Depachika Quotes

“A depachika is like nothing else. It is the endless bounty of a hawker's bazaar, but with Japanese civility. It is Japanese food and foreign food, sweet and savory. The best depachika have more than a hundred specialized stands and cannot be understood on a single visit. I felt as though I had a handle on Life Supermarket the first time I shopped there, but I never felt entirely comfortable in a depachika. They are the food equivalent of Borges's "The Library of Babel": if it's edible, someone is probably selling it, but how do you find it? How do you resist the cakes and spices and Chinese delis and bento boxes you'll pass on the way?
At the Isetan depachika, in Shinjuku, French pastry god Pierre Hermé sells his signature cakes and macarons. Not to be outdone, Franco-Japanese pastry god Sadaharu Aoki sells his own nearby. Tokyo is the best place in the world to eat French pastry. The quality and selection are as good as or better than in Paris, and the snootiness factor is zero.
I wandered by a collection of things on sticks: yakitori at one stand, kushiage at another. Kushiage are panko-breaded and fried foods on sticks. At any depachika, you can buy kushiage either golden and cooked, or pale and raw to fry at home. Neither option is terribly appetizing: the fried stuff is losing crispness by the second, and who wants to deep-fry in a poorly ventilated Tokyo apartment in the summer? But the overall effect of the display is mesmerizing: look at all the different foods they've put on sticks! Pork, peppers, mushrooms, squash, taro, and two dozen other little cubes.”
― Matthew Amster-Burton, Pretty Good Number One: An American Family Eats Tokyo

“We entered the Takashimaya department store through the basement level, and my eyes were joyfully assaulted by the sight of an epic number of beautiful food stalls lining the store aisles. "This is called a depachikaThe depachika was like the Ikebana Café with all its different food types, but times a zillion, with confectionaries selling chocolates and cakes and sweets that looked like dumplings, and food counters offering dazzling displays of seafood, meats, salads, candies, and juices. There was even a grocery store, with exquisite-looking fruit individually wrapped and cushioned, flawless in appearance. The workers in each stall wore different uniforms, some with matching hats, and they called out "Konichiwa!" to passersby. I loved watching each counter's workers delicately wrap the purchases and hand them over to customers as if presenting a gift rather than just, say, a sandwich or a chocolate treat. As I marveled at the display cases of sweets- with so many varieties of chocolates, cakes, and candies- Imogen said, "The traditional Japanese sweets are called wagashi, which is stuff like mochi- rice flour cakes filled with sweet pastes- and jellied candies that look more like works of art than something you'd actually eat, and cookies that look gorgeous but usually taste bland."
"The cookie tins are so beautiful!" I marveled, admiring a case of tins with prints so intricate they looked like they could double as designer handbags.”
― Rachel Cohn, My Almost Flawless Tokyo Dream Life

“We entered the Takashimaya department store through the basement level, and my eyes were joyfully assaulted by the sight of an epic number of beautiful food stalls lining the store aisles. "This is called a depachika- a Japanese food hall."
The depachika was like the Ikebana Café with all its different food types, but times a zillion, with confectionaries selling chocolates and cakes and sweets that looked like dumplings, and food counters offering dazzling displays of seafood, meats, salads, candies, and juices. There was even a grocery store, with exquisite-looking fruit individually wrapped and cushioned, flawless in appearance. The workers in each stall wore different uniforms, some with matching hats, and they called out "Konichiwa!" to passersby. I loved watching each counter's workers delicately wrap the purchases and hand them over to customers as if presenting a gift rather than just, say, a sandwich or a chocolate treat. As I marveled at the display cases of sweets- with so many varieties of chocolates, cakes, and candies- Imogen said, "The traditional Japanese sweets are called wagashi, which is stuff like mochi- rice flour cakes filled with sweet pastes- and jellied candies that look more like works of art than something you'd actually eat, and cookies that look gorgeous but usually taste bland."
"The cookie tins are so beautiful!" I marveled, admiring a case of tins with prints so intricate they looked like they could double as designer handbags.”
― Rachel Cohn, My Almost Flawless Tokyo Dream Life

“We passed an array of stalls selling Belgian chocolates, German sweets, and then French pastries. "The yogashi are the Western-style confections like cakes and pastries. Some of the biggest names from all over the world have stalls here, like Ladurée from France and Wittamer from Belgium. I love going to the depachika for treats. It can be like a cheat weekend trip to Paris or Brussels."
"What do the Ex-Brats have when they eat here?"
"Hard to say because the Ex-Brats rotation changes all the time. I'm the only girl in our class who has been at ICS-Tokyo for more than five years. People are always moving away. Of the current crew, I never take Ntombi or Jhanvi here. They're always on a diet. So lame. When Arabella was here, we'd come to eat in the Din Tai Fung restaurant one level down. They make these dumplings with purple yams or sweet red bean paste that are just sick they're so delicious."
Yams sounded great. I found a food stall I liked and picked out a grilled yam and some fried tempura for lunch. I didn't need Imogen to help me translate. I just pointed at the items I wanted, the counter worker smiled and packaged everything, then showed me a calculator with the amount I owed. I placed my Amex card on the tray the worker handed me, relieved to have had my morning 7-Eleven experience so I was able to observe the proper paying etiquette in front of Imogen. She bought an egg salad sandwich, which was packaged so beautifully you'd think it was jewelry from Tiffany's. It was in a cardboard box that had a flower print on its sides and was wrapped in tight, clear plastic at the top so you could see the sandwich inside. The sandwich had the crusts removed and was cut into two square pieces standing upright in the box, with pieces of perfectly cut fruit arrayed on the side.”
― Rachel Cohn, My Almost Flawless Tokyo Dream Life