German food

The German business trip was full of stress (the people we cooperate with had not built the stuff they were supposed to have built, my boss decided we needed to build some new stuff with short notice, the presentations were long and not that relevant to me, etc. etc.) and it did not help that everyone back in Japan had a five day holiday and kept posting updates on how much fun they were having, haha.

Breakfast

One thing that was great in Germany was the food, though. The breakfast and lunch buffets were very good. Lots of food that you cannot find in Japan but that was similar to Swedish food. I ate way too much.

Lunch

Bread! Japanese "pan" (which is often translated as "bread") is good but it is not very similar to European bread.

This was some weird bone marrow ball soup that I was told was a local specialty.

The thing on the right was some form of wheat based porridge, perhaps? Some local specialty.

Chocolate banana cake, served at breakfast

More bread!

Japanese Christmas food

Top selling Christmas dish at our school cafeteria (beef curry, omelette, rice, ketchup, broccoli). It is Christmas food because it has green and red colors, and is a "Western dish" (the omelette makes it "Western" by Japanese standards).

In Japan, almost no one is Christian (something like 0.5% I think) and Christian holidays are not generally known or celebrated. People do know about Christmas, though, from American movies and TV shows. So some people have Western style Christmas parties and things like that.

Traditional (though it is a fairly young tradition) Japanese Christmas celebration is to go on a date with your girlfriend/boyfriend at a restaurant serving Western food. Like pasta.

What Japanese people consider to be Christmas food is also interesting. The number on food that springs to mind when you say Christmas is apparently Kentucky Fried Chicken. My guess is the reasoning is something like "Americans eat turkey. Turkey is a bird. Kentucky Fried Chicken serves birds. And it is American. This must be the food most similar to Western world Christmas food", but I could be wrong.

There are thus huge lines outside KFC on Christmas. At some KFC places you have to stand in line for hours. At some places they only serve you if you booked in advance. Bizarre.

At our university cafeteria they also serve Christmas dishes now. These include "grilled chicken leg" (though not from KFC). They also include things like "beef curry with omelette and ketchup, and a small piece of broccoli". This is Christmas food because it has green (broccoli) and red (ketchup) on it (yellow is also common in Christmas food). Anything that is green and red, and not Japanese food, is considered Christmas food. That is not exactly how we divide food into "Christmas food" and "not Christmas food" in Sweden, but still...

Poznan: Pizzas and toilet paper

My colleague is not happy with pizzas in Japan. Pizzas are usually very expensive and when they are not, they are not very good. Some of the expensive ones are not very good either. So whenever he goes to Europe he as a rule has pizza at least once. Since we are going back to Japan tomorrow, today was pizza day.

We asked around at the meeting for a good pizza place and the local people told us that "da Luigi" is a good pizza restaurant close to where we are staying. We went there but it was full. My colleague went inside to ask when they expected to have seats for us, but they said they were fully booked for the entire evening...

We found another pizza place around the corner which seemed nice, so we went there instead. I ordered a pizza with salami and some banana juice (the weirdest drink I could see on the menu). The banana juice was not very good, but the pizza was very nice.

Also, the toilet of this restaurant had toilet paper that was quite similar to normal toilet paper (though still not quite as soft as Japanese toilet paper)!

Poznan: Da Vinci

My (barely liquid) drink

The same, but with some whipped cream on top...

My cake

My colleague wanted to go to a cafe called "da Vinci" so we went there to have some sweets after the meetings were over. The place had a very nice atmosphere, with da Vinci drawings on the walls and the menu items being named things like "Mona Lisa". The stuff they served was very good, but it felt like being on a highway to diabetes. I tried hot chocolate, which seemed to be a chocolate bar that they melted and put in a cup. Very good, very thick, probably not very healthy. My colleague ordered the same but with a mountain of whipped cream on top...

Poznan: Another lunch

Unsurprisingly, we had lunch today too. It was good.

Poznan: Free dinner!

The second day of the meeting had the project meeting dinner. This was very nice. We first had a ten minute walk around the Old Town with a local guide. Then we were let into the Poznan archaeological museum were we had dinner. The dinner was very nice. I had pork with potatoes and pears. My colleague for once selected something I had not ordered, and he had tuna.

We were eating around this obelisk

Poznan: More lunch

The second day of meetings was slightly more interesting than the first day, but still most of the time was boring.  The lunch break was great, though. Same restaurant, different food.

Poznan: Dinner

Chicken, spinach, cheese, potatoes, and a blood orange

We found a very nice place serving Polish food and went there for dinner. They had tables made from heavy wooden slabs put on top of old sewing machines, and chairs made out of old barrels. There were even seats made by putting saddles on top of wooden bars. And they had some kind of animal close to our table.

The food was excellent. I ordered a mixed set of dumplings (meat filled, cheese filled, Russian style), and some kind of chicken dish. My Swedish colleague again ordered the same things as I did... The spinach that came with the chicken was heavenly. The chicken and the dumplings were also great.

Some kind of animal

Dumplings

Poznan: Breakfast

Our guest house has a fairly spartan but nice breakfast.

Poznan: More Polish food at Brovaria

We had dinner in a place called Brovaria. According to our Polish friend's boss, who is a restaurant expert, this place had good Polish food. He was right. I ordered beet soup with dumplings (very Polish I am told) and pork with chantarelles (also common in Swedish cuisine) and vegetables. My Swedish colleague then said "exactly the same"... Unoriginal bastard, haha.

Various types of beer, including honey beer.

Beet soup with dumplings.

Pork, vegetables, chantarelles, and potatoes.

Poznan: First Polish food!

Zraz.

We arrived in Poznan at around noon, but could not get our hotel rooms until 14:00. We decided to go and have lunch until then. In the "Old Town" of Poznan, we found a place that had a very nice atmosphere, and where the staff wore some kind of historical outfits. It also served traditional Polish food, so we ate there.

I had something that I think was called zraz since some Polish people in Sapporo had recommended that. We also had dumplings, filled with various things. Very nice.

Dumplings with spinach and cheese.

The cellar, that was closed during lunch hours.

The outfits of the staff were like this.

Magic and Italian food in Garbanzo

Garlic toast, made especially small for me (since I was there and alone and wanted to eat other things too)

Today I stayed at the university working until 22:30. Which means I got home slightly after eleven. There are still lots of restaurants open where I live, even after midnight. I went to an Italian restaurant called Garbanzo today. The owner/chef there is an acquaintance of mine, and he too does some magic.

Pasta American (Amerikeenu), shrimp, cheese, pasta, and a very nice sauce.

I had some very nice food. When I was about to leave, the owner told me that if I had time, I should do magic for a couple who were also dining late. They were friends of his. I had plenty of time, so I did a short magic show for them. They were very impressed, but even more impressed by my proficiency of Japanese. People are usually quite impressed even if you just manage to say "hello" in Japanese, so it does not necessarily mean that one should be proud, though.

Some of the wine I received from some other guests.

After my magic, they asked me to sit down at their table and drink some of their wine. They also asked me about my life in Sapporo (how it is to live here if you have grown up in a very different culture) and where I had learned Japanese etc. The woman gave me her business card. She is the owner of a pair of dance schools, it seems.

A bottle of alcohol shaped like the country of Italy!