I usually eat a very light lunch. Instead, I try to have a proper dinner. So when I travel, I often want a light, local-style lunch.
On this trip, too, I visited two places where Kagoshima locals eat. I’m sure some of you are far more drawn to places like these than to the nice restaurants tourists flock to.
:: Furendo Ando Bado, a Long-Established Curry and Hayashi Shop
Curry Hayashi Furendo Ando Bado(カレーハヤシ フレンドアンドバード). In English, Friend&Bird. It’s at the entrance to Meizancho, next to the park across from City Hall. You can stop by on your way to the ferry to Sakurajima, or on your way to Kagoshima City Aquarium.
While I was taking photos outside, big trucks pulled up in front of the shop for a moment and picked up takeout. So I trusted the place even before I went in. If truck drivers get their takeout here, it can’t be bad, can it?
The menu says “since 1985,” so it’s been around for at least 40 years. And word has it they used to run the shop on Tenmonkan Bunka-dori before moving here, so it may be even older. It’s fair to call it a long-established shop.
I came for curry rice, but the menu had hayashi rice too. I ordered the Katsu Hayashi(カツハヤシ), which somehow felt warm and familiar. It’s a pork cutlet on rice, with hayashi poured over it.
Hayashi doesn’t use spices the way curry does. It’s made with demi-glace sauce as the base, simmered with meat, vegetables and so on until thick. Unlike the strong spice of curry, it tastes sweet and tangy. You don’t often see it at restaurants in Korea, but Hi-rice, one of Ottogi’s 3-minute meals, comes from this hayashi.
After ordering, I looked at the table across from me. Four men who looked like regulars were all eating Spa Katsu Curry(スパカツカレー). It’s katsu curry with spaghetti instead of rice. Seeing it, I thought spaghetti instead of rice might be good too. Maybe that’s the shop’s popular dish.
950 yen. I can’t say it’s surprisingly cheap, but the Katsu Hayashi that came out was cheap enough.
It’s a really simple setup. Rice, a pork cutlet, and hayashi poured on top. The color is orange with a reddish tint.
I didn’t grow up eating hayashi rice, you know? And yet, strangely, it feels like a nostalgic food that reminds me of my childhood.
It’s a curious dish. Hayashi rice, I mean.
There’s quite a lot of rice. And with every spoonful, I was impressed.
It was so good.
Maybe it was the atmosphere of the shop. Maybe it was because the big guys at the next table were eating so happily. Maybe it was because the master and his wife were working so hard on the food, or maybe because I like the city of Kagoshima so much.
Hayashi rice can’t have been that good, you know? But strangely, my travel notes say, “Hayashi rice is really good!!!!! It’s good! Good!!!”
What made this hayashi rice so good?
:: Torimu, Lunch for Office Workers
I’ve mentioned before that there’s a place called Nakachika Gourmet Town(なかちかグルメタウン) in the basement of the Kagoshima Chuo Building, at the edge of Tenmonkan, right? In that very arcade is Oshokuji to Sakedokoro Torimu(お食事と酒処 鳥夢).
It means “Torimu, a place for food and drinks,” so you can just call it Torimu for short.
With big buildings and companies clustered nearby, this arcade gets crowded with office workers at lunchtime. And the reason I came to Torimu in particular was the lunch set meal.
I arrived a little after noon on a weekday. The shop filled up right as I sat down, and after that, many customers just had to turn back.
It’s clearly a popular spot with office workers.
There’s a set meal of the day that changes every day. You can choose one of four, and it’s 1,000 yen. Very cheap, right? 1,000 yen.
Looking at today’s menu, there were four kinds: gyuniku menchi katsu (minced beef, fried) and aji fry (fried horse mackerel), gyuniku menchi katsu and chicken karaage, gyuniku menchi katsu and mix fry (assorted fried things), and aji fry and mix fry.
I didn’t really feel like beef that day, so I ordered the last one, aji fry and mix fry. When I travel in Japan, I always make sure to eat horse mackerel.
It’s a simple, modest, yet generous spread. Rice, miso soup, tsukemono (pickled vegetables) and harusame (glass noodle) salad. And in the middle, cabbage and a pile of fried things, the stars of today’s set meal.
To be honest, the mix fry wasn’t anything special. But the aji fry (fried horse mackerel) was so good, and eating it with the generous white rice and miso soup felt like a home-cooked meal. A bite of tsukemono now and then resets the mood in your mouth. Then the combo starts again: fried food, rice, miso soup.
You can’t have only “special meals” every time you travel. Cost is one thing, but it’s also no fun, and you get tired of the taste. So I slip in ordinary local meals like this now and then. And sometimes these meals actually become more special.
The meal here at Torimu was like that too. It may not have been a particularly delicious meal, but it was a very satisfying one. In that sense, I think it’s a place I can recommend to you too.
