Is it still Friday at where you are living? Welcome to YQtravelling’s FoodFriday. The day I show off some of the lovely eats I had while travelling.
Today we’re going to Pamukkale in Turkey for some Japanese food.
Itadakimasu!
While in Pamukkale, I found out through Foursquare that there was Japanese restaurant–Lamuko no Lokanta–near the hotel which we were staying at.
My mom who was not used to Turkish food said we must visit the place so we had dinner one night. The food was so good that we went on the second day just for its desserts.
Lamuko no Lokanta
Lamuko no Lokanta, or Lamuko’s Lokata, is run by a Japanese lady. From my eavesdropping, I found out that her name wasn’t Lamuko as the shop name suggests but was Noriko.
Outside of the shop, you will see a banner with photos of different Japanese food. The sign in Japanese advises people who are not customers not to take photo of the banner, but why it was in Japanese was a mystery.
The restaurant looks like the front yard of someone’s house but with a few tables out for guests. The eating space is cosy with about 6 tables that can sit about 4 to 6 people each.
There is also a small section of Turkish seats.
What’s most amazing about the setting is the grape vine ceiling.
When we were there in end-May, the grapes were just growing. It would be amazing if the grapes were ripe and everyone could pick them off their vines.
Lamuko no Lokanta’s menu
Since this is not a post about the setting of Lamuko, I’ll get on talking about the food.
The restaurant’s menu is decorated in the Japanese-cute style with little speech bubbles above hand drawn animals.
Apart from Japanese meals, the menu includes Turkish food and simple western dishes such as spaghetti.
The pasta section warned that spaghetti is a dish everyone must avoid in Turkey, but it’s ok to order it at Lamuko’s because they cook it nicely. (Mom did order a spaghetti Bolognese at another place. It was too squish and quite gross.)
On the menu, the ginger chicken rice bowl is the most popular dish. Mom got this for dinner.
The chicken was fragrant and did taste of ginger. Mom even felt that the rice serving was too much.
For me, I ordered an omurice. I absolutely adore omurice, going to the extend of travelling to an omurice speciality restaurant in Tokyo.
The omurice was alright at Lamuko. The egg omelette blanketed the tomato sauce rice, instead of the usual egg wrapping. It was tasty enough that I finished the whole thing.
While we were eating, the owner brought over a plate of dark cherries. This turns out to be a complimentary dessert. Yums.
After our meal, we ordered Today’s Desserts. It was a banana cake. Mom’s favorite cake is banana cake so she happily ate it.
When we went back the next day, Today’s Desserts was still banana cake but we ordered it anyway because we loved it so much.
We sipped apple tea at the restaurant. It was 1.50 lira each, a reasonable price compared with other restaurants.
Modelling Clay, the dog
When we were dining at night, a large golden lab came in. It picked up a squished mineral water bottle and brought it to me and my mom.
Even though it showed big puppy dog eyes, mom and I were not dog people so we only gave it sad glances and ignored the bottle.
The owner called the dog “Nendou”, which means “modelling clay” in Japanese. That is just the most adorable name for a dog.
YQtravelling 