Tsuruhashi Korean BBQ

If you thought food in Japan was all about wimpy vegetables, raw fish, and noodles, you’re wrong! Bring on the beef!

In Tsuruhashi in Osaka (also in Shin-Okubo in Tokyo, as in the earlier post about ultra spicy Korean Nabe) you can get lots of authentic Korean food. Especially, Korean BBQ (焼き肉 - やきにく). Korean BBQ is basically BBQ’d beef… There is nothing about it that should fail to appease a traditionally Western meat-eater appetite. Get your meat fix here. Tsuruhashi station, literally, I’m not exaggerating here, literally smells like Korean BBQ as soon as you step off the train. Nearly the entire area around the station is filled with Korean food shops run by Koreans living in Japan.

Good stuff.

The selection of meats however is a bit more… 豊 (yutaka) than what most Westerns may be able to… stomach… however. There are many internal organs regularly eaten, such as liver, stomach, and tongue to name a few. Personally I tend to stay away from the internal organ （ホルモン）area, except for tongue, which is actually pretty good. In fact, cow tongue (牛タン - ぎゅうたん）is also famous in Sendai Japan.

All of the Korean BBQ places I have been to are do-it-yourself. You order the meat, and it comes to you raw and seasoned. You can cook the meat yourself on the grill at your table. It’s a little busy, as you always have to keep pace and make sure you don’t burn anything, or that the grill doesn’t suddenly become empty, but it’s a lot of fun!

There is also an interesting Korean drink called Makkoli that you can try in Tsuruhashi. Read about it at the wikipedia link, but basically it’s a type of rice based alcohol, milky in color.

Food. Why is every other post I do about food?

- Harvey