Nagano Getaway Pt 2: Magome to Tsumago

From Matsumoto, we drove the next morning to Magome. The trail between Magome and Tsumago is a well maintained section of the former Nakasendo, the route that ran along the Kiso Valley and connected Tokyo with Kyoto during the Edo Period. We had planned to hike from Magome to Tsumago, return via bus, and then drive home. It made for a very full, but incredibly rewarding day. 

Both towns have been maintained and restored from the Edo period; complete with timbered walls and wooden water-wheels. The hike itself exudes charm, history, and a sense of old Japan. Close your eyes, and you can see the horses, flags and armor passing you by.

The trail is about 7.8 K, going over a steep pass about half-way through the hike. The trail crosses the road several times, and is dotted with bells to ring before crossing. We didn't see any bears - or many people either. Since the rain of the day before had continued through mid-afternon, this wasn't terribly surprising. 

About half-way through, there was a rest-station - a small hut, with a fire in a square fire-ring. An iron kettle simmered. We walked in, and were offered hot tea and brandied ume. Perhaps it was the cold, but those were the best little alcoholic apricots ever. We also bought walking sticks, having read that you could get the sticks branded at each station on the trail to the top of Mt. Fuji. 

Passing houses and charming shrines, we eventually rolled into Tsumago. If possible, it was even more charming than Magome. Less development and more cobbled streets. 

Having skipped lunch, we were starved - after getting our official walking stick brands for Tsumago, we went for the first restaurant we could find. Being cold and wet, we ordered hot soba noodles topped with green onions, mushrooms, tofu, seaweed, yam (kind of slimy) and "grass". We learned at dinner in Matsumoto that all green vegetables that Japanese persons didn't know proper english names for were called "grass".  In this case, "grass" was wild asparagus. Amazing.

We also ordered "gohei-mochi" - toasted rice ball on a stick, glazed in sesame and walnut soy sauce. Absolutely unbelievable. So good. 

A short tour of the town, a little green tea ice-cream, and some photos of the stunning cherry blossom display finished off the town. Mostly dry by this point, we caught the bus back to Magome, and started the trek home. 

Near the end of the drive, we stopped at a Japanese rest-stop off the highway. Now, Japanese rest stops really deserve their own post...I'm not sure they can even be compared to the grimy bathroom-and-vending-machine truck stops in the  US. Think of the duty-free-shop-and-retaurant area in a larger international airport. Better. With cleaner bathrooms - and often more restaurant choices. In any case - we stopped at one of the rest stop restaurants for Japanese-style hamburger and salad. A bit more of the drive home - accompanied by reading-out-loud from "Essays on Japan" (thanks Carrie and Mike!) - and we made it home. One of the best weekends we've had in Japan!

Nagano Getaway Pt. 1: Matsumoto - and Dinner!

One of our first weekends in Japan, we rented a car. Mostly to move our boxes from the Navy lodge to our house…but since we didn’t plan on getting a car of our own, it was a great chance for a getaway. We chose to go north to Nagano, to see the castle town of Matsumoto, and then to hike the old “post trail” from Tsumago to Magome.

Matsumoto is mostly famous for “Matsumotojo”, also known as “Crow Castle”. 

The somewhat precarious staircase climbs past a snazzy exhibit of old armor and firearms up to a lookout over the town.  The woodwork and exhibits of the castle were outstanding. The pounding rain made the views somewhat less stunning, but the town itself was charming, full of restaurants, shopping streets, and (for some reason), frogs. We stayed in a charming Ryokan (traditional Japanese-style hotel) complete with tatami floors, shoji screens, and incredible bathing facilities.

However, the best part of Matsumoto was undoubtedly dinner. Our guidebook recommended  a little place called "Sa-No-Haru", noting that it served incredibly fresh, local, traditional Japanese food, in a space more like someone's living room than a restaurant.  

The guidebook was right - and then some. It wasn't the basashi (horse meat sushi) and soba noodles the region was famous for - but it was much better. 

We sat down at a low bar-counter, facing in to a narrow prep space - rather like sitting at the sushi bar. It was spring-time, and all the food was seasonal. We didn't order any of it. But a slow procession emerged from the kitchen, was carefully plated (on appropriately sized and shaped dish ware), and was placed in front of us. First was some sort of small bean, served with local salt, and fresh bamboo shoots. Also, some sort of marinated raidish-y vegetable. Next came tempura vegetables and shrimp; the broccolini served with green-tea infused salt, the shrimp served with a soy-based dipping sauce.

Chef poured sake - sometimes hot, sometimes cold -drinking along with us t each pour. Next came new potatoes - boiled simply, and served with salt. Absolutely delicious, especially with eaten with the pickled radishes.

Following this came a fish course - thick-cut tuna, flash-seared, served with daikon, ginger, green onions, and a soy-and-sesame sauce. Chef grated fresh wasabi into the sauce for us. There are no words.  

Soup followed after - just a simple broth, made with clams, a halibut-like fish, and the softest, silkiest, most amazing tofu we've ever tasted. 

Following this came house-made pickles - cucumber, daikon, and...not quite sure. All delicious. The perfect palate-cleanser.

Rice with yuzu, and fresh oranges (the best this california girl has ever tasted) finished up the meal. 

By the end of the night and conversation, we were pronounced family - photos and gift exchanges followed. 

Home

Special request of my sister-in-law: Photos of the house. So a somewhat belated post about our house here:

***

We got lucky. The house we finally found isn’t a typical rental house, but a family residence, thoughtfully designed and built by a family whose name still hangs on the gate. Even without any furnishings, the house still felt like a home. The two daughters left handprints in the cement steps to the handkerchief-sized patio, and the lease agreement forbade us to cut down the olive tree in the front yard. Even our real estate agent looked a little surprised at that!  Someone in this family is a little like Heidi’s custom-builder father – organized, highly efficient, and aware of small details which generate disproportionate convenience and/or luxury. Multiple electrical outlets in every room - including the tiny finished storage attic. (Alex has claimed this as his home office/man-cave. “Cave” being a literal descriptor of its height, he outfitted it with a Japanese-style ground-height leather armchair and low desk.) 

Hamling Medical Service's Home Office!

There are built-in storage cabinets in all the right places, plus a large entry area for shoe-changing. Light switches that have a small green light when they are off – so you can see them to turn them on.  Roll-down metal wind-screens have an “automatic” switch. Most commonly, these are opened and closed by hand…most places we looked, it was a 5-step process. The automatic switches give you privacy when needed, and light when wanted.

The bathroom has a deep-soaking tub, which can be controlled via a panel in the bathroom OR from the kitchen. Let your hot water fill up while you finish cooking/the dishes.

There's a classic Japanese "tatami" room, with lovely grass matting, that we've outfitted with a futon as our bedroom.

The living room/dining room is long and narrow. We brought in a comfy couch, more grass matting, and a low-to-the-ground Japanese tea table.

The kitchen is narrow, larger than many Japanese kitchens, and with a connecting bar counter through to the dining room.

Since the master bedroom is also long and narrow, we re-purposed it to be Heidi's Home Office on one half and the Yoga room/Guest bedroom on the other half.

Heidi's Home Office.

We moved in with not much - clothes, mostly. Since the stay isn't long-term, we didn't want to fuss about furniture.  Furniture was second-hand, or from Nitori (the Japanese Bed-Bath-and-Beyond meets Ikea). Since we're lacking certain non-essential furniture, and since the batterie de la cuisine is somewhat less extensive as when I (Heidi) was in college, there is a certain back-to-basics feel.

On the whole, loving it! Thank you, Hosue family, for renting a house that lets us enjoy Japanese home life, with a few little luxuries.

Food Adventures in Japan

What do we eat while we’re here? Quite the variety. We eat out more than in the States, partly because we’re out and about so much, trying to explore Japan. Out: we’ll eat Japanese, Thai, Italian, etc. At home, it’s often a Japanese-US fusion. We’re not quite familiar enough with Japanese cooking to make authentic cuisine, but have so many ingredients readily available that we do our best. A few examples:

Home-made miso soup: (More traditional). We bought the Miso in Nagano prefecture, after a hike in between two post towns. First made home-made daishi stock – this is the foundation of most of traditional Japanese cuisine. It is essentially a stock, but made using kombu, or dried giant seaweed, and katsuobushi, or dried bonito flakes. I (Heidi) couldn’t quite read any of the packages at the grocery store – but had read about it, and took a wild stab at the packages that looked large, popular, and seaweedy/fishy. I seem to have guessed right – the daishi was a little strong, but after stirring in miso, some sliced soft tofu, and some chopped green onions – the soup was delicious.

Homemade Vegetable Gyoza: Finely chopped veggies wrapped in won-ton wrappers. Steam or fry. Serve with a variety of dipping sauces. I like the recipe I found for sesame-soy dipping sauce. Serve with salad and rice.

Fish Tacos: Some beautiful tuna that had sat around for a day or so longer than we thought best for sushi. Marinated in a little mirin, sugar, soy (essentially, a teriyaki). Pan-seared, leaving the fish very rare. Shredded cabbage (lots of cabbage options here), some yogurt with lemon, and a little feta. Excellent.

 

Soup: Homemade fish stock. Not proper daishi, but made from fish heads, celery (we think) from the garden), onions, herbs. Add aromatic vegetables, buckwheat noodles (soba), and green-tea rubbed seared salmon – lovely.

 

Endless variations of rice: fried rice, onigiri (Japanese rice balls), and rice with (insert sautéed vegetable/meat here). We usually use brown rice – easy enough to find in Japanese grocery stores, although more expensive, with a ratio is 3 brown rice options to about 200 white rice options. Often served with fish or squid – our “Japanese” oven is really a small fish grill.

Japanese adaptations of “traditional” American food too, especially on busy nights  – Japanese love hamburgers, and generally eat them softer, with teriyaki. Flatbread pizza (cooked in our toaster) made with sautéed mixtures and seasoned with soy, ginger, sesame, and rice wine.

For the foodie-folk out there – more soon on meals-out, Japanese-style!

147 Ways to Separate Trash

In the US, the utility company sends you a 2-page leaflet that notes which Friday is a recycle day, and which Friday is not. Trash and recycling. Oh, and yard waste.

In Japan, you can pick up a 2-cm novella that describes provides a detailed calendar of the multiple different trash categories. These include: "square symbol" recycling, "circle" recycling", "A" trash day, "B" trash day, the still-mysterious "burnable trash", and "non-burnable trash", old/used clothing, and what we call "special trash". There are others, but let's start there. A two-page leaflet comes with this, and is posted on our fridge so that we remember what to take out each day:

Square and circle recycling are pretty straightforward: anything with a symbol like this:

   Or This:

In the States, we rarely went thorough products with that much plastic packaging. We use a lot more here - markets tend to package meat, fruit, and sushi etc., in single-serving styrofoam trays or boxes. Bring it home, use it, and recycle the container.

Burnable trash can be pretty much anything - as long as it is inside a yellow plastic bag. You can buy "burnable disposal" bags in different sizes at your local 7-11 or grocery store. Most people collect their trash, and set it out in front of their house covered by a plastic bin. This, apparently, is so the crows don't get at it! 

The garbage truck drives around in the afternoon, with the trash engineers (for they could be nothing less) calling an announcement on the loudspeaker. I usually hide inside at this point, just in case we collected and packaged the trash incorrectly.

The night before "A" and "B", trucks drop off a collection of yellow bins at your local trash collecting area. (Rarely further from your house than a block or two.) Each bin means something different. I finally took pictures of the label on each (full) bin, so we could see what to put in it, instead of guessing! There are separate yellow lug bins for clear glass, colored glass, white food trays, colored food trays, steel/tin cans, aluminum cans, milk cartons (break down flat), paper, PET bottles, aerosol bottles, bottle caps, etc. As I took the pictures this morning, my helpful neighbor shared with me that you separate paper garbage into: 1) cardboard/with a circle symbol, and 2) paper without a circle symbol. Oops. (Below: Nice neighbors sorting trash at 6am. One of the bins, showing a broken-down milk carton).

On "special trash"/"non-burnable" day, the truck drives down your street playing a synthetic, tinkling version of Mozart classics. Apparently “moonlight sonata” is supposed to remind you to take out the broken light bulbs and deceased furniture. It’s certainly nicer than the dull, irregular roar of an American garbage truck. The charmingly recorded music doesn't tell me what official sticker I have to put on my broken space heater before the nice truck will take it away...looks like another consult with the helpful neighbor!

The books and online translations seem to indicate that if you dispose of your trash INCORRECTLY, it will show back up on your doorstop with a notice of what you did. Happily, this has only happened once or twice...and we can mostly figure out what the mistake was. Back goes the item into our elaborate sorting system for next week.

While this system certainly takes more time and trouble than the system in the US, it keeps a lot of trash out of landfills - critical in a small, and impeccably clean country. I wish I could come up with a better system for sorting trash in the house than this: 

But still - Kudos to Japan for taking care of the environment. I wish I could read the guidebook...but given the number of cartoons and posters out there, I think that the Japanese might even have trouble with this sometimes...