THROWBACK: Japan Honeymoon 2016 (Day 9: Osaka Municipal Central Wholesale Market, Dotonbori, Ichiran)

Day 9

Worked out super early to catch the 4.30am tuna auction at the Osaka Wholesale Market. It was really an eye-opener.

We took the cab from our AirBnB and told the driver we wanted to go to the Osaka Wholesale Market. I guess the driver was quite shocked and didn't know where exactly to send us to, so he dropped us off at the cross junction and we had to walk into the area ourselves.

As this is a real market, nobody really will be bothered with you. Don't expect directional signages to point you to the auction place. So we had to walk around and try to figure out the place in the cold winter morning, with occasional stares from the hawkers.

So eventually you will come to this enclosed building and see a group of man gathered together, with lots of tuna fish on the floor. That is the place where the magic will take place. Interestingly we confirmed that this was the right venue when we saw another group of 4 Malay tourists like us.

Loads of prized tuna on the floor

Auctioning

So the auctioneers & bidders, mostly hawkers or restaurant owners, will stand on each side of the tuna row. The auctioneers will carry this wooden bench where they pull and place at each location. The main auctioneer will then go into some kind of chant and you see the bidders raising their hands to bid for the tuna. Each time is really fast. Probably 1 - 2 mins per fish. I guess because they have so many tunas to auction, though not all the tunas go through this, so I reckon it's only the super premium ones get auctioned.

Another interesting we saw was when there were 2 bidders at possibly the same price, they use the most conventional way of settling it. Rock, Paper, Scissors! It's really quite funny that you see a group of grown-up men doing it.

The entire auctioning process will only take less than 30 mins, so it was still super early when it's done. But we were super intrigued by the entire experience and agreed that it was one of the highlights of our trip!

So as many guidebooks pointed to 中央市場 ゑんどう寿司 as a must-try, we decided to wait for it since it was supposed to open very early at 5am. But hell no, it didn't open at 5am and we were almost on the brink of giving up when it eventually open its doors at 6am. Remember the Malay tourists? They were waiting together with us and that probably kept us motivated.

And we thought it's gonna be a short wait

So when the doors finally open at 6am, we were so happy to be out of the cold!

The menu was limited and besides the 5-piece plates, you can order their miso clam soup. As both of us have been waiting in the cold for an hour plus, even DarHub who doesn't usually order miso soups decided to try it. But unfortunately the soup was full of ginger slices that didn't work well with our palate. Sushi on the other hand, was out of the world, like how some reviews put it. It's as if you can taste the freshness of the ocean in your mouth. There is definitely no fishyness or whatsoever. Though the Japanese take their 鮪 very seriously, we could only appreciate the salmon. So while each of us had our own plate, we ordered an extra plate of just pure salmon nigiri.

Oh and the Malay tourists? I don't think they really enjoyed/appreciated the sushi. They probably ordered 1 - 2 plates and left almost immediately after they're done. 

So after the wonderful breakfast, it was still rather early and we decided to take the subway back to our AirBnB and sleep away!

Probably didn't do much for the rest of the day and we only headed out to 道頓堀 for dinner. It was the Halloween period so we see lots of such mascots along the streets.

 

 

 

So we've not had ramen at all in Japan so far, and we almost wanted to walk into this rather famous  金龙拉面 that is super crowded. DarHub ate there the last time he was in Osaka and apparently they had free flow rice to go with your ramen soup after you are done with your noodles. But as we headed nearer to the place, I was overwhelmed by the pork stench from the broth that I immediately wanted out. Thankfully we came across Ichiran 一蘭 and decided to try this supposedly very good ramen as well.

I didn't take pictures but you first go to the vending machines on the first floor to place your orders. As everything is in Japanese, we could only order based on our guts. And after you are done with your orders, you head to 2nd floor where they will seat you and ask you to fill up a form on your preferences. That form is in 3 languages, so it was a lot easier for us. So basically they asked you about the preference of the noodle doneness, the thickness of the soup, condiments, etc.

So even though the soup was very porky (most ramen soups are), I really enjoyed Ichiran! It was really tasty and I loved the texture of the ramen. Both DarHub and I had such a good time DarHub decided to buy the instant noodle version back for his parents, which unfortunately his parents chose to exchange it for some cheap instant noodles with their relatives.