Tokyo restaurant’s mega pasta is so huge they’ll pay you US$455 if you can eat it all by yourself

If you’re hungry and quick enough, this eating challenge in Tokyo’s liveliest student neighborhood can earn you a stack of cash.

Here at SoraNews24, we never back down from a challenge…as long as that challenge involves trying to eat a ridiculous amount of food. So no sooner had we walked away from the table after ordering a triple-decker wagyu beef hamburger steak in Akihabara, we were already looking for our next edible adversary, and boy did we find one.

Right now, the branch of the Stamina Taro Next restaurant chain in Tokyo’s Takadanobaba neighborhood is offering what it calls the Meaty Mega-mori Stamina Taro Napolitan Spaghetti, “mega-mori” being the Japanese phrase for “mega-sized” food. The restaurant is in no way kidding around with that descriptor, either, as the entree weighs a mind-blowing 3.7 kilograms (8.14 pounds).

▼ It’s a two-kilogram pile of spaghetti topped with a 500-gram hamburger steak, four strips of bacon, and no fewer than four pork cutlets. Oh, and it also comes with tonkatsu and cheese sauces on the side.

Stamina Taro Next is a pretty casual restaurant, but still, all that chow doesn’t come cheap, as the Meaty Mega-mori Stamina Taro Napolitan is priced at 10,800 yen (US$98). Still, the last time we went out and paid 10,000 yen for spaghetti, we only got 2.3 kilograms of food. Plus, when you order the Meaty Mega-mori Stamina Taro Napolitan, it’s actually an investment, since you can profit from eating it.

▼ Deep-fried gold!

See, if you, all by yourself, can finish the entire Meaty Mega-mori Stamina Taro Napolitan in 30 minutes or less, not only will Stamina Taro Next waive your bill, they’ll also give you 50,000 yen (US$455) gift certificate as a prize!

Intrigued by this opportunity to indulge both his avaricious and gluttonous tendencies, our Japanese-language reporter Ahiru Neko volunteered to take on the challenge, boldly telling us “I’ve been waiting for something like this. Leave it to me. I’ll finish it off in a flash. How can I do that? You doubt me, the Dekamori Assasin? Hahaha!”

▼ Ahiru Neko can be a pretty intense dude under the right conditions.

Though his confidence didn’t waver, Ahiru Neko’s vocal boisterousness changed to quiet resolve once the Meaty Mega-mori Stamina Taro Napolitan was placed before him. While he’d been waiting for the server to bring him his food, he’d been mentally calculating his battle plan, giving himself eight minutes to eat the pork cutlets, another eight for the pasta, three minutes for the hamburger steak, and finally three more for the bacon, which would leave him with eight minutes to lean back and contentedly pat his stomach before his 30 minutes were up.

Stamina Taro Next is kind enough to provide challengers with a timer, and we kept one eye on it and the other on Ahiru Neko’s display of eating prowess. Occasionally he’d mumble his impressions, such as “Wow, these cutlets taste great” or “You know, this bacon is really high-quality,” but for the most part he only sounds we heard were from his constantly moving fork and jaws.

Ahiru Neko’s original target time of 22 minutes came and went, and still he wasn’t finished. But while he never stopped eating, neither did time stop flowing, and before long, the timer’s chime went off, letting us know the 30 minutes were up…

…despite a huge amount of pasta and meat being left over.

“Starting with the cutlets was a mistake on my part,” Ahiru Neko said, immediately launching into a post-loss self-revue of his tactics. “It really threw off mu pace. Pork cutlets must be like my Achilles’ heel,” he continued. Really, we think “kryptonite” is the term he was looking for, but we weren’t entirely sure his ears weren’t filled with pasta by this point, so we didn’t bother correcting him. “Still, I’d like to congratulate Stamina Taro Next on its victory,” he announced, graciously admitting defeat

▼ When you’re beat, you’re beat.

With the one-on-one portion of this battle finished, fellow reporter P.K. Sanjun and SoraNews24 owner Yoshio, who’d accompanied Ahiru Neko to the restaurant, started in on the leftovers. and were happy to find that Stamina Taro Next’s Meaty Mega-mori Stamina Taro Napolitan is incredibly tasty.

And lest you think the restaurant is only offering the 50,000-yen prize because they know they’ve set the bar impossibly high, the staff told us that Ahiru Neko is the third person to attempt the challenge, and that both of his predecessors succeeded. So incredible as it sounds, soloing the Meaty Mega-mori Stamina Taro Napolitan is within the capabilities of humanity, and if you’d like to try your hand/stomach, the challenge is in effect until March 14.

Restaurant information
Stamina Taro Next (Big Box Takadanobaba branch)/ すたみな太郎NEXT BIGBOX高田馬場店
Address: Tokyo-to, Shinjuku-ku, Takadanoababa 1-35-3, Big Box 9th floor
東京都新宿区高田馬場 1-35-3 BIGB OX 9階
Open 11 a.m.-11:30 p.m.
Website

Photos ©SoraNews24



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Domino’s Pizza Japan offers discount to customers in masks for limited time

The special “mask discount” aims to support people suffering from colds and hay fever at this time of year.

Big international brands like Domino’s love thinking outside the box when entertaining the local market in Japan, coming up with all sorts of creative ideas like reindeer delivery bikes, Hatsune Miku collaborations, and romantic kabe-don delivery offers.

Now Domino’s is outdoing itself with another limited-time special, this time coinciding with the transitional period between winter and spring, when many people around Japan can be seen sporting face masks, either due to colds and flu or to protect themselves from pollen during hay fever season.

The new offer, called “Mask-wari” or “Mask Discount“, gives customers a 41-percent discount on all pizzas, as long as they meet one condition: they must be wearing a mask when they receive their order.

According to Domino’s, the idea for the unusual offer came about after they conducted a survey amongst 100 of their employees, asking them to indicate the reasons why they would wear a mask. The results showed the majority of responses (41 percent) pointed to hay fever as the number one reason for mask-wearing.

A second survey, asking employees what they most wanted to eat when suffering from hay fever, revealed that pizza was the most popular choice. This was all the data Domino’s needed to come up with their new discount deal – cheap pizza for mask wearers during the February/March spring hay fever season.

Given that stepping outdoors into the pollen-filled air can be a difficult task for pizza-loving hay fever sufferers, Domino’s has decided to limit their Mask Discount deal to online delivery orders only. This means that customers won’t have to head outside to get their pizzas, but to get the 41 percent discount, they will have to receive their delivery at the door while wearing a face mask.

The offer, which runs from 26 February to 11 March, can be taken up by entering the discount code QMK41 on the online ordering site. And if you’re thinking about taking part in the campaign, don’t forget that in Japan, the word “mask” refers to the white masks commonly worn by people to ward off colds and allergies, so don’t count on getting the discount if you answer the door in a mask with glowing, soul-sucking eyes like this one!

Source: PR Times
Featured image: PR Times
Insert images: PR Times (1, 2) Pakutaso



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Japanese art reference book is all about panty poses, promises to have you drawing undies ASAP

Panties and socks also part of the deal that’s made the book Amazon’s number-one best-seller in its category.

Japan is a country that loves to draw. With an robust animation and video game industry, the skills of professional-class illustrators are always in demand, and growing up in that environment means that the nation also has a huge population of student and amateur enthusiast artists, especially now that they can share their work online via social media.

Another thing that Japan loves is panties. So budding illustrators who already own, for instance, a book that teaches them how to draw a cop flipping over another cop will be happy to know that soon they’ll be able to buy an entire reference book for how to draw pantie shots and poses.

Preorders have begun for the Specialized Pantie Pose Collection-We Love Panties, So We Want to Draw Them ASAP, a new illustrator’s reference from Tokyo-based publisher Genkosha. And yes, it’s already leaped to number one on Amazon Japan’s sales chart for the art reference category.

▼ Helping readers with their hard, lengthy studies of perspective and anatomy.

It bears repeating that this isn’t just a bound collection of smutty photos (though, if so inclined, purchasers can easily use it in that manner). The 207-page tome contains a plethora of pantie poses featuring different styles of underwear, to help up-and-coming artists avoid pigeonholing their output into just one style of lower lingerie.

▼ While it’s not one of the standard myths about Japanese high schools, we should mention anyway that classrooms in Japan generally don’t have steel poles running through them.

▼ Aqua-and-white striped panties are naturally included, given their prominence in anime…

▼ …as are sock-inclusive poses, because Japanese fetishists are pretty unabashed.

If this is indeed the sort of book you’ve been waiting for (for artistic improvement purposes, of course), preorders can be placed here with Amazon Japan, which is selling Specialized Pantie Pose Collection-We Love Panties, so We Want to Draw them ASAP for 2,700 yen (US$25), with shipping scheduled for April 7.

Source: Otakomu
Featured image: Twitter/@lewographix
Top, insert images: Amazon Japan/サイトウ零央



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Should saying thanks at a Japanese convenience store go without saying?

Manners maketh the man. Unless he’s at a convenience store, according to some Japanese social media users as debate over manners erupts.

As the saying goes, being polite doesn’t cost a thing. Except, it does. It uses up some of our ever so valuable seconds, seconds that could be spent doing much more worthwhile things. Personally, I always say thank you but more out of habit than a genuine feeling of gratitude, so that more than once I’ve found myself thanking the automated check-outs at the supermarket. Similarly, I always say thank you to convenience store staff in Japan when I pop in for my daily essentials. But, according to more than a few Japanese social media users, I and my fellow gratitude-expressing kin just look ridiculous, or creepy.

▼ A typical convenience store customer engaging in a ceremonial bow to express his gratitude for the shop clerk heating his bento in the microwave.

There are plenty arguing that people saying at least a single word to show their appreciation should be common sense, whether it be arigatou gozaimasu (equivalent to thank you very much), arigatou (thank you), doumo (thanks, or ta), or the horribly grating to English-speakers’ ears, sankyuu. A surprisingly large number argued the opposite though, including some convenience store staff.

“I always say thanks, but I often overhear people behind me saying things like, ‘Aren’t they embarrassed?’, or ‘What an idiot!'”
“There are so many rude people! I get so annoyed!”
“What exactly are you supposed to be thankful for?”
“There’s no difference between them and vending machines, what do they care if you mumble something or not.”
“As a clerk, it’s really creepy when people start thanking you.”
“I don’t say anything, only weird people do, right?”
“Arigatou gozaimasu is a bit much, but you should at least say arigatou.”
“I bet all the people who don’t say anything have never worked a job like that.”

A survey conducted by a student part-time job-finder site MyNavi found that only 21.8% of respondents said thanks every time, while 24.1% never said anything at all. In an earlier survey by the same company, thirty convenience store clerks were asked how being thanked made them feel and the answer was a unanimous “happy”, so maybe some of those who joined in the debate on the not-saying-anything side will rethink their stance…or take a leaf out of the foreigners in Japan handbook.

Source: Yahoo! News Japan/J Cast News via jin115
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert images: Pakutaso



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Crazy-huge triple-decker wagyu hamburger steak will draw you to Akihabara even if you hate anime

Why eat nine Quarter Pounders when you can eat this instead?

Our Japanese-language reporter Seiji knows a thing or two about dreaming impossible dreams. He’s had both his romantic and musical hopes dashed again and again, but still, his heart burns with the passion to rise to new challenges.

If Seiji spots a shooting star, he wants to chase it. If Seiji comes to an ocean, he wants to cross it. And if Seiji sees a stack of three gigantic hamburger steaks, he wants to eat them all.

There will be no further mentions of stars or oceans in this article.

Like any good anime fan, Seiji often finds himself in or near Akihabara, Tokyo’s mecca of otaku culture. But his most recent trip to the neighborhood wasn’t prompted by a desire to purchase anime merch with which to fill his home, but to eat at restaurant Gyusha and fill his stomach with beef.

Hamburger steaks in Japan are often made from a mix of ground pork and ground beef, in order to keep costs down. Gyusha’s three-patty lunch special, though, is all-beef, and made entirely from wagyu.

▼ It’s also crowned with a fried egg, because putting a cherry on top would just be silly.

The only side order included in this beefy lunch set is steamed white rice, but since there’s literally a full kilogram (2.2 pounds) of sizzling meat on the hot plate the waiter brings you, you can’t really blame Gyusha for not tossing in a chef’s salad.

Devoid of female companionship as he may have been, sitting in the restaurant, with this mountain of beef in front of him Seiji couldn’t help but feel that this was one of the high marks of manly decadence and adventure in his life so far. Taking up his fork, he stabbed the utensil into the pile and came away with a mouthful of meat, dripping with mouth-watering juiciness.

Seiji took a bite, and was thrilled to discover that Gyusha’s mammoth meal delivers on both quality and quantity. With his heart racing with excitement, he took bite after bite, alternating between the three dipping sauces the set comes with to keep from having any one single flavor overload his taste buds.

▼ Seiji opted for Japanese onion, garlic, and Italian tomato sauces, but salty green pepper and black pepper sauces are also available.

Before he knew it, Seiji had polished off the entire plate, a feat which left him happy and full.

If there’s one drawback to Gyusha’s amazing triple-decker hamburger steak lunch, it’s that at 4,800 yen (US$44), it’s not exactly cheap. However, that price is entirely reasonable for a full kilo of wagyu. Even better, Gyusha allows multiple diners to share the set, so you can always enlist a friend to help you with the enviable carnivorous task. And even if you’re a solo diner, Gyusha also offers more compact hamburger steaks, starting at 200 grams (7 ounces) for just 990 yen.

But before you go by yourself, could you give Seiji a call and see if he’d like to go with you?

Restaurant information
Gyusha / 牛舎
Address: Tokyo-to, Chiyoda-ku, Soto Kanda, 6-5-9
東京都千代田区外神田６−５−９
Open 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m., 6 p.m.-10:30 p.m. (may close early is restaurant runs out of meat)
Closed Sundays

Photos ©SoraNews24



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