuned for more, Domo Arigato!
PHOTOS: Japan Blue Fin Farm
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Land Of The Rising Sun!
After 34 hours we made it to our first destination. 6200 miles, 5 airports and a 2 hour car ride later wer made it to Amokusa, Japan in the Kumamot0 Prefecture (Prefectures are states in Japan like New York, Pennsylvania, etc.,). A long way to come but the country is beautifully spectacular. I never knew Japan was formed on a line of volcanoes, and the landscape is quite evident of this. We drove through at leasrt 60 tunnels in our trip from Kumamaoto to the Blue Fin Tuna farms in the sea of Japan in Amokusa. While there we went out on boats to the actual holding pens of Red Sea Bream (very popular in Japanese sushi) and Blue Fin Tuna (The highest quality and most exxpensive tuna in the world and not sustainable when caught in the wild so Wegmans doesn't carry this).
Pictures are difficult to load, but hopefully I'll have them up tomorrow. I'm 13 hours ahead of you whoevevr is reading this, and the internet works very slow to upload photos and videos but hopefuly I'll have some tomorrow.
Pictures are difficult to load, but hopefully I'll have them up tomorrow. I'm 13 hours ahead of you whoevevr is reading this, and the internet works very slow to upload photos and videos but hopefuly I'll have some tomorrow.
Monday, October 5, 2009
The Swordfish Lands!
See photos from this adventure Barnegat Light Photos
Sunday October 4, 2009 Barnegat Light, New Jersey
Cole and I arrived in Barnegat Light on the Jersey Shore waiting for the fishing vessel Frances Anne to come into port. The boat and crew, captained by Chris "Chummer" Kleme were featured on the new Discovery Channel series, Swords - Life on the Line. They have been out at sea for the past 10 days on the Georgia's Banks, 350 miles off shore and some of the richest fishing grounds in the world for swordfish and tuna.
The boat came into port around 1:00 pm with an incredible catch of almost 24,000 lbs of fish! So much was caught, that they actually had to ice the swords down and keep them on top of the deck in the bow. A film crew from the Discovery Channel was filming the entire trip for next year's season of Swords - Life on the Line which will air sometime in August. Cole and I watched them unload and grade the catch for 2 hours. All of the swordfish were pristine, and graded red and red up which is the best quality you can get. We selected 8 swordfish from the top of the catch ranging from 80 - 120 lbs for 8 of the New Jersey Wegmans stores. The top of the catch are the most desirable, as these were the last fish that were caught, most likley on the last day of fishing which means they are the freshest. From here, it's less than 24 hours before they are in the stores and ready for customers to buy!
Cole and I arrived in Barnegat Light on the Jersey Shore waiting for the fishing vessel Frances Anne to come into port. The boat and crew, captained by Chris "Chummer" Kleme were featured on the new Discovery Channel series, Swords - Life on the Line. They have been out at sea for the past 10 days on the Georgia's Banks, 350 miles off shore and some of the richest fishing grounds in the world for swordfish and tuna.
The boat came into port around 1:00 pm with an incredible catch of almost 24,000 lbs of fish! So much was caught, that they actually had to ice the swords down and keep them on top of the deck in the bow. A film crew from the Discovery Channel was filming the entire trip for next year's season of Swords - Life on the Line which will air sometime in August. Cole and I watched them unload and grade the catch for 2 hours. All of the swordfish were pristine, and graded red and red up which is the best quality you can get. We selected 8 swordfish from the top of the catch ranging from 80 - 120 lbs for 8 of the New Jersey Wegmans stores. The top of the catch are the most desirable, as these were the last fish that were caught, most likley on the last day of fishing which means they are the freshest. From here, it's less than 24 hours before they are in the stores and ready for customers to buy!
Saturday, October 3, 2009
Gone Fishin'
I'm heading off to the Jersey Shore with Cole today. We are meeting the Fishing Vessel Frances Anne in Barnegat Light. They are coming in from the Georgia's Banks and have upwards of 20,000 lbs of fresh swordfish and tuna. This is the boat and crew featured on the Discovery Channel's new hit show, Swords - Life On The Line. I'll be hand selecting some big fish for our NJ stores as soon as it lands tomorrow morning.
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