Kyoto Restaurant ‘Hatakaku’ – Botan Nabe (Wild Boar Hotpot)

Botan Nabe, or wild boar nabe ‘hotpot’, is a dish commonly found in cold, rural, mountainous regions of Japan today. It may surprise you to learn, however, that it was in fact invented in Kyoto by the founder of Hatakaku, a restaurant founded nearly 100 years ago, located just north of the Imperial Palace. Botan Nabe I have been meaning to introduce this restaurant and this special dish to winter visitors to Kyoto for some time, but was lacking the photographs to do this beautiful and delicious cuisine justice. The other day, however, Kyoto photographer, Kosuke Okuda and I went to Hatakaku and…

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Mamezen Soba: Kyoto-style Dashi Soymilk Ramen

Mamezen is another Kyoto culinary treasure and if you are into noodles and, or soymilk dishes, you should definitely put Mamezen on your list of places to ‘foodie’ when you visit Kyoto. Mamezen serves ramen in a unique soymilk broth: Mamezen Soba. I like the ‘omakase set’ which is soymilk ramen and yuba donburi ricebowl. Mamezen Soba: Soymilk Ramen Mamezen is the creation of a young Kyoto chef named Minoru Yonegawa. His family owns a very nice yudofu (simmered tofu hotpot) restaurant in Kyoto called Toka. Toka make their yudofu in a soymilk-based broth, which is very unusual, creating a very ‘Kyoto’ luxurious and rich broth with which to simmer your tofu in. Chef Yonegawa worked at his family’s…

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