A Japanese pharmaceutical company is investigating 80 deaths possibly linked to a yeast-containing supplement it sells in Japan, the country’s health ministry said Friday, in a shocking increase from an earlier revelation that is focusing attention on how supplements are regulated. The company, Kobayashi Pharmaceutical, in March had reported five deaths potentially linked to its…
Falling as it does in mid-June, Father’s Day coincides with an upswing in outdoor excursions. Whether your dad is into backpacking, fishing or forest bathing, he could probably use a few upgrades for his campfire cooking. Replace his worn-out plastic cooler with one from Oyster, a Norwegian company that launched its gleaming aluminum, vacuum-insulated version…
At the southwest corner of Ishikawa, a verdant prefecture hugging the Sea of Japan, traditional craftsmanship thrives alongside contemporary art and architecture in the small towns that make up Kaga City. Three of these towns — Katayamazu Onsen, Yamashiro Onsen and Yamanaka Onsen — are famous for their onsen, or hot springs. In centuries past,…
In cooking, timing is everything. So much so that if the chef Kei Kobayashi spots diners heading to the restroom as he sends a dish out from the kitchen, he stops them. Nature’s call can wait; his culinary offerings should be tasted at peak flavor. Such imperiousness and exactitude align with what Mr. Kobayashi, the…
There are a lot of reasons to visit Matsumoto, a city at the foot of the Japanese Alps in the central prefecture of Nagano. Most visitors head there to see the 16th-century castle, one of the oldest in the country, or to bathe in the natural hot springs. But few, even within Japan’s large community…
In an era of rampant language baby-ification — “delulu” for confidently delusional, “stimmy” for stimulus check, “bb” for baby — one might forget that sando isn’t a cutesy shorthand for the word sandwich. It is, in fact, the Japanese word for sandwich, shortened from sandoitchi, itself one of many “loan words” from English and other…
Matthew and Timothy Nichols’s story could be a case study of what it means to manifest something. The goal they realized: To amass an enviable collection of Japanese maples and establish a leading role in championing them. In 2008, when the brothers took over their father’s hobby — a Japanese maple project they had helped…
As the sun peeked out from the cloudy sky in Kyoto, Japan, monks wearing vests trimmed with pompoms and the black box-like headdresses known as tokin were being quizzed in front of Mibu Dera, one of the oldest temples in the city. These were the Yamabushi (mountain hermits), part of a Buddhist sect known as…
A friend recently showed me one of the handmade sake cups that he adores. It was a deep midnight blue rounded copper cup sprinkled with gold flecks, like a starry sky. And it was made by Gyokusendo, a family company established in 1816 that specializes in tsuiki, the Japanese term for copperware hammered by hand….
The chef Sylvan Mishima Brackett’s San Francisco izakaya, Rintaro, will turn 10 next year, and in a city crowded with good places to eat, and a state with access to spectacular ingredients year-round, it still stands out. The restaurant’s courtyard, hidden from the street behind a nondescript door, is filled with fragrant fruit trees (including…
