Note: Adjust wasabi content according to your tolerance! What you'll need:

• 1 avocado (very ripe)
• 2 tablespoons for high quality mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons of wasabi powder mixed with an equal amount of water
• 1 teaspoon of light soy sauce
• Salt

What to do:

1. Peel avocado and remove seed.
2. Mash it up until smooth.
3. Add the above ingredients and mix thoroughly.
4. Salt to taste.

The very first coin-operated vending machines were built in London in the early 1880s and these first machine sold postcards. The first vending machines in the United States were built in 1888 and sold chewing gum on train platforms in New York City. Since then vending machines have exploded in popularity and there is no place in the world where vending machines are more popular than they are in Japan.

In the Japanese alps, a 150 year old wooden home in Ueda is where Mikio Koda runs his bakery, who learned his trade from a French baker who was living in Japan.

Using only quality ingredients, the bakers at Levain use domestically grown wheat and natural salt.

Koda is so serious about his ingredients that he uses a wild yeast he's cultivated for almost 30 years! Just meters away from their kitchen's stone oven, Koda's fare sits on wooden trays that were once used for sake in their previous lives.

Levain, 2-43-13 Tomigaya, Shibuya-ku;

Tip: Using pre-seasoned chicken will prevent your chicken burning and drying out. What you'll need:

• 1 pound of boneless, skinless chicken thighs chopped into small skewer size pieces.
• 12 bamboo skewers
• 4 baby leeks cut into 1 inch lengths

Basting Sauce:

• 3 tbsps of Mirin
• 2 tbsps of soy sauce
• 2 heaping tbsps of sugar

Cooking:

Morning...

Serves: 1

What you'll need...

• 15g of dried bonito fish flakes
• 2 eggs
• 1/4 tsp of vinegar
• A splash of cooking oil
• Japanese radish
• Soy sauce

Step 1 Boil roughly 100ml of water and add dried bonito flakes. Once the water returns to a boil, strain it and retain the stock.

Step 2 Beat eggs and add your stock and vinegar.

Both Vancouver and San Francisco are known for their huge number of Chinese restaurants.

However, with the ever increasing popularity of Japanese food, Japanese restaurants now rival that of Chinese and Italian restaurants throughout North America.  

If you are a fan of Japanese food and a lover of sushi, you probably know what wasabi is. It's that green, spicy condiment. But what a lot of people don't realize is that the wasabi you normally eat with your sushi probably isn't "real" wasabi at all.

If you're a fan of Japanese food, you've likely had the pleasure of eating this delicious spinach salad with sesame dressing, or "Horenso no goma-ae" as it's known in Japanese.

What you'll need...

• 5  1/4 ounces (150 g) of fresh spinach.
• 1/2 tsp of light soy sauce

Japanese beer has become extremely popular due to its unique flavoring, refreshing taste and distinct body.  Beer lovers everywhere are beginning to wake up to the pleasures of Japan’s top beers, especially when it complements well with Sushi. 

With over 5000 types of crab on our oceans, around 1/5 are found in and around Japanese waters. Despite these numbers, only a handful are used in Japanese food.

Swimming Crab

The "swimming crab" or "Watari Gani/Gazami" as it's known in Japanese, is a common species found off the coast of Japan, Korea, and China. The reason they are known as the "swimming crab" is because they are pretty good swimmers, for a crab that is - their hind legs resemble flippers. During the winter months, the pregnant female of this species is considered a delicacy.