Kobe and Awaji Island have been newly added to the areas covered by the “Michelin Guide.” They become the fifth region covered, following Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, and Nara, which are already included in the anonymous-inspection rating guide published by the French tire maker. On 5ch, the discussion drifted away from the actual Kobe/Awaji ratings and toward a long-running debate over the old saying “there’s nothing good to eat in Nara,” comparisons of star counts between Tokyo and Kansai, and the historical ties between Awaji Island and Tokushima.
“Kobe and Awaji Island” will be added to the coverage area of the “Michelin Guide,” the world-famous guidebook that rates restaurants and other establishments with stars.
The “Michelin Guide,” published by a French-headquartered tire maker that features roughly 17,000 restaurants and hotels worldwide, already covers “Tokyo,” “Kyoto,” “Osaka,” and “Nara” in Japan.
The star ratings take into account the quality of ingredients, the level of cooking technique, the polish and originality of the seasoning, and the overall consistency of the cuisine, with anonymous inspectors visiting and dining at restaurants to evaluate ingredient quality, technique, and more.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
Tokyo → makes sense
Osaka → makes sense
Kyoto → makes sense
Nara → wait, what?!
"Nothing good to eat in Nara" — words of the great novelist Shiga Naoya
Nah, it's Tokyo that's the real problem lol
They handed out so many stars in Tokyo that it wrecked Michelin's whole brand lol
You can eat court cuisine straight out of the Nara period, 1,300 years ago. That's actually incredible.
Give me a reason to.
There was this daytime drama called "Love Letter" that was so good it made me go to Shodoshima. That trip was so great I ended up circling the whole of Shikoku. Shikoku is paradise.
Kuzukiri (chilled arrowroot noodles) is pretty good too
In Tokyo even a bad restaurant can limp along, but in Kansai those places get weeded out fast
So you basically can't go wrong wherever you walk in
Kyoto and Osaka combined barely add up to Tokyo's star count alone, and even then they don't touch Tokyo's three-star tally
Osaka's star count is about on par with London's
Sure, sure. You probably can't afford to go anyway, so why do you care?
When I was touring on a Cub (small motorbike), it was honestly a bit scary
Come to Tokushima sometime — compared to that, Awaji drivers are crawling along
I'm originally from "Pasona Island" (Awaji, nicknamed after the Pasona Group's HQ move there) and now live in the "Awa Odori prefecture" (Tokushima), and I was shocked at how bad Tokushima's driving manners are
Well, people touring Japan by car don't exactly go out of their way for Tokyo
Publishing guides for a huge, traffic-choked city with great public transit feels like it's straying from the original point of all this
That's it! They're rolling out small-area editions as a setup before splitting Tokyo into multiple volumes
People will end up buying two books
Kobe's full of bad food. Even the Oriental Hotel's curry has started going on about now using onions from Awaji.
Kobe's a place for enjoying jazz and high-end audio gear, not food.
Makes you wonder if it's even in the same cultural sphere (as Kobe/Kansai)
Well, Tokushima does show up in the Kansai regional weather forecast
(meanwhile Mie doesn't, lol)
Tokushima itself basically is Kansai
It's been tied to the Kinai region (the ancient capital area) since antiquity
Most of the inspectors for the Japan edition of Michelin are actually Japanese
It's only originally a French company — the ratings themselves are made by Japanese people
Because the area under Pasona's control is nothing but mountains
The fact that you can only get there via the expressway doesn't help either
There just aren't any real tourist attractions
Just some so-so beaches, and even the sea isn't that clean
Foreign tourists know there's nothing in Nara, so they head to Osaka at night
The nice places (pricey, around 10,000 yen or so) weren't near the station — they were usually tucked inside the park
Come to think of it, that's a strange way to lay out a town…
As mentioned above, it spread because the great novelist Shiga Naoya once wrote that "Nara is a place with nothing good to eat"
If you're opening a restaurant, you'd rather do it in Kyoto or Osaka than Nara — the price points are just too different
Go there and you'll see. It's really true.
The deer in Nara Park are a protected natural monument, so you can't eat those
Just go to a regular game-meat restaurant — venison is actually pretty tasty, and Nara has places like that too
Don't hear about it much up north, but down south around Totsukawa there are places that serve it
Before the boar hot pot they brought out venison and char (iwana) sashimi and I just ate it — but heads up, both can carry parasites…
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
The “Michelin Guide” is a rating system published by a French tire company using anonymous inspectors, and with Kobe and Awaji Island now added, it becomes the fifth region covered in Japan, following Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, and Nara. Some in the thread pushed back with “why does a foreign tire company get to rate Japanese food,” though others pointed out that most inspectors for the Japan guide are actually Japanese, with the French company being only the parent organization. Much of the discussion focused less on the actual Kobe/Awaji ratings and more on the old saying “there’s nothing good to eat in Nara.” That phrase traces back to a line written by the Taisho-era novelist Shiga Naoya in an essay, and isn’t a reflection of Nara’s current food scene. There was also talk of how Awaji Island was historically part of the Tokushima domain during the Edo period, with some arguing that geographically it has stronger ties to Shikoku and the Kansai region than to Hyogo. On star counts, Tokyo is said to outnumber Kyoto and Osaka combined, fueling further debate over how the regions stack up.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Breaking News+) thread “[Hyogo] “Kobe/Awaji Island” added to Michelin Guide coverage — 5th region following “Tokyo,” “Kyoto,” “Osaka,” “Nara”.”
