We all know Japan, right? Honshu, Kyushu, Hokkaido, Shikoku. Samurai, haiku, kabuki, cherry blossom. Anime, pachinko and the undisputed pinaccle of human culture, Takeshi’s Castle (1986). Of course given this blog is about food perhaps my list of clichés should have been sushi, miso and katsu. And I should have littered the post with lucky cats and pictures of The Great Wave off Kanagawa just to be extra subtle.

In all seriousness I do find Japanese food particularly interesting, particularly at this phase of our round the world trip, as there is so much less bleeding together of cuisines here than is usual.