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- A Real Taste of Local Life in Tokyo: Asagaya Pearl Center
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Experience the Neighborhood Culture in Tokyo: Mingle with the Locals at Asagaya Pearl Center
- ASAGAYA
- TOKYO
- DINING
- SHOPPING
- SIGHTSEEING
- SPECIAL
- NEIGHBORHOOD_CULTURE
- REAL_LOCAL_LIFE
- SHOPPING_ARCADE
- SOUVENIRS
- STREET_FOOD
Asagaya Pearl Center is located in the residential neighborhood of Asagaya in the Suginami prefecture. It is a shotengai, which is Japanese for shopping arcade.
About 700 meters long, it starts from right outside the South Exit of JR Asagaya Station.
If you want to get a taste of Tokyo's real local life, Asagaya Pearl Center is what you are looking for. It hosts a wide range of shops to satisfy the locals' every need; restaurants, cafes, supermarkets, butchers, clothing shops, sweets shops, street food vendors and all kinds of everyday goods stores. Here you will find authentic souvenir shops run by locals, selling a wide array original goods.
With its beautiful glass ceiling, this shopping street is bright and welcoming. A few conventional chains are present, but they do a good job blending in with the local atmosphere of the many mom-and-pop stores.
Taiyaki Tomoean | たいやき ともえ庵
If you're a street food lover you surely can't pass on this popular stand. It sells taiyaki, sweet cakes filled with red azuki beans and shaped like a fish. Tomoean uses an unusual technique in which the cakes are baked one by one in a singular mold, as opposed to a bigger mold that can fit many at a time. The skin is thin and crunchy on the edges and the cakes contain a very, very generous amount of filling.
The current special is lemon taiyaki! Using lemons from Hiroshima, they boil the peel and mix it with the azuki beans obtaining a sweet-sour filling that by itself makes Asagaya worth the trip.
From top to bottom: regular taiyaki (150 yen) and lemon taiyaki (350 yen).
Better hurry up: the lemon taiyaki is only available until April 9th!
Information
Taiyaki Tomoean | たいやき ともえ庵
Hours: 11:00am-8:00pm
Closed on Monday
Website (Japanese-only): http://www.tomoean.net/
Inageya | 稲毛屋
If we're talking about eating and walking, we can hardly leave out the king of Japanese street food: yakitori. These meat and vegetable skewers are carefully prepared and neatly stacked at the front of Inageya. The delicious smell caught us from a distance and we just had to stop here.
From right to left, we tried chicken with sweet sauce (125 yen), chicken with leek (145 yen), and Inageya's original chicken tenderloin with bell pepper (185 yen).
The tenderloin and bell pepper yakitori was the tastiest of all!
Information
Inageya | 稲毛屋
Storefront hours: 11:00am-8:00pm
Restaurant hours: 11:30am-2:30pm (last order at 2:00pm), 5:00pm-8:30pm (last order at 8:00pm)
Closed on Wednesday
Kamajyuu Kamabokoten | 蒲重かまぼこ店
Established in 1936, this shop specializes in kamaboko, which is food made with fish paste. The cheerful man serving us was chatty and restless, hustling around and making sure that everybody was served.
Kamajyuu Kamabokoten also sells oden, a kind of hot pot dish. Unlike most shops that only sell oden in winter, this shop makes it all year.
The pride of Kamajyuu Kamabokoten is satsuma-age, a fried fish cake. They come in many variations and flavors; you can get them to take out and enjoy at home. Most of them are only 90 yen a piece!
I tried this tasty combination of three flavors: plain, shrimp and gobou (burdock root). They paired really well with some of the yuzukosho paste that I described in my previous article about yuzu.
Information
Kamajyuu Kamabokoten | 蒲重かまぼこ店
Hours: 9:00am-7:30pm
Closed on Wednesday
The Shopping Arcade
In many of the shops you will find traditional Japanese sweets and snacks. They often come in beautiful, season-themed packaging and colors. This picture was taken in March so the dominating color is pink, reminiscent of the cherry blossoms that are about to bloom all over Tokyo.
Arare is a crunchy treat made with rice. It is typically sold during Hina-matsuri or Girl's day, celebrated on March 3rd.
The many grocery stores and food shops will give you an insight of the Japanese everyday life. I wonder how many amazing dishes can be made using this dried fish!
The food markets spill out into the street and are always alive with the cries of the merchants and the chatter of the locals.
If you'd like to take a little break Japanese style, nothing can beat a cup of green tea and a bowl of anmitsu at one of the cafes that can be found along the street.
Pearl Center is lined with stores where you can find a wide variety of clothing, including kimono, and accessories. A branch of the popular second-hand clothing shop, Mode Off, can also be found here.
If you are the crafty type or are just looking for a special souvenir, there are also little independent shops selling all kinds of fabrics and paper goods.
Wandering around the shops is relaxing and fun, and you never know what kind of unique bargain you will find.
Compared with the busier parts of Tokyo, there seems to be a lot more interaction between the shopkeepers and the locals here. Vendors are friendly and everybody finds time for a chat.
At a certain point the shopping arcade splits into two open air streets. There is a kind of homey, nostalgic feel to these streets. Pretty, quiet and residential, they'll make you forget that you are in the middle of a metropolis.
About Asagaya
Asagaya is just 8 minutes away from Shinjuku on the JR Chuo and Sobu Lines, which run through the city connecting many important districts. Despite being so well connected and close to central Tokyo, Asagaya is not a big tourist spot, and retains all the atmosphere of a residential area.
Asagaya is mostly famous for the Tanabata Festival in early August. The festival is held inside the Pearl Center shopping arcade, where huge papier-mâché puppets are exhibited along the street by the shop owners.
The neighborhood is also home of the annual Asagaya Jazz Streets festival in October. During the event many jazz performers play in various bars and clubs in the area, and street performances are also held in the shopping arcade.
If you long for a break from the metropolis, spend a day in Asagaya! While restoring the peacefulness of mind you can also get an insight of Tokyo's everyday life and taste some delicious food!
About the author
Laura is an Italian living and working in Tokyo. She loves exploring hidden and unknown places, taking pictures and listening to Punk Rock music. When she’s not busy doing the above, she might enjoy a craft beer or play the sanshin (an Okinawan instrument similar to a shamisen).
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THIS ARTICLE IS BASED ON INFORMATION FROM 04 10,2017 Author:DiGJAPAN! Editorial Team
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