I'm Shenji, what are you doing?

mid night canteen.

As the name suggests, a canteen that only opens in the middle of the night has business hours only in the evening.

It sounds like just an ordinary late-night snack, but in Japan, it is a unique culture that belongs only to this overseas island country.

Different from ordinary restaurants and bars open at night, the menu of this type of restaurant is extremely simple. It is just a piece of paper with several items printed in order:

XX set meal - XX yen.

XX noodles - XX yen.

XX wine——XX yen.

Entries are generally limited to single digits, usually five to six. In addition, you can also order dishes that are not on the menu. As long as the store has the ingredients and the owner knows how to make them, they will sell them.

Don't expect to eat any delicacies from the mountains and seas in this kind of place. The area of ​​this kind of restaurant is more than ten square meters as small as thirty or fifty square meters in large ones. The ingredients in the store are also ordinary goods that can be found everywhere, which is convenient for storage. It goes bad easily, and some even use whatever is cheap.

What, do you mean there are no customers in such a restaurant? Can it continue to operate?

In other countries, unless there are no restaurants nearby, it would be really difficult for such a restaurant to operate. But in Japan, this kind of restaurant is quite popular, and the longer the store is open, the more prosperous the business becomes.

This has a lot to do with Japanese society and culture. The social custom in Japan is not to go home after get off work, or to find a place to drink and eat with clients or colleagues, and to go home after eight or nine o'clock. If you don't do this, you will appear useless, your colleagues will ostracize you, your boss will look down on you, your family will dislike you, and the company may even fire you.

This custom mainly originated in the last century when Japan's economy took off. At that time, evening entertainment became the mainstream of society. In many companies, entertainment receipts can be used to deduct taxes. Although Japan's economy was no longer so prosperous later, this custom was inherited as culture.

On the other hand, because Japan is a fast-paced country, the pressure in Japan is very high. After a day of work and life, I have accumulated all kinds of stress and complaints, and I need a place to talk. And the more people live at the bottom, the greater the pressure, so this kind of cheap restaurant that can provide a place to talk is very popular. Perhaps what the guests eat is no longer food, but a feeling similar to home.

"Grumotei" located in Iwate Prefecture, Hokkaido, is such an ordinary late-night restaurant.

The original name of "Liao Sao Pavilion" was not "Liao Sao Pavilion", but a more common name. The boss was an old man over sixty years old, but recently he was replaced by a young man who seemed not to be a local and had a bit of a Kansai accent. I heard that he was a relative of the boss. He had been living outside for years and had achieved nothing. It just so happened that the boss was getting older and his health was not as good as before, so he took over the shop and changed the original nondescript name to the current "Grumble Pavilion" .

At first, regular customers were worried that a familiar place would become unfamiliar. But soon, they discovered that although the name of the store had changed, the decoration of the store had not changed, and the acquaintances around them were still there. The young people were doing the same cooking and work as the previous boss, and their speech and behavior were not like today. The young people are so impetuous, but they have the maturity to experience the facts.

Opening a store is not an easy task. You have to deal with the government and the Yakuza. Every year, there are reports of conflicts between business people and the Yakuza in every place, causing bloodshed, and most of them are young people. But this young man is different. No matter what situation he encounters, he always looks kind and kind. He solves the problem in a few words. The usually arrogant club members also become kind and kind when they come to the store. Sometimes I sit down and have something to eat like the guests.

It’s still the original recipe, it’s still the same taste, and more importantly, the familiar feeling has never disappeared. The small waves of changing the name of the store and changing the owner have disappeared in the passage of time. It didn't take long for regular customers to realize that the new store name was a perfect fit, since that's what everyone came here to complain about.

The young new owner also brought a lot of surprises to everyone. Compared with the previous owner who could only cook local cuisine, the new owner can cook a lot of things. He is not only involved in Kanto, Kansai, Hokkaido, Okinawa, but also can cook A little bit of foreign cuisine.

A curious customer asked the shop owner: "You are so good, why don't you go to a better place."

The young man just smiled and replied: "I just traveled a lot when I was dawdling, and I learned a little casually. It's not as exaggerated as you said, and I don't have a chef certificate. And if I leave, who will cook for everyone?" Woolen cloth?"

Then there were all kinds of jokes and memories from regular customers, and the atmosphere in the complaining booth became a little more lively.

However, this is only a small episode that only occurs on rare occasions. Most of the time, the atmosphere in the Grievance Pavilion is stable and somewhat dull.

The guests walked into the store and silently ordered a glass of wine. The older ones would order sake, and the younger ones would order beer. They announced the names of the dishes that they had already mentioned many times, and then drank the wine and food in low voices. Complain. Probably only when someone encounters something happy or when the young shop owner is bored and develops new dishes, the store will have a different atmosphere.

Regular customers call this time a surprise. The last surprise was eight or nine days ago. The boss got a few small bottles of wine called "Erguotou" from nowhere. It looks no different from sake, but when you take it in, you realize that it tastes much stronger than sake. When you look carefully, the alcohol content is as high as 52 degrees, which is three to four times the content of ordinary sake. It’s a shame he can get this kind of thing. , it seems that what he said about his wildness is indeed not empty talk.

Of course, there are regrets. After all, he is a young person, and the new store manager is not very good at some of the dishes that only older people know. At this time, the store manager will sincerely apologize to the customer and ask for advice humbly. If the customer doesn't know how to do it, he will take time to visit the local elderly. Soon, a new name will be added to the boss's list of items not on the menu.

It is this serious attitude that makes the shop more and more famous in the neighborhood and its business is getting better and better. Some regular customers even think that it is not a bad thing to marry a female of the right age in the family to the boss, and they begin to Explore the matter in a roundabout way.

But they soon gave up this idea, because this young man who looked like a passerby ABC actually had a beautiful and outrageous girlfriend.

Every time late at night, when the customers have left, the girl who likes to wear white clothes will walk into the store and shout in a voice that is incompatible with the atmosphere in the store:

"Na na, I'm hungry, Shen-ah, Haruki."

or--

"It's so boring. Come play with me, Haruki."

Whenever something like this happens, the young boss will throw a knife or a menu or just throw a tomato, apple or something like that.

"Don't make trouble. How many times have I told you not to affect others, Hesha. If you're hungry, just wait for a while and I'll make you something to eat. If you're bored, come over and help me wash the dishes."

As a result, another young and beautiful figure appeared in the store.

PS: Alas, Dongma and Xuecai are both good girls, but they are limited by the short-term vision. It is better to be a long-term one, what do you think? Justessa, Erquette, Master Craftsman?