Today we’re interviewing Satoshi Umino, founder of Sustainable Foods Asia, a consulting firm that helps companies enter the Japanese market. Satoshi personally works with companies to prop and pop up restaurants and educates consumers about unique food ingredients.
I met Satoshi multiple times when I was back in the United States and it’s been really good bumping into him. It seems like a lot of Japanese companies are going to the United States to find the next big innovation. Our manufacturing partner has been courting Japanese companies through his facility so something’s there.
Satoshi does a great job describing the Japanese culture when it comes to tasting food and it’s been really interesting learning about how he’s introducing new food to the Japanese market. Pay attention specifically to how he introduces things like jackfruit, spirulina and moringa, all fantastically new ingredients, to Japan
Our world is global, and the food itself is global and people like Satoshi are needed to explain just why our global food system is so cool.
Satoshi echoes Akiko’s interview in what Japanese consumers look for in terms of the values go for food and some clarification on what the Japanese want in their food.
It’s always amazing just thinking about the new friendships I’ve made throughout this journey and just having a network of global faces that I’ve seen coming to America has been absolutely wonderful.
Links
Sustainable Food Asia
Umami
Ajinomoto
Jackfruit alternative meat
Rismanken University in Kyoto
Sydney Australia
The China Study
Second life metaverse precursor
Reit – pork pate
Gapow Rice
Silkworm meat
Spirulina
Moringa
Renewal Mill- Caroline Cotto
Konjac Starch
Beyond Meat
Impossible Foods
Tofu
Miso
Gividuan
Fukuoka
Kyoto
What’s Up with Adam
So recently, I’ve taken a sound meditation class. I caught up with a friend from Wild Earth and we talked about Meditation. She’s like a professional yogi and on the side, she does sound meditation. So to support a friend and to look at a new community, I joined and it was really relaxing. Yvonne sed sounds to activate the imagination and it allowed me to go into a certain imaginative journey. It was really inspiring and cathartic. I think people use meditation for different things and it’s fascinating to meet people who use meditation to help them with their lives. I’m not a huge meditation dude, but I feel like it really helps scale things down in your life. At least, every other person I meet in San Francisco, practices some type of meditation.
Anyways, let me talk about my trip to Japan and also some best practices.
So Japan is nothing short of amazing and guess what? I might be going back real soon.
I spent around 15 days here and I bought a JR rail pass which allowed me to take the bullet train from Tokyo to Fukuoka. If you use it well, the $400 dollar rail pass is well worth it,
I play a lot of Japanese video games and my favorites are games that take place in real-life cities like Shibuya and Shinjuku so it was a blast seeing the landmarks that I’ve only seen in games.
Tokyo was great. If I could spend a month there, I would. It’s such a dense and beautiful city. After that, I went to Yokohama. I feel like Yokohama is super underrated but I found it one of the most memorable. By the way, only reason why I went there was that the game Yakuza Like a Dragon 7 took place there. Yokohama’s a bit spread out but they have a fantastic Chinatown that is essentially a snacking empire. I think I’ve talked in the past about my experience at the Cup of Noodle Museum too.
Anyways, after that, spent about 4 days in Kyoto and Osaka. I wish Is spent more time at Osaka, but the trip to Kyoto was picturesque. Kyoto was probably my favorite part of this whole journey abroad. The memories of the sites are seared into my mind. Not only are the temples fantastic, but there’s some quirky stuff like Dotonbori in Osaka and the Manga museum I stumbled upon in Kyoto. By the way, it was so easy to navigate in Japan. There’s a decent amount of English where I could circumnavigate the country. The museums also had a lot of English supplements. In fact, now that I think about it, everywhere I traveled had English text displayed everywhere.
Speaking of Museums, I then went to Hiroshima after a recommendation from Jennifer Stojkovic to visit the Peace Memorial. I thought it was a beautiful museum that talked about the absolute tragedy of the atomic bomb. I saw a ton of Japanese students corralling around the museum and I get it, this event was a huge part of history that needs to be taught. I found the museum super impactful about the horrors of war and this destructive weapon.
After that, I went to Fukuoka, a nice coastal town similar to Busan in South Korea. Great city, and thanks to some recommendations from SigmaXYZ, I enjoyed a variety of hidden gems and food around the area. My last stop to Japan, was the island of Okinawa, Japanese Hawaii, where I met with my high school friend, Thomas. Someone I haven’t talked to in like, a decade who is enjoying the perfect, peaceful Japanese life.
Next episode, I’ll tell you more about that.
End of Show
Making Friends
Satoshi says that making friends is the best way to win in this industry.
Overall, one of the most fascinating things about my trip abroad is the friendships, professional and personal, that I’ve been able to forge, and having a sort of global network of amazing innovators globally, where I can go and tap into, has been extremely useful, and I hope I’m useful to them too.
Already, I’ve met some familiar faces at Californian trade shows and it’s been amazing catching up with them.
And also already, the support and happiness catching up has been so fulfilling and has been so fruitful, that it’s made me addicted to traveling again. This whole experience reflecting and talking about it every week has me thinking a lot.
Looking back, at all the cities and all of the places I’ve lived, the friends I’ve met there have been amazing. Each a different story that’s unique, yet people are more similar than they seem. Anyways, one of the best joys in my life are the friends I’ve made along the way and I personally love meeting new people that I can tlak to, get a different perspective on life, and overall, feel more fulfilled.