Tokyo it is a modern, agile, dynamic city, with a multitude of people coming and going at all times everywhere and thousands, thousands of cafes, bars and restaurants. There is not a street in which you do not see a place to eat or drink, no matter how small. The Japanese eat and drink outside every day of the week and you, as a tourist, do the same.
Tokyo has many restaurants with Michelin stars because the gastronomy is superb but it also has unique and particular places for other reasons. Japanese popular culture is good for everything so here is a list of five very bizarre restaurants in Tokyo. From vampires to hallucinogenic dreams to ninjas, robots and Alice in Wonderland.
Alice in a Labyrinth Restaurant
If you like Lewis Carroll's stories this is a good place to go out for drinks and a light meal. It is in the neighborhood of Ginza, one of the most expensive and exclusive in the Japanese capital, but do not think that they will take your head out for going for a drink. Calculate an average cost of 40 euros for an Italian meal.
This place is open from Monday to Friday from 5 pm to 11.30 pm and on weekends and holidays it opens in the morning for coffee, from 11:30 am to 3pm and again between 4 to 11:30 pm. As you can see, it is a very curious place and from the moment you arrive you go through a corridor decorated with sheets from Alice's book with original illustrations. Within the tables are cards, there is a reserved that is a giant teacup and the girls are dressed as Alice.
As always, the presentation of the dishes is superb. You arrive by subway, getting off at Ginza station on the same line, which is only a five-minute walk away, or by taking the JR Yamanote line and getting off at Shimbashi. It works inside the Taiyo Building, 5F 8-8-5. Accept credit cards!
Christon Cafe
Anyone who has visited Tokyo knows that it is very difficult to find a church in the city. It's not that there aren't, obviously, but when you come from a Christian country you are used to churches and chapels everywhere. The image of Christ is part of the landscape and that is why I find it so interesting to visit such opposite cultures. You realize that geolocating the world in Christian terms is not always relevant.
Anyway, in Tokyo you can go to this cafe decorated with Christian motifsCandlesticks with candles, velvet curtains, vaulted ceilings, marble bars, polished wood altars, stained glass windows, statues of Christ and the Virgin Mary and that kind of typical church decoration. All with a turn of the screw towards the gothic Well, there are gargoyles, coffins, a somewhat fatal organ and a menu with particular names that combine religion with terror.
There is another Christon Café in Osaka, it is the original one, but it became so popular that today there is also the Shibuya and of Shinjuku. You have two to choose from! The company in charge of the coffee says that what you see was brought from Europe and Latin America but it is likely to be Made in China. Anyway, what will you see girls dressed in gothic lolita style and when night falls it becomes a nightclub.
Shinjuku's address is Sankocho Heim, 5-17-13, 8-9F. It opens from 5 pm.
Ninja Akasaka Restaurant
The ninjas and Japan, one heart. This site serves he only dines and does a ninja show so it can turn into a special and fun night. Inside is a restaurant with wood and stone, in the style of medieval Japan. The ninjas take your order and bring it to you, in silence and appearing and disappearing as if they were on one of those secret missions of which they were protagonists. They also entertain diners with some sword or martial arts show.
The gastronomy of this place is modern but the moment of serving it is what makes it special because the ninja-waiter it is quite dramatic. And it is possible that the food reminds you of a ninja star or that the smoke dummies are the snails you asked for ... Great fun! This site is in Nagata-cho, at Akasaka Tokyu Plaza, 1F. It opens from Monday to Saturday from 5 pm but the doors close at 10:30, although people can stay until midnight.
You arrive by walking just three minutes from the Ginza Line station or from the Marunouchi, Akasakamitsuke station. From their website you can book.
Kawaii Monster Coffee
La kawaii culture it has been imposed all over the world. If South Korea exports k-pop, the Japanese export kawaii culture with the same intensity. And the girls of the whole world rave! Here in Tokyo you have this restaurant and cafe Super Crazy.
It's like an LSD dream. If you go in stoned, my God! It is about the site super quirky and colorful which has been designed by Sebastian Masuda in the Harajuku neighborhood, where else? This guy first owned a shop that became very popular, 6% Dokidoki, and later teamed up with pop star Kyary Pamyu Pamyu to open his cafe in Shibuya: Kawaii Monster Café. You dare?
You enter the cafe through the open mouth of a monster with huge eyes to a place with Huge Teddy Bears, cupcakes and sweets everywhere. The place is divided into four sections: the Milk Stand has unicorns, bunnies and candlesticks and baby bottles; the Mushroom Disco is very psychedelic has a huge multi-colored mushroom, the Mel-tea Room has macaroni pillars and the Experiment Bar serves cocktails that look like something out of a bar on Venus.
And the staff are not far behind with their costumes and their attitudes so you have Dolly, Baby, Crazy, Candy and a sexy cyborg named Nasty. The gastronomy abounds in edible coloring. It's at YM Square, 4F.
Vampire Cafe
Our latest bizarre restaurant / cafe in Tokyo revolves around vampire culture. It's a dark place, red and black velvet, skulls, coffins with lighted chandeliers and an elegantly decadent atmosphere.
The staff wear tuxedos and the girls dress in French style. It is a very detailed site so here they have put the batteries in recreating a typical vampire book scenario. As if you were fully immersed in the universe of Bram Stocker and his Dracula. Sounds Baroque music and the menu is not out of tune so you can order some dead ribs a la Van Helsing, Dracula's funeral cookie cooked in a people's fire or the vanilla dessert with candied blood ...
The cafeteria belongs to the same group as Chrison Café and Alicia's. This site is in the Ginza neighborhood, on Lapeville 7F.