I screamed for ice cream!

I went to the Yokohama Ice cream expo yesterday. It is being held in the Aka Renga (red brick warehouses) out on the bay front in Yokohama.
I arrived there late so I only got to sample about 7 ice creams.
Here's a closer view of the main poster:
I think this is a woman. They are from Akita and apparently, she said she was the only one who could make these flower ices.
Strawberry and banana flavors. Tasted very artificial but my friend loved it. Looks good but 400yen isn't cheap.
Here's a montage of all flavors in the festival. Took my bloody ages to photo them all. The pit viper ice had run out, unfortunately. I stayed away from the raw horse flesh and the cow tongue ice creams. Click on pic to see full size (big)
My friend ordered a goya soft cream, from the lbue Seal guys in Okinawa. It wasn't bad. Creamy and a little bitter.
Next up, I tried a holstein (good cows) soft cream from Hokkaido. It was okay but WAY too creamy. A bit too smooth too.

I decided to try a curry ice cream, as I was feeling hungry.
Good! a bit spicy and burned the throat a little but I liked it.

Didn't like this, though:
Absolutley horrible.

I had enough time to chance one last ice cream, so I grabbed the crab ice cream.

It was not bad. a bit strange at first but I got used to the taste.

All in all, an intersting little festival. If youliek ice cream then I recommend paying this a visit. You'll find a lto fo itneresting ice creams from all over Japan, asll in one place. It's not cheap. The cups ranged from 300 to over 450yen. The other ice creams seemed to be a bout 350 or 400yen.

Yokohama ice cream expo 6/10.

First day of Hibiya Oktoberfest 08:

Just some brief info on the Oktoberfest 2008 in Hibiya park.

Pics of a busy first evening:
It's very dissapointing that the stage has been moved to right behind the one covered area. Its very small and mos tof the people can't se it and there's no space for friendly communal dancing. This part seems to be totally shite this year.
Loads of people around the fountain (which seems to have been cleaned up, so maybe I'll be scaling the centre for the third time, this year?):
Here's a quick drunken video I took:

Beer choices:

In one place you have the standard Bitburger/Erdinger for around 1300 a pint (plus deposit for glass).
At another you can splash out on some Franziskaner (nice eber but way overpriced) at 1500yen a pint.
The spaaten optimator and bock go for 1200 a pint:Or you could try the friendly local beer section:On offer are Yokohama beer and Fujisakura beer, both about 1,000yen a pint. Better value and the money is staying in Japan (I think).

Here's the new young brewer at Yokohama beer , smiling behind his bohemian pilsner:It wasn't bad. Would've liked a bit more bite, but not too bad.

Now the Fujisakura weiisen dunkle:Amazing smell. So much banana . Not a bad drink.

Next I treid the new Fujisakura Marzen:It was ok but not as good as the dunkle weissen.

I left the Oktoberfest as it was winding down. I'm thinking Saturday should be a big day. Friday was very buys but the guy at fujisakura is expecting 70 members of a weissbeer club and I7m expecting about 50 from Tim's beer club so it should be interesting.

Beer area to reccommend has got to be the Fujisakura beer section. I only hope they put in their rauch beer, instead of the marzen. Alas, the chief brewer told me he may stick it on when the dunkle wiessen runs out so drink it while you can.

Kirin The Gold - or the bronze?

Today I bought Kirin's new beer - The Gold.

It's supposedly an all malt pilsner (as opposed to almost all the other 'beers' out there which contain rice and corn starch to help make up the sugars that become alcohol - a silly tax law in Japan lets beer companies save moeny by using less barley in their beers. The result is happoshite and other such cheap crap. The basic drinker doesn't mind, as they save money and still get drunk. Well, I still hold out for the real stuff).
Anyway, I decided to give this 'beer' a whirl.


The result?
Well, it has a higher than average maltiness to it, I'd give it that.
Dry taste too, but nothing special. Still empty, bodywise. Slightly above average.
5.5/10. No suprise, really.

I'm gonna wait until the 4th of the 4th (April) to taste what I hope is going to be a nice beer, from the guys at Sapporro: