Not Made in My Kitchen: November 2016

Wednesday, November 23, 2016

Hokkaido Autumn Road Trip 2016 (Part 8) - Yoichi and Otaru

Date: 16/9/2016 (forgot to record today's weather)

We woke up, went over to Times Car Rental and collected our car for the day.
This time, we no longer got an upgrade. It was a subcompact, Mazda Demio. Car collection time was much shorter as the center knew we just returned a car the day before, and the briefing time was really brief, well, it's protocol, they still had to do it.

We went to Sapporo Curb Market to have breakfast. I will write about it in the next post.

After an unsatisfactory breakfast, we went on our way to Yoichi

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Hokkaido Autumn Road Trip 2016 (Part 7) - Obihiro and Tokachi Subprefecture

After the land of Seafood, here I come to the land of agriculture.

Tokachi is a subprefecture in Hokkaido and Obihiro is the city in this subprefecture. Tokachi has a large agriculture sector and the main crops produced are wheat, potatoes, beets, and beans, but there has also been progress in the production of nagaimo (Chinese yam), lily root and burdock. The amount of arable land in Tokachi is the highest in all of Hokkaido.

Animal husbandry is big business in Tokachi with a major dairy industry. Tokachi itself has 40% of beef and dairy cattle in all of Hokkaido. Tourists come to Tokachi to visit dairy farms and savour the dairy products. 十勝牛乳 is a common milk brand in Hokkaido and the name is translated as Tokachi Milk, produced by Yotsuba company.

Tokachi produces the largest amount of wheat in Japan. The headquarters of 3 nationally renowned pastry companies Rokkatei, Ryugetsu, and Cranberry are also located in Obihiro. There are many interesting pastry shops in Obihiro and I don't think it is possible to try all of them in one trip.

There are lots of restaurants in Obihiro. Really a lot! And I saw quite a number of them putting a sign infront of their shop that English Menu is available. The Tokachi Subprefectural Bureau is heavily promoting Tokachi as a tourist destination, but is often overlooked by foreign tourists. There are many websites providing up-to-date information for tourists, and they even have printable translating sheets (for pointing) for basic conversation needs. They do understand that tourists need to be understood and tourists hope to enjoy this area and not feeling lost.