Ethnic Groceries
The Kaldi Coffe Farm Foods Chain
These grocery stores are one of the best sources of ingredients, partly because of their ubiquity, and partly because they really sell all kinds of things, from Nam Plaa to spices, cooking chocolate, Indian Tandoori mix pita bread and French cheese. This is the list of their Tokyo area stores. Visit the one closest to your house. They are worth it.
Shimo Kitazawa 03 3422-9512
Kichi Joji 0422 201200
Shimo Takaido 03 3323-8897
Sengawa 03 5384-5217
Umegaoka 03 3420-8480
Soshigaya 03 3483-3495
Ogikubo 03 3220-5345
Kinshicho 03 5669-2345
Musashi Koyama 03 379-36201
Mizonokuchi 044 8500085
Other Food Stores
There is first of all a distinction to be made between Asian and European Food. Let's start with Asia as a courtesy to our hosts.
Asian Food
HALAL FOOD
From the Asahi Evening News
On June 25th 1998 the Asahi Evening News published a very interesting article about a group of Indian and Pakistani food shops in Ikebukuro. I include the addresses it contains, and give the AEN all my thanks.
The various shops and restaurants are all clustered around Ikebukuro Sation's west exit and given the map (160K, but I couldn't make it any smaller), you should have no problems finding all of them.
1) The Asian Shopping Center includes the Indian restaurant New Delhi (Tel. 5391-9449), a mosque and a food shop. Sets at the restaurant go for 2500 yen.
2) On the third floor of the same building is the Halal Food Ismail Video Center, which in spite of its name offers a variety of Halal foods. Indian movies are of limited interest to most of us, but the center does offer some foods, although most things are also available at Al Flah.
Tel. 5950-7157.Al-Flah Supermarket
3) In a word, Al Flah is a precious source of rare ingredients. Certainly the best for Indian and Pakistani stuff.
The Al-Flah Supermarket, beside the Royal Hotel, sells all kinds of Halal ingredients. I have been there, and they have Lebanese stuff (Tabuleh, Falafel, Halewa, etc.), Indonesian, Thai, Filipino, and other ingredients. But, most of all, this is a fantastic resource of Pakistani and Indian ingredients.
Spices: Everything you can think of in 200 g packages for 300 yen. Most packages contain also a recipe the spice can be used for. A great chance to learn new dishes.
Meats: Al Flah sells 1 kg whole chickens for 350 yen, mutton and lamb meat, already made kebabs (the same sold at Marhaba. The owner is the same), beef, and more. Even sheep brains.
Breads: Frozen Naan and Chapati, plus ingredients to make them.
Beans and grains: Chickpeas, lentils, and kidney beans of every confession, all of good quality and at a good price. You can also find esoteric varieties of flour or Basmati rice.
Plus much more: Ghi, Indian sweets, coconut flour, and so on. Visiting this shop is a really a trip to an unknown world. You will see more kinds of Chutney than you knew existed.
Tel. 3985-3015 or 3985-9784.4) Marhaba is a Pakistani restaurant affiliated to the Al Flah Supermarket. It's very good, quiet and cheap. See the review.
Tel. 3987-10315) Amina is the superlative Burmese restaurant my Indian friend Sohan told me so much about. See the review.
Tel. 3985-06456) African Shokudo in the Rosa Kaikan is an African restaurant serving crocodile, ostrich, and kangaroo meat
Tel. 3986-3051/67) Asia Shokuhin offers Southeast Asian and Thai food ingredients.
Tel. 3590-34138) Chion sells Chinese and Taiwanese food ingredients.
Tel. 5951-0433End of the AEN article. From here on it's my own stuff.
Other Asian Food Stores
Ingredients for practically all Asian cuisines are readily available at a variety of places, the best being Ameyoko in Ueno. Coming from Okachimachi JR Station, walk towards Ueno, and after maybe 300 meters you will see a building called Ameyoko Center. In its basement is the place you are looking for. It's called (in Japanese) Chika-Shokuhin-Gai, and it sells about any exotic ingredient you can possibly dream of, including the wonderful Basmati Indian rice.Not as big, but by far more convenient for those like me who live on this side of town are the countless food stores in Okubo, Takadanobaba and Ikebukuro. I will give details only about the ones I go often to.
Nikko - Okubo & Ikebukuro
Nikko is a chain of two great stores which can be considered a dream come true. The one in Okubo is the best of the two in the sense that it sells a greater variety of things. That in Ikebukuro sells mostly Chinese cooking ingredients. I normally shop in Okubo, where they have great Thai rice, Indonesian spices, Chinese noodles, and so on. Always open, no CCs and probably no English spoken, but it's great fun to browse among all these exotic things. The scent of spices in the air is pungent but good.
Okubo Branch: Tel. 3209-0372
Ikebukuro Branch: Tel. 3988-0575
The Siam Store - Okubo
Besides Nikko, there is on Shokuan Street another great shop called Siam Store, which sells canned and fresh foodstuffs, plus magazines and videotapes from various Asian countries. Open 24 hours a day.
Omori Bldg 3 Fl. 1-11-1 Okubo, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 169.
Tel. 3232-4939 - 9109
Fax 3232-4935. Click here for the map.Souen - Takadanobaba
Souen, 30 meters to the right of Taverna's door (see map), is smaller than the others but still useful. Here is the usual map.
Tel. 3202-2816
Other Sources
Many Thai, Cambodian, and Vietnamese restaurants (e.g. Cambodia, Huong Viet, Kao Thai, and so on) usually sell ingredients.
But often you don't even have to go that far. Peacock sells in most of its branches Thai and Indian Curry pastes, Nam Plaa (Thai fish sauce, called Nuoc Mam in Vietnam), Vietnamese rice noodles, and fresh coriander. Coriander, sold often also in neighborhood green groceries, in Japanese is usually called Kosai (with a long o). For lemon grass and the like, though, you will have to go to Okubo or Ueno. Ginger, as you surely know, can be found almost anywhere.
European Food
European food ingredients are (I think) harder to find. For example, I grow my own rosemary plant in the garden because it is otherwise very difficult to find in this country, green peas are rare, mozzarella unbelievably expensive, as are zucchini. So in goes. Even when cooking a popular cuisine as the Italian, it is often impossible to complete a recipe. Two thirds of the recipes in my cook books are useless in Japan because a key ingredient cannot be found. No matter what they tell you, there is not such a thing as tiramisu in Japan. You can find mascarpone cheese here and there, but I have never seen anywhere the type of cookies indispensable to make it. I am sure other Europeans also have their problems.
Very reliable, but alas insanely expensive and trendy, is Kinokuniya in Omotesando or Kichi Joji. Much smaller but also interesting is Meijiya in Roppongi and Ginza. Miuraya, near Kichi Joji station, has a good variety of foodstuffs (telephone number 0422-21-1020). If you live near Ikebukuro, try Tanakaya twenty meters left of Mejiro JR Station's exit. It sells lots of stuff, like olive oil and cheeses, at really good prices. Great and cheap for Italian stuff was Yamaya, in Shinjuku, but now it's interesting only for wines liquors. Get out of Shinjuku Station, South Exit, and walk on the right side of the Koshu Kaido for about 5-700 meters, and there it is, phone number 3342-0601. In any case, I find Peacock sells most of what I need to cook. Very often you have to replace ingredients with others similar enough. For example, American bacon, although different, can be used for a Carbonara. In my recipes, I will indicate what to replace and how when necessary.
