Check out a few of my favorite Kyoto veggie lunch options....there are some amazing ones despite the reputation of it being hard to find vegetarian food.
On a foggy morning I pull off the side of Highway One and into Swanton Berry Farms. Complete with brightly hand painted signs and defiantly cheery sunflowers I watch as people step out of their cars and smile. Entering an old converted barn packed with nostalgic signs shouting the praises of strawberries on every available wall space I smiled and thought, this is the California that I hope the world imagines.
This stretch of ramen restaurants on the basement floor of Tokyo station is awesome. Designed and built to highlight the best of Tokyo’s vast ramen scene, you could come here many times and eat something new and delicious every time. Offering everything from tsukemen (ramen noodles served with a dipping sauce) to hearty Sapporo-style ramen, each restaurant on ramen street is an outpost of a revered ramen joint somewhere else in the city, and was specially invited into this elite group.
After about a week of tacos al pastor and tiny little tastes of things with fried meat my body really wanted something else. Preferably something fresh and light.…like salad, but one of the changes here is the difference in availability of vegetables.
Kyra Busch has advocated for local food sovereignty for over a decade. Working with the Alternative Agriculture Network of Thailand and the Educational Network for Global and Grassroots Exchange, she worked on successful initiatives to certify and import Fair Trade Thai jasmine rice to the U.S. and to prevent an inequitable U.S.-Thai free trade agreement.
Brian Dowd-Uribe is a food systems researcher and assistant professor at University of San Francisco. He met Devon in the Environmental Studies PhD program at UC Santa Cruz.
Since moving to Mexico City in 2007, Niki Nakazawa has navigated between the art, architecture, music and food worlds. After several years working as managing editor at art and architecture publishing houses, she founded the experimental pop-up restaurant and catering company Pichón with Emma Rosenbush and Kenny Curran.