Dining in Kyoto

Kyoto's historical Gion District is a maze of dimly lit alleyways that are chock a block with neighborhood restaurants. But you'd barely know the restaurants are there because they are so discreet in their signage, all of which is in Japanese. It is only until you build up the guts to slide open the shoji screen door that you know what you're getting into. Will the place be big or small? Chairs or tatami mats? Tempura or yakitori? English menu or not?

The bigger question for us is whether a restaurant will be Ingrid-friendly or not. We've become artful in our management of her sleep schedule so that we can get adventurous in our dining. Many/most of the restaurants are small and very quiet so if Ing is sleeping we just lay her down on the tatami mat beside us and do our best not to spill tea on her. But at other times she is awake and can be a major pill, like the time in Matsumoto when she spilled the entire chili flake jar in my lap. But the best times are when she is well behaved because she does have a way of charming the most surly of sushi chefs or the most business-like of businessmen sitting at an adjoining table.

ADDENDUM: Alright, this time we have absolutely no excuse for our whining in the above commentary. Earlier today at lunch we got brave and made our way into a very traditional-style restaurant only to be told that the eel was the only thing on the menu, a common theme since many restaurants specialize on a single thing, however we don't know that until told because everything is in Japanese, in this case they even pantomimed an eel for us.....back on go the shoes, back down the stairs goes the stroller, the walk of cultural shame is upon us as the other local customers watch our retreat.....So not an hour after posting the previous post we had an overtired Ingrid fast asleep in her trolley at dinnertime, a dream scenario. We hit the town in search of a great meal, popping our heads into place after place only to come up with one reason or another why not to take the plunge.....so we left the traditional quarter and stumbled into this place (pic below) only to be told "just Octopus!" by the proprietor. We could only laugh, we're the fools and have no excuse after seeing the painting above the door on this one.