Space Washoku? Space Japanese Food!

Hmmm.... WHAT is THAT?? You are likely to ask, because you have no idea what I am talking about. Well, I am talking about having Japanese food in the space!! Yes, THE space as in the space shuttle and the space laboratory.

Having lunch appointment with a friend at Tokyo Station, I arrived at the station several minutes early. To my surprise, the Tokyo Station has been totally remodeled with many cool building and lots of nice (or expensive) looking shops all over. While I was looking for the eatery I bumped into this place looks like a science store where you can see a space suite standing in the window. It turned out to be an exhibit space offered by JAXA, or Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. As an ex-space enthusiast, I went in for an exploration.

Ms. Matsumoto, the knowledgeable and patient exhibit guide, explained to me with great details of the Japanese space program and the articles being exhibited. She did a great job, and the exhibit was FUN. If you happen to be in the area, I highly recommend a visit. It was highly educational (time for you decadent people to get some real education!!), and the admission cost nothing - uncle J picks up the bill!

Somehow, the video game like boxes in the glass case caught my attention - wouldn't it be fun to play a space shuttle landing game? Ms. Matsumoto laughed, and told me that the silver box was a "space food". Or, to be more exact, "space Japanese food". This is neither Nintendo nor PS3. What you see in the silver box is a "Space Curry". It even got the food manufacturer's mark on it!! Standing in the back of the curry box, not the game controller as you might think, are the sweet red bean pastes (Yohkan)!! Chris and Alex, you guys gonna love these stuff, they are so totally cool!!

Ms. Matsumoto told me the space food actually tasted as good as their street counterpart in any Tokyo restaurants. These foods in exhibit can also be purchased, so I bought 4 packs of different kind: space curry, space yohkan, space daigaku imo (yam), and space takoyaki.

Getting way excited, I told my buddy Eddie, a CalTech aerospace engineering graduate (how appropriate!!), about this new discovery and ask him to come over for a taste test and he happily agreed. We plan to do that test and post reports on this blog!!

Do come back to visit again, and EXPECT to see TokyoTracker's entirely serious "Space Japanese Food" tasting reports!!