So yea, this is how we are starting our day, going to lunch at Coco Ichibanya lol. We had originally planned this day to be “Kyoto day 2” where we do a second day trip to Kyoto and check out the western side of the city and see stuff like bamboo grove and tenryuji temple and some nice funny stone statues but alas we decided to diverge from our plans because damn, we were still too tired from yesterday. So we just stayed back in Osaka and explored the city more and revisited some other places, which is cool.
It is surprising that we hadn’t tried Coco yet until this late into our trip but here we are. Ordering probably way more food and toppings on our curry than is probably normally for a lunch. I ordered a special panko bread pork cutlet, addons for an additional chicken cutlet and sausages. When it came it was more than I was expecting, shit. Probably shouldn’t have ordered the sausage and the rice upgrade from 300g to 350g. Nevertheless, I ate all of this shit, same for my sister who ordered similar but less toppings. I had spice level 5, it was spicy, but not overwhelming at all, completely manageable by my standards. Overall I would say that Coco is pretty good, overall the best curry chain around, although I am mainly just comparing it to Go Go Curry which is still good and has it’s place, but if your looking for a solid Japanese Curry experience, Coco is where it’s at. They even have tablets now to order digitally and in English, making it even more accessible than ever.
After walking around feeling heavy from the curry, we walked and made our way to the Sennichimae Doguyasuji Shopping Street nearby which is known for kitchenware stuff and knives/cookware.
Not to busy on a Tuesday afternoon but that’s a good thing because now you can navigate into the stores with little crowds and take your time.
The general vibe of the area is that it’s mainly for local people but only recently became a small tourist spot with some foreigners here and there and some shopkeepers speaking English, which is good. But then again, it just may be that more people in Osaka can speak decent English than other places in Japan.
A lot of the shopping districts Cris-cross into other shopping streets and I think this one was heading into Kuromon Food street I think. This out of nowhere Takoyaki place with no visible English signage had a sizable line up which I can only assume is popular with locals.
We ended up back at Dotonbori in the afternoon and it looks very different than at night. While a different experience, Dotonbori is definitely a place best visited at night once lit up. In the backdrop is the famous bait Ichiran Ramen, we didn’t go since it’s overrated. Apparently they opened a meat-less Ichiran Ramen nearby, I am assuming for vegans and those who cannot eat pork/meat for reason. I wonder what kind of ingredients they use for their broth.
Crane games are everywhere, and that means you can win stuff anywhere. My sister won this nice ebi tempura plush in only 2 tries on the crane. It was jokes because a guy besides her was playing the same game with the same prize and he had been there for awhile trying for the same prize. After he saw my sister win in only 2 tries, his spirit was ruined and gave up and walked away in shame. lol.
This famous osaka drummer clown guy taro something has tons of merch and products made. Funny how it still remains a iconic thing for so long even tho it’s so tacky and jokes.
For our last dinner in Osaka we decided that we needed to have okonomiyaki and we choose this place that was highly rated in Dontonburi called Chibo, which is a popular chain all around Japan. These two guys where asking people in line what they intended to order in advance. It was interesting how the guy on the left was another brown guy working in Japan, apparently like his first day of working as the guy on the right was teaching him in English how to operate the order taking machine. Hmm.
After a 40 minute wait to get seated and a few more minutes waiting for them to bring us our orders, our okonomiyaki came! Noice. Looks good. Mine has the egg and green onion, although we both shared some of each. It was very different than other okonomiyaki I’ve had and or made at home, very fluffy and soft, almost pancake omelette like, I could hardly tell if there was any cabbage in the batter but I’m sure it was there. Good shit.
After finishing off our meal we went outside and saw that the line to get into Chibo has extended to another queue line. Wow. I mean, it’s a chain restaurant but being located in dontonburi just boosts it that traffic like no other. Wow.
My diarrhea is being ‘controlled’ pretty good now thanks to the drugs my sister brought yesterday although when I still do a number 2, it’s still pretty bad, hope it gets better before I get back.
With that ends more or less our time in Osaka/Kansai region, which honestly has been pretty good. Tomorrow we are going to head back to Tokyo for the last few days of our trip so hopefully everything goes smoothly on the shinkansen unlike the first time.
Hope we survive.