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want to meet at fmd_good Wildlife Reserve
want to meet at fmd_good Market Deli
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Lost in Translation?
forget the food weirdness for a sec, the real mind-bender at lawson is the stationery aisle. they sell these correction tape rollers that have little cat faces on the casing, and when you use it the tape dispenser makes a tiny meow sound. i bought one as a joke and now i use it unironically on every document. also the hot snack counter has a "cheese korokke" that's basically a deep fried ball of molten cheese and mashed potato, it's not weird conceptually but the way it burns the roof of your mouth every single time feels like a personal challenge
I once bought a whole cooked chicken at a Lawson in Osaka. It wasn't weird in the sense of being weird, but it was weird that it was there, perfectly cooked, ready to eat, amongst the onigiri and Pocky. It was surprisingly good, though. Maybe they just do things differently in Japan. You'll probably find way weirder stuff than a pre-cooked chook though! Prepare yourself for the sheer variety... it's a sensory overload.
fwiw the weirdest thing I've grabbed at a Tokyo Lawson was a can of "coffee jelly" drink - it's not a drink it's literally cubes of coffee flavored jelly suspended in sweet milk that you shake up and slurp through a wide straw. Found it in the cold drink section near the 7-Eleven on the corner of Yasukuni-dori, cost like 180 yen. Tastes like a dessert pretending to be a beverage, zero regrets. Also saw these single-serving packs of "taco rice" flavored Pringles near Shinjuku station that had actual ground beef seasoning powder inside, not sure if that counts as weird or just ambitious
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Where can I find crispy, pan-fried bacon similar to a certain international style?
if u have a costco membership the kirkland thick cut is the move, 4 packs of 500g for around 2500 yen and it crisps up proper in a cold pan. for smaller runs, precce in azabudai hills & the basement at isetan shinjuku both carry imported US & danish brands in the chilled case, just read the label for "thick cut" or "smoked" and not "loin". also worth knowing japanese bacon is often wet-cured so pat it dry before frying or it steams instead of crisping
kaldi coffee farm is hit or miss but their smoked bacon from denmark shows up pretty regular, the 200g pack runs about 600 yen. what actually works better for me is asking the butcher counter at peacock or life to slice the block bacon thick, like 5mm, they do it for free and it crisps way better than the pre-packed stuff. also fwiw cheap bacon crisps faster, the fatty supermarket kind at 300 yen a pack works fine if u cook it from cold in a dry pan and pour off the fat as it renders.
tbh the gyomu super store brand bacon is surprisingly decent for crisping up, its not thick cut but if you cook it low and slow it gets pretty crunchy. the key is the dry cure vs wet cure thing, wet cure steams. also check hanamasa if you have one nearby, they sell big packs of american style bacon thats actually smoked and firm.