One Saturday we shove our homework into a corner and make a dash for San Francisco before another spring storm takes over the bay. Parking is as easy as hiking with a twisted ankle, but all that matters is we find a spot, then stroll a mile to the food bazaar on Webster street, Japan Town, arriving just a little bit before noon. Up from the steep sidewalk we see rows of white tents and white chairs, smoke rolling above the grills covered with beef and pork riblets, a line getting long on one side of the conglomeration. It is still early in the first morning of the Cherry Blossom Festival.
The carnivore instinct leads me right to the grill. It’s never too early to eat meat. The first booth whips out rice bowls with either ribs or unagi, braised eel cut into palm long chunks. We don’t feel like filling up with a rice bowl just yet, so we walk further down the row eying signs, then back track to the Nihonmachi Little Friends’ booth for three skewers of grilled beef at a mere five bucks.
Crispy-charred-edge marinated beef, though erring a little on the chewy side, delight my feet after that hike from our parking spot. The downright old school meatiness would have well enhanced the kiddie dollar snack omusubi, wedges of plain white rice mixed with nori bits, which Mudpie buys way after we finished the skewers. Waste not want not, the musubi will find its place in my lunch this week, after I wrap it up in nori sheets and maybe with a slice of fried spam. My idea sprouts from seeing at least three booths selling spam musubi and dozens of family walking around with golden brown sauce at the corner of their mouths. I, however, fall victim to the facile yakisoba, soft stir fry noodle with crunchy cabbage dressed only with soy sauce and seaweed sprinkles. The noodle tastes flatter than it looks, and certainly flatter than the wad of six dollar bills we pay for it, but it is a good pacifier for the empty stomach.