August 25, 2011

Tsumugi Cafe in Shiozawa/塩沢のつむぎカフェ

Today, my daughter and I went to Tsumugi Cafe in Shiozawa around noon.  Tsumugi means pongee.  Shiozawa is very famous for its pongee and other types of fabric.
今日は、昼頃、塩沢にある「つむぎカフェ」に娘と行きました。つむぎとはpongeeという意味です。塩沢は、紬(つむぎ)などの織物でとても有名です。
(This photo was taken in March 2010. I forgot to take a picture of the exterior of the cafe today!)
(この写真は2010年3月に撮ったものです。今日は、カフェの外観の写真を撮るのを忘れました!)

Luckily, today's cake was sawayaka (refreshing) rare cheesecake! "Rare" means unbaked.
運良く、今日のケーキは、さわやかレアチーズケーキでした。「レア」とは焼いてないという意味です。
Interior of the cafe:
カフェの内部:
These bags are for sale.
バッグは売り物です。
So are the carpets on the tatami (straw mat) floor.
畳の床の上のカーペットも。
We ordered one set of rare cheesecake and one set of dry curry, and shared them.
レアチーズケーキセットとドライカレーセットを1セットづつ注文して、分けました。
You can see wet oshibori (hand towels) and glasses of mugicha (barley tea). The dry curry comes with fukujin zuke and rakkyo (pickled shallots).
おしぼりと麦茶の入ったコップが見えます。ドライカレーには福神漬けと、らっきょうが付いています。

I ordered iced coffee as part of the set, and my daughter ordered banana juice.
私はセットの一部としてアイスコーヒーを、娘はバナナジュースを頼みました。
The plate next to the iced coffee has small cups of gum syrup and fresh cream on it.
アイスコーヒーの隣りのお皿には、ガムシロップと生クリームが入ったカップが載っています。

I don't know how popular iced coffee is in other countries/areas, but it's very popular in Japan.
アイスコーヒーが他の国・地域でどのくらい一般的か知りませんが、日本では非常に一般的です。

10 comments:

Sissi said...

I wish I could go there... Unfortunately I would certainly spend some money on the things which they sell...
Iced coffee is not very popular in Switzerland, although very fancy cafés (serving several types of coffee, fruit syrups, dozens of different teas... as someone said "girlie places", not the traditional ones) serve it.

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: You mean you are interested in Shiozawa pongee?
Here is some info on it:
http://kougeihin.jp/en/crafts/introduction/weaving/2796

Whether you like iced coffee or not, hot coffee is not a wise choice on a hot summer day (laugh)!

Sissi said...

Hiroyuki, thank you for the link! It's a pity the photo gallery link below doesn't work...
You are right! and every time I went to Italy in the Summer and saw Italians drinking very strong and hot coffee all day long I wondered how they managed to look clean, not sweaty etc.. I love strong and hot coffee, but when it's hot I drink it only in the morning, to wake up.

Fräulein Trude said...

Hiroyuki: iced coffee- yes it is very well liked but with crushed ice and some extra flavour as vanilla, caramell, cinnamon and nowadays often mixed with milk foam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frapp%C3%A9_coffee. Without milk "frappe" with milk "laccino" and made from real espresso and not instant coffee.
My collegues are crazy about shooting vouchers for coffee and junk food servings via internet (so called hot deals at starbucks, balzac or the like), afterwards we pay only half the price with voucher. So we visit cafes quite often during lunchbreak - until we run out of vouchers of cause (laugh). But these guys are always up to date with new offers.
There is iced coffee with one or two scoops of vanilla ice cream and whipped cream (optional) too or iced and spiced milk tea.
Kiki

Karupin said...

Iced coffee is very popular in Austria, but you mostly get it with some scoops of vanilla ice cream and lots of whipped cream on top. I´m not much of a coffee drinker (more a tea fan) but since our visits to Japan my mother loves the japanese version with crushed ice and no sugar. Sadly you don´t get much iced tea here (just this overly sweet stuff). Thank you for always sharing your pictures and reports about foods and festivals, even if it´s just pictures of some dagashi :-)

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: Prabably what they mean by "Photo Gallery" is the collection of photos below the title.
You can always do a Google image search for 塩沢紬 (Shiozawa tsumugi in Japanese).
Here is a video on the Shiozawa Tsumugi Memorial Museum
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7HRRz14JnE
which is only a one-minute walk from the cafe.

Hiroyuki said...

Kiki: Thanks for your description and the link.

I don't know why, but Frappé coffee is not very popular in Japan. That's fine with me because I am kind of a coffee purist, meaning that I almost always drink coffee without adding anything else.

Hiroyuki said...

Karupin: Thanks for your comment.

I'm glad to know that I have a reader in Austria!

muskratbyte said...

I would absolutely love to visit a fabrics store in Japan! In the US, iced coffee is very popular. I live in Texas - right now it is 43C here! あついですね? So, right now my coffee is always iced!

Hiroyuki said...

muskrat: Shiozawa is also the home of Echigo-jofu:
http://www.unesco.org/archives/multimedia/index.php?s=films_details&id_page=33&id_film=315
Very rare and expensive!