Here’s Part 2 of my winter break trip! This post is about the return trip back, starting from my flight to Haneda Airport, then to New Chitose, and going home from Sapporo! The break felt long but short at the same time…
My flight was a little before midnight on January 6, and this was because I wanted to land on the 8th (the 8th is a public holiday, so got to extend my vacation by a day!). International flights this way suck becaue of the sheer amount of time and time difference it takes, but nothing I can do about that. Anyway, I basically spent the entirety of January 7th on the plane. Woe is my Duolingo streak. Curse you American Airlines for no free wifi. Bless Japan Airlines for free wifi.
In line with my last post, I took American Airlines as my return flight, and not entirely looking forward to the food. What was interesting this time around was that they did not provide the Japanese “otsumami” snacks, and this was a longer flight too. Anyway, about an hour or so after takeoff, food started coming out, and today’s dinner menu was…chicken or beef. Seriously? This irked me the last time too, but I wish there was either an actual menu or description we can look at or see beforehand, or an actual description right there (maybe I was spoiled by the Eva flight I took to Taiwan, which released the menu before the flight, and gave you details on the flight). They can pretend it’s the same thing all they want, but it’s not just the protein that’s different you know…I went for the beef, because beef is generally the superior protein to chicken, and it turned out to be a kind of starchy-sauce beef with vegetables and rice. From a few glances and smelling around me, I think the other dish was somne kind of tomato sauce noodle with the chicken.
As for the “beef”, aside from the entree, this time we got a savory bread roll, water, butter, a noodle salad with shrimp, a leaf salad, meditteranean dressing, a coke, and a churro-flavored bar. I spent a good chunk of time trying to open the dressing packet, but nothing worked, and I ended up eating it plain. It was suppsedly only olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and I’m used to eating romaine lettuce plain, so it was fine, like normal lettuce. I ate the bread roll later, and it was fine, came out cold, but the inside was a bit fluffy, and had a bunch of herbs in it. The noodle salad I think had a bunch of cilantro and green onion, both which I don’t like, but was refreshing, and I surprised myself by eating the shrimp, since I’ve not been a fan of plain, cooked shrimp as of late. I actually quite liked the entree beef itself: it was a bit spicy (seriously, again?) but tolerable and very tender. The rice it came with sucked, and I ate the mushy veggies for the nutrients. The churo bar was pretty good! It had this oat cinnamon crumble on top, while the bar itself had a bit of a chew.
About an hour before landing, we got our snack (breakfast?). This time the choices were…eggs or vegetables. With no other clue as to what else was in it, as a non-fan of plain eggs, I went the vegetable route. Unfortunately for me, this was made up of a spicy vegeatble mix (of what was mostly carrots, edamame, and bell pepper), over more of this sucky rice. I ate what I could of the veggie mix, and the fruit cup was, a fruit cup.
We landed around 5am on January 8th in Haneda Airport. Immigration didn’t take too long, my bag took a bit to come out, customs was a breeze, and I safely entered the country! Because I had a connecting flight, I needed to go to the domestic flight check in located on the arrival floor (very convenient!), only to find that the Japan Airlines counter doesn’t open until 6 (but the ANA had been operating since 5:30). The process itself was relatively easy, and though the lady directed me to the domestic connecting security right behind the check-in counter, I had other plans, as I wanted to get food from pre-security in Terminal 1. I took the normal free inter-termnal bus to Terminal 1, to get some real food because I was actually pretty hungry.
Now, it was around 6:30am, so not many places are open. Fear not though, because I did my research (ha!), but did double check with the signs in real time. At first, I was just going to go to the Starbucks to get the new seasonal frapp, but I felt pretty hungry, and had quite a bit of time to kill anyway, so I headed to Hitoshinaya, which was serving more traditional Japanese style breakfast sets. I actually believe that their breakfast, which opened at 5:30, lunch, and afternoon menus are all different, which seemed cool. Their menu was pretty small, as aside from small add-ons, the choices were between the “Roasted Salmon Set Meal”, the porridge set, or the chazuke set, which were all the same price. I don’t like wet rice, so I went with the grilled salmon.
It was extremely pretty, and everything tasted amazing too. To start, they gave me a glass of water, and also a small cup of dashi, which actually hit different on a cold day and had the perfect amount of flavor. Miso soup as good, the salad had some tuna which was nice, and the main box had a small tofu appetizer, some cold veggies, lotus root on acidic grated radish, some tamagoyaki, and the main salmon piece. The salmon was great, with crispy skin, and the meat itself was not falling apart but not tough, and most importantly, wasn’t excessively salty. I have to say though, the biggest plot twist was the egg. I am not the biggest egg-by-itself fan, but this was amazing. It was sweet, so there was obviously some sugar added to it, but it was also wrapped in a thin layer that fell apart a little if you weren’t careful, and had a soft but still a bit structured texture to it. Finally, the rice was heavenly, especially compared to the airplane food. Plus, you get a free refill! Unrelated to the food, but their wet towel was also very unique.
It was definitely a filling and satisfying meal, but I also really wanted to try the new seasonal Starbucks, the Hojicha Mochitto Milk frapp. The official description says it uses a hojicha blend powder with a cream daifuku sauce, some white chocolate powder, blends in gyuuhi (which I learned is a soft confectionary made with rice flour), and topped with whipped cream. I subbed with nonfat milk, and all in all, I really liked it! The hojicha taste itself is a little muted, so it definitely is a little more milky than hojicha, but nevertheless it is there. I was surprised when I first sipped some mochi bits (probably the gyuuhi)! They were tiny, probably smalled than boba, and were kind of flat, but also added a nice textural chew. It was very good, and I thoroughly enjoyed that.
Finishing my drink and with nothing else to do, I headed to security, which took no time at all. I spotted a Pokemon plane which was unfortunately not mine, and found out that Terminal 1 has a garden. Wild.
As always on a Japan Airlines flight, you got to get that sky [time] juice.
My boyfriend came to pick me up at the airport when I landed a bit after 10:30! After a 40 minute train ride to Sapporo, it was perfect time for lunch, and after a bit of contemplating, I decided to go to Nana’s, partly to try their new seasonal parfait and winter food options. This would be the first time I got something savory from Nana’s!
I got the miso soup with pork and vegetables with salmon over rice lunch set, and the Chocolat Framboise Parfait. Officially, the soup uses a housemade Fukuoka miso blend, and is made so you can taste the sweetness of the vegtables. The rice bowl on the side makes it a set (you can get the soup by itself), and can choose between 4 different toppings for the rice bowl. As for the parfait, it’s supposed to be Valentine-themed and have chocolate mousse, framboise jam, crispy flkes, chocolate sponge cake, soft serve, framboise gelato, vanilla ice cream, and a heart cookie. My boyfriend had just gotten ramen at the airport, so he just got a matcha latte. Specifically the one with added chewy rice ball and red bean.
The soup was really good! It was flavorful, a bit thick, and true to it’s name, had plenty of vegetables, including carrots, burdock root, tofu, daikon, and onion, other than the pork. The rice bowl itself was fine, salmon flakes were nice, but I am not a big shiso fan…As for the parfait, I had no idea that framboise actually meant raspberry (a quick Google tells me it’s a Belgian beer made from raspberries, go figure), so all the red stuff isn’t strawberry. Quite unfortunate, because I am not a raspberry person either. The vanilla ice cream and chocolate mousse were very good, and I really like the cereal flakes they use here. I liked the gelato even though it was raspberry, though I could have gone without the extra jam sauce.
Because I had no groceries at home and I was going to work the next day, I wanted to get a bento of some sort while I was in the area to take home for lunch the next day. After browsing the Daimaru basement a bit, I settled on a bulgolgi kimbap box from Gangnam Kimbap, a relatively new Korean food booth. It was good! Besides the usual seaweed and rice and the bulgolgi it had cucumber, egg, carrot, and daikon. I used to not really eat kimbap, but over the years I’ve grown to like it, and this was a good combination. And no, it’s not “Korean sushi”.
I didn’t want to rush to make the bus at 1, so we stuck around for about another hour. This included doing some window shopping, and a stop by McDonald’s. My boyfriend recently has been into the new Godzilla collab, and their new beef stew pie. He wanted to buy 10 to take home, but when we got there, it seems they had just discontinued it…oops.
Last but not least, I had to get boba for the trip home! My pick was Gong Cha, for their new seasonal milk tea. Read about my boba here!
Then we hopped on the bus at 2 to go home! This day, the ride took almost 4 hours…maybe it was also the snow, but the highway was closed for some reason that day, and there were a ton of confused tourists trying to take the bus and kept trying to ask the driver questions whenever we stopped.
Things I realized immediately: I love Japanese airports, and I missed Japanese public bathrooms.
That was the return trip! The departure trip, or Part 1, is here.
Japan Excursions 
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