Last night, as promised, Satoshi, Ting, and I hit the streets of Beppu to visit one of the greatest inventions known to man: a sushi conveyer belt restaurant! Now before we begin, I should clarify that there are two types of SCBR’s in Japan, differentiated by price. At the first type, plates whirrrrrr about in a variety of different colors, which signify different prices. These restaurants typically serve more upscale sushi and sashimi delicacies, but the bill can add up pretty quick. Furthermore, after several mugs of beer, you may no longer be able to distinguish between red, pink, and reddish pink plates, leading you to select the $8 ’emperor’s plate’ when you really wanted the $2 ‘lil fishie’ plate! This was not the type of restaurant we visited.
We went to the other kind, the everyman’s SCBR, where every single plate can be had for the flat fee of 105Y – tax included(~$0.92). Therefore, one can snatch any damn plate he feels like and still be able to immediately calculate his current tab. After having eagerly anticipated this event for an entire week, we arrived a little after 5:30pm Saturday evening. Early yes, but these places are ridiculously popular, and not 15 minutes after we got there every single seat was taken and people were queuing along the walls.
Let’s get down to the mechanics, as most of you have been to a regular old vanilla sushi restaurant. First off, we chose a booth to better facilitate conversation between the three of us, although stools along the belts are the predominant seating arrangement. The restaurants are setup so that no matter where you sit you’ve got the belt running right past you, covered in its glorious fare.
Once seated, it’s only a matter of waiting for something you want and greedily snatching it off the belt as it goes by. As plates are removed, chefs in the kitchen simply churn out replacements and toss ’em on the belt. On an empty stomach the options can occasionally be a little overwhelming as you try to decide which tasty victuals you want to conquer first. Ting found himself in exactly this position of indecision,
but eventually was able to make an acceptable selection and get down to business.
Naturally, one must make an appropriate beverage selection to complement the sushi, and in this part of Japan, that comes down to two options – Kirin or Asahi. A quick nod towards the nearest waitress gets your order taken, and in 15 seconds or less you get a giant frosty mug of brew fresh from the tap, and you better believe the beer in the mug matches the name on the outside of the mug! Kanpai!
As for me, I favored Asahi this evening. They should give me a job in marketing, such are my product placement skills!
In another first, I was finally able to capture on film evidence to support one of my most famous stories about Japanese food – the slimy skinny things with two black specks on one end. What do the contents of this particular type of sushi look like to you?
Maybe you should take a closer look!
You bet, them’s some sort of eely lookin’ thangs! Woah Mama!
Another item you won’t often find stateside, is octopus tempura, although here in the native language it’s called Tako Tenpura. I love this stuff. Kinda chewy, but tasty nonetheless.
Eventually though, the plates start to pile up and you have to start getting more selective as your available internal sushi repository space decreases. Late in the game, every choice takes on heavy consequence, witness Satoshi’s extreme concentration as he scrutinizes the options motoring by.
Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, though it was a pretty sharp finale. All told we were responsible for 6 giant mugs of beer and 34 plates of sushi.
That’s my stack in middle, the biggest one, hell yeah. Ting downed 9, Satoshi tackled 10, and I gave up after 15. Eagle eyes will note that my stack only shows 14 plates, that’s because I had one after the picture was taken… There was talk of attempting to eat one’s age in sushi, I was 2/3rds of the way there, it certainly is tempting…
My final bill was 2600Y, or $22.79. Considering I had almost 30 individual pieces of sushi, or 15 pairs, along with two very very large mugs of beer, I made out like a bandit by standards of US pricing! It was a good trip indeed.
The adventure didn’t end there however, when we arrived back at the nearest bus stop at 7:30pm, we found out to our dismay that the last bus to APU had left at 7:05pm. I should mention we were at least 7 miles away from campus – it wasn’t looking good. Fortunately, as the time gets later, buses stop at less and less “minor” stops, so we guessed that if we could make it to one of the two major stops before APU, we might still be able to hop a ride.
The only problem with this plan was that the first major stop was over an hour away on foot, and the next was 20 minutes past that one. Well, 75 minutes of walking down umpteen-million sidewalks later, we made it to Kamegawa train station. The walk was not without incident though, I ran into this old friend along the way.
Sure enough, at Kamegawa we could catch a bus, but not for another 30 minutes. Rather than wait idly in the cold, we decided to finish the walk to the second major stop which just so happened to be an all-night supermarket, and all-night supermarkets sell beer!
So 20 minutes later we staggered into Marushoku supermarket and headed for the drink section. My stomach had about had its fill of Japanese beer, so I grabbed a Chu-hi, which is like an American wine-cooler, although far less syrupy – definitely still a ladies’ beverage though. While I was making my selection I spied this bizarre product.
Who on earth would want to drink something that tastes like crappy American beer AND has no alcohol, is beyond me.
Once back outside again, we made our way to the bench at the bus stop and collapsed, exhausted.
The night ended in smiles though, as we waited for the bus with our final round of drinks!
All in all, it was great, and I went to bed with a full stomach, a slight remaining buzz, and deep satisfaction.