00:04 John Daub: Hello everybody, welcome to the great city of Tokyo, Japan. I'm right in front of the Mister Donut here in Monzen-Nakachō. This is the one I usually come to because it's one of the closest ones. And this month they have on special matcha-flavored donuts. They do this every year, it's nothing surprising. But the way that they do it, what innovations have they put into these donuts, that's kind of interesting. And sometimes it's not Uji, there are other brands of matcha tea. In this episode I'm not just going to show you and eat some of these amazing donuts. I'm also going to talk a little bit about green tea and the harvest that's going on right now all over Japan. But first, I need to go inside and get these donuts. I already bought them, but let me just see.

05:27 John Daub: And then there's Aiken. I found it, Aiken! Look! That's awesome! Thank you for that. I hadn't seen this before. Yesterday was the first day that this started. And the day before yesterday was in Takadanobaba and I thought that was really cool to see that. So you guys, thank you so much. It was just a surprise. Sayats, it's pretty loud at the corner. There's no park in the area with a good signal that I can take you to. Oh, a box of donuts. Beautiful. That's not one donut, like five. That curler on the corner is for Kanae Daub. She didn't want any matcha confections, but I got her what she wants. Which is French Cruller, please. So, there you go.

06:24 John Daub: We're going to start off with the classic here. This one. Now, in Japan, look at the color of it, right? Look at the color of it. Aiken, I think that Super Thanks is a great idea, especially for your Daco channel. Yeah! We're going to be up there in Hokkaidō and this is a game changer for us. First, I got to cut my fingernails. It's apparent. It's not that bad. Whenever you're hand modeling, you have to be very, you have to think about that kind of stuff. And then, there's the deep matcha color of this donut, right? And for some of you, I don't know if you've ever seen real matcha before. The difference between green tea and matcha, matcha is a powder that's ground up and they grow it a little bit differently. And I'm going to Shizuoka next week to finish up a documentary about green tea and matcha growing. The harvest this time.

07:31 John Daub: Pondering have like a mochi mochi in it. Mochi (glutinous rice cake) is this very stretchy glutinous kind of rice powder in it that gives it a different consistency compared to other donuts. Yeah. It's springy. Mmm. It's like a regular Pon de Ring. It's not this spring stuff. Wow. Yeah, that was good. Here's the thing with Mister Donut, sometimes, the normal Mister Donut stuff is just perfect. You don't need to get into the food. You can get fancy stuff and sometimes the campaign donuts are not that good. They're not as good as the originals. But in this case, it's... There's a subtle matcha flavor. It's more sugar than matcha, but it's a very subtle matcha flavor. And matcha is an interesting food as a confection. Japanese don't like confections that are overly sweet. They want a very gentle, subtle sweetness to it.

09:05 John Daub: But Japanese palates are different than Westerners, I think, in the sense that they're more delicate, maybe. More delicate, meaning they seem to pick up different flavors that I might not like. Bitterness is one of them. Japanese love bitterness, a very subtle bitterness. And matcha, the green tea, has that subtle bitterness to it. So I think with the sweetness and the bitterness here, there's a lot of stuff going on in the palate that doesn't go on with other flavors. And that's why matcha as a confection, put into foods, is pretty good. I think so. Custard is pretty good too, right? Who wrote that? Daryl, if donuts aren't custard cream brûlée or matcha, I don't want it. Daryl, that's one of the best comments I've read in a very long time. Amanda writes in here, this looks delicious. I don't like super sweet foods as well. I love the bitter foods. And you might like Japan's bitter donuts. Although, they are sweet. And I'll show you what I mean in a second.

10:05 John Daub: I didn't get much sleep last night. Leo was crying. It reflects in daddy's face. Alright, check this one out. So they cut it in half. Oh my. Oh mama. They have, um, I think that's mochi in there? That gel? You see a gel in there? You see that gel? I'm repeating myself because I can't believe that there's some sort of mochi gel. I've never seen anything like this. You can see little pieces of green tea in it. JKO Adventure's right, maybe undercooked. That could be true. Three, two, one. Alright, how do you eat this? Is it like a Reese's peanut butter cup where you go around the side and then you take the middle chunk of peanut butter? How do you eat this? Daryl, you would like this one. It's kind of custardy, but it's a bitter custardy. Sweetness of course. The springy mochi, Pon de Ring taste. This one's got it all.

11:24 John Daub: I don't know what that gel is. I think it's warabi mochi (bracken starch jelly), maybe? I think it's supposed to be warabi mochi. That's fascinating taste. Wow. Wow. I don't know if the Pon de Rings are deep fried or baked either. I don't know how they make the Pon de Ring. I just kind of guess that everything is deep fried. Donuts are not healthy. Just eat them in moderation. I only eat half and then I save them for later. Alright, there's two more here. I'm not going to eat Kanae's. This is a chocolate hojicha. The last two are hojicha. Hojicha (roasted green tea) is interesting. It's a green tea that's been roasted. If you look at the scale of green tea colors, there's apparently a scale of seven intensities or something, according to some of the green tea shops. Hojicha is always the darkest one because it's been roasted. And the roasting process removes most of the caffeine.

12:42 John Daub: I'm talking louder because there's so much traffic noise. The roasting process removes most of the caffeine. I don't know if it's 0% caffeine. I don't want to be careful about that. But if you ever want to drink green tea that's decaffeinated, or mostly decaffeinated, try hojicha. That's got a really nice roasted taste to it. Wow, it's loud in this corner. It's more exciting if it's loud. It's what I used to say in college. Alright, let's open her up here. Oh, wow. You have to do the open test. Oh, the chocolate's locked it in there. It's locked in there with the chocolate. Little green tea on there. Okay. Very musical. I hope it's so old that it's not decaffeinated. And the truckers are watching me too. How you doing, guys? Alright, here we go. Itadakimasu (I humbly receive). Mmm. Oh, that chocolate wrap around it's so good. Melts in with the cream and each bite. Mmm.

14:12 John Daub: Not much hojicha taste for that. Just a tinge of bitterness. So if they add in... They add in some hojicha... It just... It hits you... On a different side of your tongue just a little bit than another kind of donut, I think. Just the regular wheat donuts or whatever they put in there. That is the worst coffee I might have ever had. It was $3. Alright, we got one more. Watch the truck driver there. This one, I guess it's like jewelry, right? So I saved it for last. It comes in a box. Look at that. The bottom is a... That's interesting, right? I thought... This is kind of neat. So let's open her up. On the street. Whoa! Wow, it's like opening up a book and finding a story that you can eat. Oh, I got to turn around the other way maybe. Okay. Alright, 3, 2, 1. Whoa! Look at that cream on the top there. Really? It looks like cake.

15:49 John Daub: What is that black stuff around it? Is that kuromitsu (black sugar syrup)? Black honey? Or... What? I guess it looks kuromitsu and hojicha? I'm not sure. But this is the Uji green tea version of the donut. So it's got to have some sort of green tea element to it. There's only one way to find out. Eat it. Looks like a Cinnabon right to Debbie. Yeah. It totally does, Debbie. Oh, wow! Check out the bottom of it. So a donut is a donut because it has a hole. If it doesn't have a hole, it's a Danish. So I've been told. This is an old-fashioned meaning. I guess it's more cakey than a normal donut, which is good because there's more volume to it if you're trying to get cost performance out of a donut. Which, you won't get a Krispy Kreme. You will at Mister Donut. Check out the bottom. It's like they just stamped on a piece of chocolate on the bottom of it. What? Ah, this is going to be an amazing bite here.

17:18 John Daub: Gosh, you know, I want to dunk this in coffee, but there's actually an old quesadilla back here from the 1950s or 60s, it looks like. But they don't do takeout coffee, I asked. Which is weird. They should do that. I'm going to go to the coffee shop. Here we go. Interesting. It's a Nakacho ramen. Whenever you see Mister Donuts and me, it's more than Nakacho. This is, um, it's got that hojicha bitterness, a roasted green tea bitterness to it. The chocolate, that's what that one is. Now I can see it on the inside. So it looks like it's, I think it's a kuromitsu, but you can see that warabi mochi on the bottom there. What? So they stamped on the chocolate to keep the warabi mochi in. That is sweet. It's like a real, it looks like a gel, but it's a kind of mochi. And it really adds like a new, a different complexity to it.

18:29 John Daub: I don't even know if you can get to call these danishes. They're like works of confectionary art. I love the fact that Mister Donut and in fact all of the restaurants in Japan, especially fast food, have to innovate like this or else people get tired of it. It's one of the things I love about Japan. There's always something new. It's a fad-driven culture. Uh, I don't know. I don't know what people think the difference is, but I'm like, Hey, I like the food, but there's always the good old fashioned stuff that people don't know. There's always Mister Donut. You always have the good old fashioned stuff, the people that loved the menu, and then you have one or two items that just blow people's minds. Like the Pikachu donuts, the Pokémon donuts were extraordinarily interesting. Like they do a good job with that. Krispy Kreme, in order to compete with them, also has stylish donuts, but they're never at the same level as Mister Donut. Mister Donut is the king of Japanese donuts, coming from, strangely enough, I think their first shop was in San Francisco and Chinatown. So their history is very American, which is what a donut would be.

20:09 John Daub: Wow! Now you see it! Can't taste a lot of matcha. That part is disappointing, but... I don't think there... I think some indie donut shops in the United States have satellite shops here in Japan. I don't think there's too many indie Japanese donut shops. Donuts in general are... I think Mister Donut has that corner. It's like... you know, it's like pizza was in Japan about 15 years ago. There weren't many players in it, and Japanese wouldn't really buy pizza for their family, and they wouldn't really eat it. Because it was too big for a lunch. But in the last two or three years, you... most of you who haven't been in Japan have not seen this. Japanese supermarkets and Japanese stores have turned to the fresh-made pizza bento. It's not a bento, but you can get these brick oven pizzas in plastic containers, which is idiotic because it gets soggy. But they're selling like hotcakes, and they're like $4. So you can get these personalized brick oven pizzas at... almost $10. Every supermarket now for $4, $5. And I've noticed that a lot of supermarkets are turning to this. Maruetsu is one chain in Tokyo that has it, like, stacked up, and they sell like crazy.

21:38 John Daub: Their personalized small pizzas people can eat is like a bento. I bring this up because donuts are like pizza. It's not something that a lot of Japanese will eat until they start eating it. Mister Donut has ramen. Mister Donut has pasta. Mister Donut has like Japanese lunch haida. And then people will have a donut with that. Whereas you go into Dunkin' Donuts, I guess they have like donut sandwiches. They have sandwiches and things like this now, but traditionally, it was just donuts. I don't think just a donut shop would do too well in Japan. But if they're selling like ramen and then selling donuts as a part of something else, then it does well. But I think what's really popular... I'm going to get my mask on, and I'm going to go. And then we can get out of here a little bit. Just to round it up, my favorite of the donuts... That's a really hard one. I'd probably say this one here because it's a Pon de Ring, and it's got the best of everything in there. So I would say that this wins out if you're coming here. It's got warabi mochi inside. It's a Pon de Ring springiness to it, that bitter matcha taste, and a sweet cream. Oh, I'm retasting it again right there. So that's the winner for me. $1.50 each one. No, like $1.50 with the exchange rate right now.

23:04 John Daub: Class rates in here, it's too loud. All right, I'll take you to another place then. Let's walk around Monzen-Nakachō just for a little bit. And I want to show you now one of the things that I just love about this neighborhood here. It is so warm. I don't know how people can wear the masks voluntarily, but respect to people who keep up the routine, you know? And I fail. Some people gamble. Some people smoke. I remove my mask outside, which is normal. People don't like it here. So, all right, let me take you on a walk. Hey, Rainer, thank you, buddy. Let me dump this in my bicycle. Hold on. I'll put this in my illegally parked bicycle. You can do that here. You just have to move it really quickly. Okay. I wasn't going to do a live stream for more. I'm going to do it in, you know, 30, 40 minutes anyway.

24:42 John Daub: This is the Osmo 5, the new one. So it's not as good as the Osmo 4 gimbal. It's a shame. It's a little shaky, and I'm not sure why. Maybe it's a faulty unit. We're going to cross the street, and I want to show you the really old section of this place. It's such a beautiful little alley. And I'm starting to see Tokyo coming back. I'm starting to see Tokyo coming back to life a little bit. I know that the infection rate's kind of spiked up a little bit, but it's going back down again. And I think that the professionals see that this might be the right time to open up tourism, maybe. This is where we are. Hey, did anybody see the monkey video that I just uploaded? Japanese snow monkeys in a bath video. If you haven't watched it, definitely check it out. This is a 15-minute video of the snow monkeys park. I think it was. I spent a really long time editing it, so hope that you guys like that. Morning meditating monkeys to the cool tunes of the Blue Danube. A little 2001 Space Odyssey. You know, since the monkeys and the monolith. Some people got it. Some people didn't.

26:48 John Daub: All right, let's go right here. This is my favorite. One of my favorite streets in Tokyo. Hey, Leo. So right here, we're going to take a left and you're going to see why. It's a throwback from the old Shōwa era, which was like 1930s to 1980s. It's a really long era. Sixty four years. Look at this. I love this street. There's a tree right in the middle of it that's jutting out into the center of it. I love that. You see it right there. I don't know why this gimbal shakes like this. Gimbals aren't supposed to be jittery. Wow. Monzen-Nakachō is beautiful. And you can hear usually around six or seven p.m. karaoke in the night as people are singing in some of the shops. This one is really interesting. The one with the bicycle in front of it and all the flowers. Just an old building. And you can see this tree. Looks like it's had better days. Still well groomed. Survived a lot of earthquakes. I'll tell you that. Looks like not for much longer. Everything is kind of leaning.

29:01 John Daub: Yeah. The Snow Monkey video is a chunk of positivity and relaxation in a very stressful YouTube right now. With the war going on and all the other stuff. Politics, inflation. Yeah, definitely take 15 minutes and just watch that video because it will really relax you. Especially the beginning of it. Wow. Beer garden. Alright, I marked it. Mental mark. If we make a right here. We go to Kiyosumi-Shirakawa which is, I don't know, maybe about a kilometer down the road. They have a beautiful park and it's considered Japan, Tokyo's coffee town or cafe town. Because it has maybe the most cafes in one area. A lot of old kissaten (old-school coffee shops) mixed in with new chains. Blue Bottle which is a popular chain in the US has their first shop in Japan in Kiyosumi-Shirakawa. It's on the Ōedo line and the Hanzomon line which is the purple one. Beautiful day here in Tokyo.

30:16 John Daub: Across the street here. Hey there's a Moss Burger. Let's go check out the menu. I like this area too because they don't see a lot of YouTubers. People holding a camera walking down the street here. It's pretty funny. And they play old music on the streets here. Hold on. I don't know why. Announcements on music. I love it. What's your job? I'm the main street DJ for the PA system for ambiance right all right let's see what Moss Burger got on the menu here so they have the green burger i don't think those guys can grow a beard do you see any those are the smoothest man faces i've ever seen and they're probably in the 30s that's crazy do they photoshop out the whiskers i would like to have that done much more attractive this is the uh teriyaki burger on the right and the cream cheese teriyaki burger on the left what cream cheese teriyaki burger interesting i guess moss burger gives you smooth skin we do have a plant-based burger and they do have the rice burgers here where the buns are rice and then they have the Natsumi burger which the buns are lettuce i love that guess you could just call them lettuce wraps not a burger right they have better coffee here than they do at mister donuts for takeout which is weird mister donuts got to step up their coffee game imagine dunkin donuts without takeaway coffee it's like pure insanity.

33:04 John Daub: Here's a yaoya (greengrocer) right here this is a um local vegetable stand and before we start let's stop let's go take a look quickly at mcdonald's see what they got going on here i think the ultraman burgers might be at the end of their cycle uh the trends in the fads for these these things usually last a few weeks from about uh two weeks to a month and then something new will come the tsukimi burger which was one of the first fads that i saw when i came to japan it was a egg on a burger and the egg had a moon-shaped yellow to it that looked like the moon to represent the harvest moon for the rice harvest it's called the tsukimi burger because tsuki (moon) means moon in japanese so look at the moon yes.

34:10 John Daub: Before before we look at the mcdonald's i guess come back here so tomorrow we're having a family outing and i guess and i said that one of the ideas she had was um speedboat so leo weather permitting might go on his first speedboat ride tomorrow and of course i'm going to try to live stream that because it's freaking speedboat and i have not ridden speedboat in a very very long time since before the pandemic so this will be really special and uh um either that or maybe we'll have to wait until the pandemic is over to see if we can get a speedboat ride because we made an appointment for i guess Ueno Zoo so we're going to see which one that is here i'm not quite sure i'm looking at mcdonald's here to see if they have something interesting to show last time i got in trouble uh live streaming with the entrance which is weird all right all right mcdonald's still has the ultra man burger hold on a second right here they still have ultra man on the menu to that but i rarely go to mcdonald's i just whenever they have a fad i'll go and try it once and i'll make a quick judgment call nine times out of ten it's a pass but that tenth time is magical.

35:41 John Daub: Oh and one other thing that i found not family mart but lawson's right now if you're in in town lawson's has godiva melon pan (melon bread) it's one of the most amazing melon pans i've ever had it's just bizarre for for a non-fresh baked melon pan because it's you know it's a little bit of a wrapped and probably a couple days old they have uh like this deep rich chocolate inside of it it's incredible and i'm looking for a lawson's right now i don't see one which is a shame maybe across the street here i had one for the first time yesterday and was incredible i don't see a lawson's around here there's a kfc down the street here this would be my fast food hub it's an ekimae (station front) my right in front of the train station so there's a lot of food ramen shops a lot of businesses the ekimae always are stacked like this it's pretty cool in front of monzen-nakachō station which is on the Ōedo line and the Tōzai line the oedo the tozai line on the left is metro which is run by private company and the oedo line the e on the right side is uh the city subway there's four lines shinjuku toei uh mita and asakusa line and they're run by the city so tozai line is the city subway toei is still open at this time of the year the city service is open in the city show uh the car and travel in tokyo as well and Tokyo's got jr metro and toei as your public transportation.

37:27 John Daub: I can't wait for Leo to be old enough to eat pure sugar. We don't give it to him yet. And that closes the door on this episode. There you can see Mister Donuts' other options. If you have any questions, definitely leave me a comment and I will be checking this out and answering it. I have some good stuff here. And leave me a comment! Leave me a comment on the monkey video that I just uploaded to on the main channel. I put a lot of effort and time into that and I would really appreciate it if you guys check it out. And if you leave me a comment, I will reply if it's a good comment. And ask me a question or something. I will reply. I'd appreciate it very much. Look how relaxed they are. I might have photoshopped in this baby monkey though and fixed the colors and added snow. Still self-explanatory thumbnail. Monkeys. How you doing?

38:38 John Daub: Alright everybody, have a good day, have a good night. Thanks for watching this video. I'll try to do more of these food adventures tomorrow. Family outing. It should be a lot of fun. Could be speedboat, could be Ueno Zoo. Either way, it's going to be pretty awesome. Hopefully the weather holds out and we still have some sunshine. And then coming up, I have another trip to Shizuoka for the matcha harvest. The matcha harvest, the green tea is covered. So they do it differently than they do with sencha (Japanese green tea). And I'm making an episode combining both of them with access into the harvest and the processing of green tea. It's pretty unique. And this is the time of year that they do the first flush. And I'm going up to Hokkaidō from the 24th of May to the 30th of May and you're coming with me. So loads of live streams. And finally, on the 31st, I'm going to Nagoya as well. So you're going to get a couple of live streams from Nagoya, which is going to be really cool. I haven't been a lot there. So we've got a very busy, very busy May. And I'm glad that you're all a part of it. So join as a member. You get to put in some pretty cool emoji and help support the traveling. And I'll see you tomorrow on our family trip. Fingers crossed for Noguri. And Kanae, if you're watching, your donut is on the way. It spikes down there. If it is still there. Is it still there? I think it's still there. I think somebody tried to drink my drink. I think it's still drinkable. I think it's still okay. Nagoya John writes in here, Nagoya. Haha. On the night of the 19th and the 20th of May. It's all booked. See you later, everybody. I think the drink's still okay.