Kyoto Street Food Crawl Through Nishiki Market

Kyoto street food is a series of small decisions that add up very fast. We went into Nishiki Market for a wander one afternoon and came out a few hours later having eaten far too many things. These are the ones I remember.

The Kyoto street food we ate at Nishiki Market

Sparrow

Sitting next to the grilled eel, with a sign daring me to take the Sparrow Challenge. It turns out this is a proper Kyoto thing and not a tourist stunt. Suzume kushi is said to be where yakitori began, back when sparrows were pests in the rice fields, and Kyoto is one of the last places still selling it. It was okay. A bit gamey. I am glad I tried it, but I am not gonna eat it again.

¥700 a skewer · 2/5

Yuba croquette

It is made of yuba, the skin that forms on top of simmering soy milk and gets lifted off by hand, folded here through a white cream sauce and fried in the posh olive oil they sell at the front of the shop. They claim it is the best croquette in Kyoto and I was in no state to argue. Crisp outside, molten inside, into a paper bag and gone in four bites.

¥300 · 5/5

Nukazuke

Nukazuke is fermented vegetables, pickled in rice bran and salt, and the shop had a whole laminated sign explaining that this Kyoto street food counts as a superfood. I have decided to believe the sign. Properly refreshing.

¥580 · 3/5

Takotamago

A baby octopus with a quail egg tucked inside its head, glazed in sweet soy until it goes glossy and red. I love octopus, and I love tamago, so this was two of my favourite things in Japan on one stick.

The stall signs call it a Nishiki speciality, and the lady suggested I eat the head in one go; otherwise the egg will fall, she explained with a lighthearted gesture.

¥350 · 5/5

Okaki

Rice crackers are big in Kyoto. Okaki is made from glutinous mochi rice, so it puffs and chews, while senbei is made from ordinary rice and snaps. I had the chilli one freshly made, still hot and sticky, which is the correct temperature for winter. I gulped it down with a ¥100 shot of sakura sake from nearby. Bliss.

¥1,404 for seven flavours · 5/5

Candied chestnut

Made with Tanba chestnuts from the north of Kyoto Prefecture, and it tasted like candy. So nice. I remember making a note to come back and buy a bag. As usual, we forgot. Oh well. It is Japan; there is always next time.

¥120 for one and ¥500 for five · 5/5

Black soybean tea

Kyoto does this one well. The beans are Tanba black soybeans, from the same corner of Kyoto Prefecture as the chestnuts above. I later had the same black soybean in cracker form as an onsen snack in Kinosaki, and I have been obsessed ever since.

3/5

Grilled Ayu fish

Salt-grilled with the roe still in. Ayu is a river fish, and the name roughly translates as sweetfish. You can eat the whole thing, head and bones and everything else, and the ones carrying roe are the autumn catch, taken on their way downstream to spawn. The first time I had ayu was at Yunomine Onsen, and something about that whole day makes me feel good every time I think about it, so now I love ayu fish. It is weird how one experience can imprint a love for a food on you as an adult.

¥700 · 5/5

Red bean mochi

Pounded glutinous rice wrapped around sweet azuki paste, and Kyoto is where Japanese sweets got refined in the first place, courtesy of centuries of tea ceremony.

Very convenient for me, because it is one of my favourite not-too-sweet sweets, and this one tasted ten times better than anything I get in Australia.

5/5

Whelk

A sea snail, and another first for me. Simmered, sweet, chewy in the right way. Tasty.

Ps. The sign said the shellfish came up from Hokkaido, so this one is Kyoto street food by postcode only.

¥400 · 4/5

That is ten things in a few hours, one gamey aftertaste and one bag of chestnuts I still owe myself. If you are only doing one food thing in Kyoto, make it a Kyoto street food crawl through Nishiki Market, and do it hungry.

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