Hi! We are Ami and Nanaka.
For our blog post, we want to introduce one of the hot spots in Tokyo, which is Shin-Okubo.
Shin-Okubo is a very popular place especially among teenagers.
Previously,Shin-Okubo was still a popular place but mainly among K-pop fans.
Nowadays,more people come to visit this place because many new restaurants and food stands that serve trending Korean foods are opening one after another.
One of the famous ‘foodie Instagram account’ in Japan “りょうくんグルメ (Ryo-kun gourmet)” introduces the trends gourmet inTokyo, and there are many Shin-Okubo foods in his posts. His followers come visit the same shops to eat those trending foods.
(↑Some of his Instagram posts, including the foods in Shin-Okubo)
We are going to introduce the menus and restaurants that we recommend to visit and eat in Shin-Okubo based on where we actually visited in the past.
〜Hot&Spicy!! Typical Korean foods〜
- Yangnyeom Chicken (written by Nanaka)
Yangnyeom Chicken is Korean style seasoned chicken. It is fried and smothered in a sweet and spicy gochujaang (fermented chili paste) based sauce. Almost all the restaurants, we can choose the flavor and its honess. The picture down below is chicken I ate at Kanghodong restaurant. It was so tasty and we can eat at a very reasonable price. (about 3000yen for 2〜3 people.)
Yangnyeom chicken goes greatly with the cheese as well. The second picture is chicken with full of cheese. Chickens are dipped in melted cheese and sprinkled over it. Cheese relieve the hotness of Chicken and make the taste more delicious.
- Samgyeopsal (written by Ami)
Samgyeopsal is a very popular Korean cuisine. Samgyeopsal(삼겹살) means ‘pork belly meat’ in Korean. Thick slices of pork belly meat are grilled on the iron plate which is set on the diner’s table. It is usually seasoned only with salt, and also Kimchi and garlic slices are heated on the side of the plate with it. After the slices are grilled, waiter will cut the slices into small pieces with scissors. Sauces, Celtuce(Korean lettuce) leaves, and spicy green onion salad are usually served with. There are two types of sauces; sesame oil with salt and Ssamjang(spicy miso) so that we can dip the meat and change the taste. Celtuce leaves are for wrapping the meat. In most of the restaurants, we can have a refill of Celtuce leaves for free.
Since it is a popular menu, you can find Samgyeopsal in most of the Korean restaurants in Shin-Okubo. Samgyeopsal can be ordered for 2 or more people and its average price is about 3000yen (for 2 people).
I recommend the restaurant “Ton-chan”. There are several buildings of “Ton-chan” in Shin-Okubo so every restaurant is not very crowded. I like to order the ‘Kimchi fried rice’ after Samgyeopsal. The staff will cook us a delicious fried rice on the iron plate using the remaining meat oil and pieces of grilled meat.
〜Especially for Cheeseaholic〜
- Cheese hot dog (Nanaka)
Cheese hot dog is Korean style hot dog which wrapped in a thick dough and deep fried. You can try to sparkle with sugar, coconut powder, ketchup,honey mustard and so one. It tastes sweet but salty, works extremely well. You might expect that sausage inside of it, Korean Cheese hot dog is not more than just a sausage. The most popular one contains mozzarella cheese inside. This combination is unexpectedly good and so delicious.
Since the mozzarella cheese inside of a Cheese hot dog, it is popular to challenge how much you can stretch melted cheese and take pictures. The picture is me trying to stretch it!!
You can usually buy it at the street shops in Shin-Okubo. I would recommend Ariranghotdog where is the head street shop of Cheese hot dog.
4. Shrimp cheese fondue (Ami)
“Hongdae Pocha” is the restaurant in Shin-Okubo, famous for serving shrimp cheese fondue.
In my opinion, this is the best food in Shin-Okubo! I really like this shrimp cheese fondue so that I went to this place for 5 times in this year.
This is the video I took in the restaurant. The waiter uses gas burner to melt the cheese in the iron plate. Spicy sweet chili sauce, pieces of white bread, vegeyable sticks are served with shrimps to eat with.
It goes great with Korean alcoholic drinks, Chamisul Soju or Makgeolli.
〜Unique Rice Dishes〜
5.Korean yukhoe sushi (Nanaka)
Korean yukhoe sushi is korean style sushi typically found in Shin-Okubo. It is sushi rice topped with raw beef called yukhoe. There are a lot of sauces and toppings you can choose and it has quite different tastes depending on the restaurant.
My recommendation is restaurant “Pallet 46”. They serve 50 cm long yukhoe sushi which is very photogenic. There are about 20000 photos on Instagram. This is the restaurant where Ami and I went together. It was so delicious and addictive if you eat once. Also, it is not expensive that you can eat only 2780 yen for this long sushi. I would recommend to choose two different tastes and share with a friend.
6.Korean volcano fried rice(Ami)
Korean volcano fried rice is a kimchi fried rice (Kimchi bokkeumbap) with a fried egg and cheese on a iron plate.
You can eat this at the restaurant “Monnan Gamja”. It is very hot on the heated iron plate and the cheese on the bottom is melting.
Kimchi fried rice is spicy but eating with egg and cheese makes the taste mild and less spicy.
It costs around 1000yen for a single person.
〜Cute&Trending Sweets〜
7.Patbingsu (Nanaka)
Patbingsu is popular Korean shaved ice dessert. Usually, there are a lot of toppings such as fruits, condensed milk, Kinako, whipped cream and so on. In Japanese, it is almost the same as Kakogori. Patbingsu is so sweet but delicious and almost addictive!!
I would recommend 2D cafe for the Patbings. This cafe is very new, opened in August 2019. This is a concept cafe that the world of 2D. It looks like everything is made out of paper, which is very photogenic and instagrammable.
This cafe is designed monochro, so the colorful Patbingsu looks great in the picture.
This cafe is famous for many patbingsu and tapioca drinks. The price of patbingsu is about 1250 yen and Tapioca costs about 500 yen. The ice of patbingsu is made of iced milk, so it tastes sweet and really creamy. It goes with fruits very well. You should try them!
8.Oreo churros (Ami)
In Korea, there are many food stands that serves this sweet. You can able to order exactly the same one in Shin-Okubo, too!
You can buy this Oreo churros in the shop “Snowy Village”. The price is 480yen for 1 cup.
Oreo-taste churros is served with sweet cream that contains cookie powder. It is very sweet and yummy.
〜LOVE BOBA!!〜
9.Tapioca drink -Chakashou
-Kanachabou (Nanaka)
Recently, Tapioca has become so popular, especially for the young age. Most of our image of Tapioca is just chewy small pearls but it is actually made out of a starch extracted from cassava root. It is so famous and there are so many Tapioca shops everywhere. So, I will introduce my recommendation of Tapioca shops in Shin-Okubo.
〜Chakashou〜
Chakashou is popular tapioca drink in Shin-Okubo. There is always a long queue for this shop, especially on the weekends. Ami and I have waited about an hour to get it. It is so crowded compared to other Tapioca shops but I think it’s worth waiting a long queue. The features of Chakashou are thick brown sugar inside and soft but chewy Tapioca. You should try them once! There are hot and cold ones so we can enjoy Tapioca in winter as well.
〜Kanchabou〜
Kanchabou is also very famous Tapioca shop in Shin-Okubo. It is actually located very close to Chakashou for about 2 minutes away, so maybe you can try it both Tapiocas!! Kanchabou is also very popular shop and there is always a long queue like Chakashou. You can get it easier on weekdays compared to weeked. I ordered a Tapioca milk tea(the most basic one). I really liked the taste of sweet tea and its soft texture Tapioca. Also the logo mark is so cute that makes people take pictures. Kanchabou is a Tapioca shop but there are a lot of fruit tea and smoothes. You can enjoy here in many ways.
10.Cafe de KAVE (Ami)
Café de KAVE is also a Tapioca shop in Shin-Okubo. This cafe is managed by the famous Korean artist, Jaejoong. He was once a,member of TVXW(東方神起), popular idol group in South-Korea.
The unique thing about this Tapioca shop is it’s container of boba tea. It looks like this.
The container looks like canned soft drinks. This is very uncommon for the container of Tapioca drinks. I ordered Tapioca milk tea.
It is photogenic and popular among young people.
These are Ami&Nanaka’s recommendation of Korean food restaurants in Shin-Okubo.
We hope that you enjoy reading this blog and go to Shin-Okubo and try some food!!
Thanks for reading!!