KONNICHIWHAT!?: Adventures in eating

I've certainly had my fair share of interesting dining experiences in the short amount of time that I've been here in Japan. There's been some tasty traditional Japanese fair and there's been the Japanese take on some of the more familiar American style food that I'm more accustomed to. The fun part is always seeing how Japan can take a tried and true food and shape it into their own vision. I admit, I'm a sucker for this. Logan and I hit up a restaurant for the sole reason of having a "Mega Hamburger" in it's display window. Trust me, when you see this thing your American senses, relating to food at least, kick into overdrive and you can't wait to go to town on this thing. I couldn't even tell you the name of the restaurant that sold it, but who cares. This was a patty of hamburg with cheese on it, then a strip of pork, another hamburg patty with cheese, topped with a sunny-side-up egg. For good measure they decided to throw in some green beans, corn and carrots on the side, but let's be honest, they just get in the way. The waiter assumed we'd want the English menu, but when we got a hold of it, the language appeared to be English but the grammar was beyond horrid. It was a hilarious read.

A good part of my training group headed to a place called "T's Star Diner", which was fairly close to our hotel. It was designed like an old fashioned American diner and they claimed to sell American-style diner food. How could we resist such temptation!? Going in, the decor was pretty awesome I must say, regardless of how cramped it was. The menu did in fact have plenty of American style foods on offer, but one item in particular caught our eyes; The Burger of Death! It was five different hamburgers stacked on top of each other through a skewer. More than enough food for any mere mortal and to top it off, it cost 3,500 yen which is roughly $45. The only one willing to step up to such a challenge was Tommy "the Tank Engine" Turner, and step up he did! Not only did he eat every burger, including the pasta salad that came with it, but he ate all of his fries, some of my fries and a banana shake. After that, he went to the convenience store and ate two ice cream bars, a melon bread and some cookies and claimed he was still hungry. This boy, from Santa Clarita believe it or not, is a beast. There's more on him and his eating habits later. I ordered a chili dog that was by no means small and I could barely finish it. I guess that American-style pretty much translates to LARGE. This is all merely the beginning of the food quest here, but I'll be sure to post pics so you can see what you're missing (you decide if that's a good or bad thing).