mochi ice cream balls

In light of my very recent and very publicly displayed love for mochi ice cream balls, I thought I would share with you all what I had for breakfast this morning.

Mochi ice cream balls.

Surprise surprise 🙂

But no really, there’s more I wanted to share with you, especially you in London. I’ve always always been a big fan of the Japan Centre at Piccadilly Circus. It’s my one stop shop for yummies from the land of the big red sun, including such deliciousness as Sapporo Ichiban Original Ramen *yum*, delicious plum wines and all things green tea.

So imagine my utter shock and I don’t know, disappointment doesn’t even describe it. More like, kill me now when I show up at Japan Centre last night and huh??? It’s now a book shop?! WHAT? Granted, ok, it’s a Japan Centre book store but dude, I ain’t eating no books. Where did the food go?

In my haste to find myself some mochi ice cream balls, I’d (as usual) completely ignored the myriad of signage that they have outside:

Oh hello customers! Hi, you, yeh you there rushing in to buy your sushi, we’ve moved! But not far, honestly, just around the corner, like two minutes that way. See? Here, I’ll even draw you a map. See? It’s really very close. And in case you’ve missed this sign, well it’s ok, we’re really considerate here, we’ll put up I don’t know, maybe three more signs. Surely you won’t miss it now!

Yeh so I missed all the signs, ran into the book store, suffered a minor stroke and ran out in such a discombobulation that poor Panu didn’t know what to do. How do you console catty when she’s had one of her favourite food shops yanked from her grasp, especially when right this moment, she’s craving mochi ice cream so bad she has dragon fire tendril things billowing out her nostrils?

Poor guy.

BUT. With his head screwed on much straighter than I, Panu spotted the sign. Like a bright light leading the way, the sign guided him, and he in turn guided me the 50 meters or so around the corner onto Regent Street and wow, everything was so much better. Plus. Plus plus plus PLUS.

Japan Centre had not only moved, they’d renovated. The new store is enormous. It’s glorious. It’s beautiful. It’s like heaven in a grocery store. They have sections for things like the bakery, meat, veg, desserts, everything.

It was a shame that by the time my dramas had been sorted it was closing time, so I only had time to grab myself a box of 20 mochi ice creams, but believe me, I’m so back there. Like today, I’m there.

This is me in love.

NEW Japan Centre on Lower Regent St

 

Japan Centre Supermarket
Now on Lower Regent Street, London

Toku, Japan Centre on Urbanspoon

14 Thoughts on “i love you, mochi ice cream balls!

  1. Mmmm I LOVE mochi ice cream – especially the purple yam (ube) flavour.

  2. Oooo being “new” to this whole thing about mochi ice creams I’ve only had green tea, red bean and vanilla but i love all things yam/taro and would love to try that!

  3. For fear of being derided and shouted at, please explain Mochi to the less intelligent amongst us (namely me). kthxbai 🙂

  4. Louise on October 25, 2009 at 5:21 pm said:

    Loving the bowl… 😉

  5. tehbus: are you for REALZ? Ok, without thumping you too hard, mochi are gluttenous rice balls, sometimes had in sweet soups etc. But in this way, they’re frozen with ice cream on the inside omgsodelicious!

    FoodByMark: indeedy 🙂

    Louise: I think the bowl makes the photo, don’t you? 😉

  6. The First Lady on October 26, 2009 at 2:27 am said:

    You are toooooo funny! I am so glad I could be there to witness your first encounter with these little balls of goodness! I thought of you the other night – we went to a Korean sushi resto (Korean sushi is something we need to do next time you visit) and we had mochi ice cream balls in: cappuccino, chocolate, taro, green tea, mango and vanilla. All on one plate. Awesome.

  7. The First Lady: I am forever indebted to you for introducing me to the mochi ice cream 🙂 and yes you told us about the Korean sushi place.. it does weird things, right?

  8. My favourite kind of ice cream!
    I love mochi ice cream!!! Especially strawberry! I’ve been wanting some for the last several months and still haven’t fixed my craving for it. It’s a must do for next week for sure!

  9. Sydney on March 30, 2010 at 7:55 pm said:

    Haha, i love this.
    I especially love the Polaroid of the mochi ice cream balls.

    Your food blog is very entertaining.
    Inspires me to actually go all the way to London just to visit this store.

  10. I’m definitely having Mochi tonight after reading this!

  11. Howard on April 17, 2012 at 4:10 am said:

    We have just started supplying Japan centre with gourmet gelato ice cream mochi made in London. Give them a try and let me know what you think of them pls! 🙂

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