Last day in Kyoto

On Tuesday AM, we awoke and looked for breakfast around Kyoto Station.  We had this same problem 3 years ago when we stayed at the Granvia.  We ended up going to a couple of combinis just south of the station, and as usual, it wasn't bad.  We paired our pickings with some baked goods that we got at Burdigala Express in the Station.  

Afterwards, we wanted to get to Nishiki Market, so we took the subway to Shijo station, and roamed Shijo Dori. Emily especially wanted to go the Tokyu Hands that was on the street.

We got to Nishiki Market, just a few blocks from the Subway, and soon were immersed in food. Here are the remnants of some dango.

Warabi mochi.  It is NOT made from rice, but from Warabi, a fern that is eaten in Japan.  When young, the ferns are eaten as a vegetable (they're called fiddlehead ferns).  These are very very soft, and sticky; thus, they need to be immersed in some kind of flour or else they will stick to everything.  Usually, it is covered by Kinako, but here, macha powder is used.

Here is some Hamo fry, with a dab of miso. Hamo is Conger eel. It falls apart easily, hence this particular presentation is pretty special.

The classic picture, again, of Connie and her baby octopus with a quail egg.

We ate lunch at a Nishiki Market restaurant (there are only about one or two restaurants in the entire row), called Mochitsuki-ya.  Guess what they served?

Imayaki (grilled mochi wrapped in Nori), with noodles.

Imayaki, with COLD Ochazuke (note the ice cubes in the tea pot)

My dish!!!  Imayaki with macha ice.

Somen with Imayaki

Manju, lovely finish for a lovely lunch.

Imayaki

Next on the agenda, back to Kyoto Station so that the kids could shop and Connie and I would also do some shopping, but at a tourist location. Here is Sannen Zaka, a paved-with-stones place near Kiyomizu Dera.  Very hot!

Connie and I ended up just buying some food treats, and we skipped actually going to Kiyomizu.  We had been there twice before.

Biggest question of the trip.  Where to go for breakfast/lunch/dinner?  We had a tough one here, but finally decided on Katsukura at the top of Isetan at the station.  Emily refused to eat tonkatsu, so we ordered four smaller katsu sets, and she had a lot of the unlimited mugi gohan and cabbage salad. She was happy.  I ordered a fancier pork loin, but the server was too fast talking and even when I asked to slow down, it wasn't explained well to me.  One was more fatty and juicy, so I suspect that was the one.  We ended up just sharing all the pieces.  Em loves to grind the roasted goma.

Sam and me.

My meal.

Kyoto Station has a massive set of stairs and outdoor escalators.  It stretches up about 11 floors, with Isetan flanking both sides of the stairs.  They installed LED lights since our last visit, but we missed the LED light shows that they do nightly.  You can see it on Youtube. Here is a series of pictures that shows kind of what it might look like though, with the changing colors. Cool.  Tomorrow, we head to Amanohashidate and Kinosaki Onsen.