Restaurant City Blog

Hello Resterantaurs! I hope you have all recovered from the invasion of eggs last week!

This week for something entirely different, this Thursday when the new items arrive we will be celebrating the Japanese Hanami Festival! To learn more about the Hanami Festival, you can read the wikipedia article:

Hanami (花見, lit. “flower viewing”) is the Japanese traditional custom of enjoying the beauty of flowers, “flower” in this case almost always meaning cherry blossoms (桜 or 櫻, sakura), or ume blossoms (梅, ume).From mid January to early May, sakura bloom all over Japan. The blossom forecast (桜前線, sakurazensen, lit. cherry blossom front) is announced each year by the weather bureau, and is watched carefully by those planning hanami as the blossoms only last a week or two. In modern-day Japan, hanami mostly consists of having an outdoor party beneath the sakura during daytime or at night. Hanami at night is called yozakura (lit. “night sakura”). In many places such as Ueno Park temporary paper lanterns are hung for the purpose of yozakura.

We are celebrating this festival with a range of themed items, as well as new dishes that uses brand new ingredients that are created just for this occasion! We hope you will join in and celebrate the blossoming season!

First off, let´s check out those new ingredients and dishes! First up the new ingredients that you need to start hunting for are seaweed and salmon! For the dishes this week, there are three new dishes! The Miso Soup for starter, the Sushi Selection for main course and the Green Tea drink.  All three dishes this week are permanent additions so you have all the time in the world to learn them!

Seaweed		Salmon
Miso Soup (starter)	Sushi Selection (Main)	Green Tea (Drink)

Did you know that “Sushi” literally means “it´s sour” ?  There are also many different varieties of Sushi which you can read more about on wikipedia:

The traditional form of sushi is fermented fish and rice, preserved with salt in a process that has been traced to Southeast Asia, where it remains popular today. The term sushi comes from an archaic grammatical form no longer used in other contexts; literally, “sushi” means “it’s sour”, a reflection of its historic fermented roots.

The science behind the fermentation of fish packed in rice is that the vinegar produced from fermenting rice breaks the fish down into amino acids. This results in one of the five basic tastes, called umami in Japanese.The oldest form of sushi in Japan, Narezushi still very closely resembles this process. In Japan, Narezushi evolved into Oshizushi and ultimately Edomae nigirizushi, which is what the world today knows as “sushi.”

Contemporary Japanese sushi has little resemblance to the traditional lacto-fermented rice dish. Originally, when the fermented fish was taken out of the rice, only the fish was consumed and the fermented rice was discarded. The strong-tasting and -smelling funazushi, a kind of narezushi made near Lake Biwa in Japan, resembles the traditional fermented dish. Beginning in the Muromachi period (AD 1336–1573) of Japan, vinegar was added to the mixture for better taste and preservation. The vinegar accentuated the rice’s sourness, and was known to increase its life span, allowing the fermentation process to be shortened and eventually abandoned. In the following centuries, sushi in Osaka evolved into oshi-zushi. The seafood and rice were pressed using wooden (usually bamboo) molds. By the mid 18th century, this form of sushi had reached Edo (contemporary Tokyo).

The contemporary version, internationally known as “sushi,” was invented by Hanaya Yohei (華屋与兵衛; 1799–1858) at the end of Edo period in Edo. The sushi invented by Hanaya was an early form of fast food that was not fermented (therefore prepared quickly) and could be eaten with one’s hands roadside or in a theatre. Originally, this sushi was known as Edomae zushi, because it used freshly caught fish in the Edo-mae (Edo Bay or Tokyo Bay). Though the fish used in modern sushi no longer usually comes from Tokyo Bay, it is still formally known as Edomae nigirizushi.

That´s the ingredients and dishes, let´s take a look at the items that you can expect to see in the stores on Thursday at midnight GMT this week! For the outside you cannot miss the Japanese Roof, the Japanese Wall Corner or the Japanese Doorway if you are going for the Hanami theme this week! And of course you cannot miss the Sakura Tree which is a functional item and it will spread cherry blossoms around your restaurant!

Japanese Doorway	Japanese Roof	Japanese Wall Corner
Japanese Wall	Japanese Window	Mountain Tree
Garden Rock	Japanese Stone Lantern	Tiny Tree
Sushi Sign	Tsunami Banner	Tiny Bush
Pink Stone Lantern	Japanese Banner	Japanese Drum
	Sakura Tree

So what is in store for you on Thursday for the inside of your restaurant? More Japanese inspired themes of course! You need to check out the Japanese Garden Picture, the Zen Table and Chair as well as the Samurai Armor! There are also 4 new functional items that will be available from this Thursday. The Ceremonial Drink Set which will cook drinks 8% faster and the Teppanyaki Grill which will cook 3% faster compared to normal drink machines and stoves. The High Tech Smart Toilet which will work 4x longer without breaking and your customers can do their deed 40% faster on this toilet! And not to forget the Cherry Blossom Tree which will spread cherry blossoms inside your restaurant, the more Trees you have, the more cherry blossoms will be spread.

Sushi Table	Zen Chair	Zen Table
Teppanyaki Grill	Ceremonial Drink Set	High Tech Smart Toilet
Shoji Screen Wallpaper	Japanese Garden Picture	Tatami Mat
Katana Decor	Samurau Sword Decor	Samurai Armor
Bonzai	Japanese Divider	Sakura Wallpaper
Shuriken Decor	Sushi Sign Decor (free gift only)	Delicious Sign Decor
	Cherry Blossom Tree

To complete your Japanese Theme, we also have a range of other Japanese items that have been available for a while on sale this week! Go get them now!

Make sure you post your feedback – we love to hear from you! Have a fun-filled Restaurant City week!