Ikea, Tachikawa

First time at an Ikea in Tokyo.

When it comes to Ikea, other than furniture shopping, many people come for the food too.

As I just had curry rice for breakfast in the morning, I was still pretty full. Hence, I only ordered a tart and a medallion.

My butter scotch tart (399 yen) that was absolutely delicious. Wish I had could buy the entire tart home. If only, my return journey didn't take almost 2 hours. I was super worried that the tart might melt before I even reached home. Maybe I shall get a cooler bag and try to get one the next time.

This Medallion (100 yen) one here was recommended by Mish. It's just potatoes but super good. I'm tempted to try making this at home too.

My croissant (130 yen) because it looks too good to be passed.

This was actually Mish's dessert, but I had to take a pic of it because it looked yummy too~ :)

Always enjoy Ikea food. If only I wasn't so full, I would like to have some mains too. Maybe next time. Plus the 50yen ice cream soft serve was too good of a deal to let go~ heehee.....

Golden week BBQ day

Arrived back in Tokyo at 7 am via a night bus from Kanazawa, took the train, walked back home, showered and back to the station again in order to meet S at another station at 10.30am. Lol....I am super woman!

We then took a bus to Harumifuto Park from Kachidoki Station to attend a BBQ event.

We were there for about 3 hours. While others were busy making friends, hitting on the other sex, drinking or just chit-chatting, I was busy standing next to BBQ pit to wait for the food!

Even so, I didn't get to eat much as I'm just too slow. I never know when the meat is done and when it is, I'm too slow to grab more than a piece! Lol~

Overall, it was an interesting and fun event for me as I don't think I've used that much Japanese in a day since I came to Japan or spoke to so many different people in the same day.

After the event, we went up the Harumi passenger ship terminal to have a look and was surprised by the beautiful view of Odaiba!!!! Oh, and also a small view of the BBQ area~

I never knew how close we were to Odaiba till we went up the building.

Make for a nice spot for a great view of the surroundings~

After that, we went to Shibuya to attend a language event. 

My order of a mixed berry drink.

The event was ok. I felt as though people didn't want to talk to me due to my skin colour so that was kinda sad for me. People need to know that one should now judge another person's ability to speak English based on their skin colour!

For dinner, we went to this okonomiyaki place in Shibuya called 渋谷 こてがえし.

Address: 〒150-0042 Tokyo, Shibuya, Udagawacho, 25−4, ダッキープラザビル4F

We ordered the mix okonomiya for 1,328 yen, mix monjyayaki for 1,220 yen, oolong hai 486 yen and grape calpis.

We requested the waitress to do the cooking for us but here's me trying to flip the okonomiyaki! heehee....my favourite thing to do!

Ta-da~ our completed okonomiyaki!

Here's what the monjya looks like before it was cooked It came with mochi~

And after it's cooked......hahaha, looks kinda unappetising, doesn't it?

Well, you are supposed to take a bit of it with your own tiny spatula, grill it to grill it some more before eating it.

Not too bad for my first monjyayaki experience. Would love to have it again~

VANILLA BEANS Cafe, Yokohama

Visited the VANILLA BEANS Cafe at Yokohama with ST san. 

He's the one who introduced this cafe as he had read that this place serves really good chocolate.

I can never resist anything chocolate, so we dropped by for tea. Plus this is their flagship store at Minatomirai.

This is my order of Vanilla beans fondant chocolate (864 yen).

This was definitely one of the best I've had! While I'm not a fan of vanilla ice cream, I like the smooth and light texture of theirs. It went super well with the fondant chocolate and the frozen raspberries and pistachios.

The star of the day would probably have to be this~ This white cream is actually made from the husk or something of cacao. I can't really remember it now. But this dessert was made from the entire fruit. You get to taste parts of the fruit that you will not usually get to.

The cream was super light and the taste is pretty special. There's a slight hint of tartness to it. Definitely something very special. If only I didn't have lunch, I would definitely order one for myself too!

Behold it's true face~ hahaha...... Priced at 1,944yen, it's price is on the high side. But the fact that there's a limit of only 10 serves per day. If it's available on the day of your visit, why not?

The dessert was so good that I had to buy one of their little gift cake home to try. This one here is their "Three pleasures" petit chocolate cake. 

Prices at 324yen, it was definitely pricey.....considering how small the actual cake is.

Look at it in comparison to my candy......

But no regrets in getting it because it was super yummy~!!! :D

Do check out their website for more details of this shop: http://www.vanillabeans.yokohama/en.html#6

Korean Fried Chicken

Dinner with colleagues one night~

We went for korean friend chicken.

Some free side-dishes~

Probably one of the best korean pancake I've ever had~!!! and the best dish of the night in my opinion!

We ordered half portions of different flavours of korean fried chicken. This here is the honey garlic one and is my favourite flavour because it's sweet and you can taste the garlic!

This is the spicy one which I didn't really enjoy~

And this here is probably my least favourite. The weird combination with french fries.......the fries were ok, it's just the taste of the korean fried chicken that wasn't that good.

As the fried chicken was expensive and tasted only ok in my opinion, I'd probably come back just for the korean pancake in the future.

Koishikawa Korakuen

Ume hunting!

Another post from back in March when I was trying to hunt down some ume flower~

I visited Koishikawa Korakuen.

There's an entrance fee of 300yen.

There's a plum garden there~

300yen is pretty cheap considering how big the garden is and there's so much to explore.

Want a picture in traditional costume? heehee....

I decided to explore the garden a bit before heading towards the plum garden.

You really have to visit this place personally to appreciate the beauty of it

Asked a nice ojiisan for help with this picture. He took about 5!!!

I really enjoyed the views~

After about 30mins, I finally arrived at the plum garden and while there were so many obaasan and ojiisan!

Some were drawing while other were with their camera~

There were also a few who were picnicking in the area.

The ume were soooo pretty!

I was really happy that I made the trip there for the flowers~

As the garden was really huge, I also managed to do a lot of thinking while walking around. I was pretty down at that time and the walk around the garden really helped improve my mood!

Over here are a bunch of photography enthusiasts trying to get a good picture of some beautiful birds by the river.

Such a serene view~

I felt jealous of the people who brought food because I too want to sit down at a bench and just enjoy my meal with this view~

Probably the next time! I will be back for other flowers in the future....