Walking Fukuoka History Apr 14 - Yatai Experience

Yatai, Fukuoka

One local thing that we wanted to try is to visit the Yatai, the mobile food stall. Actually, I didn't know such Yatai exists and my wife read to discover it. My job is to search for the congregation of Yatai and feast on some local delicacies. My wife has been talking about 明太子, so we definitely would have to try it. We found a few of Yatai along the river en route to Canal City.  Not sure why we didn't a whole group of Yatai but there were still some with queues.  As usual, my wife walked up and down to recce which stalls have the most customers and which stalls at least have things that I could eat. 

I already knew that I would feast on Ramen. No doubt about it, so no matter which Yatai, I would order Ramen. I am a "mee" person actually. My wife has no problem guessing what I like to eat for breakfast. Back to Yatai, these mobile food stalls made me recall those stalls at Chinatown. My parents brought us to some stalls with wooden tables for dinner. The concept was the same but the atmosphere was different.

We queued at one very popular Yatai among the rest and waited for our turn. The Yatai was typically small and like "western bar" concept. We got our seats next to another Jap couple - actually we were surrounded by locals, not much tourists.  The Jap couple besides us ordered Ramen and so did we. My wife spotted the couple drinking the soup in the bowl after they finished the noodles, and she followed suit. The soup was nice. We also ordered chicken satay (grilled chicken yakitori) besides the 明太子.  The yakitori tasted a bit different, a bit fatty and I just ate without thinking.  Later, my wife told me they were chicken skin! At least not chicken buttocks or chicken feet.  

The "lead actor" came - the 明太子 and it was made up of many many fish eggs. "Mentaiko" looked too "egg" for me. However, since the locals like it and we have ordered, have to go for it. My wife asked me she didn't know why many like to eat Mentaiko.  To me, it tasted a bit saltish. Fukuoka shops have different cans and packages for Mentaiko souvenirs as gifts.  Want some Mentaiko?

Yatai experiences were fun. It was a place where locals ate and drank. It felt like a open-air pub.  The bill was not cheap though, and I could sense from my wife that she preferred to dine elsewhere since the cost was similar to that in restaurant.