Christmas Eve in Shanghai

After a Christmas feast at a local dumpling joint, was about to pack it in for the night. Gotta work the next day. That's until my housemate Eric, provoked me to go out. It's Christmas Eve in Shanghai, let's go.

We didn't want to go too far so we decided to check out this Izakaya. An Izakaya is a common Japanese bar or restaurant. People will have a few drinks and small snacks at these places.

It was almost midnight, we arrived at:

Yakitori by the Charcoal Fire and Noodles
Dongzhuan Bang Lu
Near Zhenning Lu

It was late, the place was still packed with Japanese expats downing pints of beers and bottles of Sake. It was quite happening for a small place like this at this hour. The interior is nothing impressive, it is what you would expect from a local Japanese restaurant. Light coloured wood panels, wooden doors with white translucent glass panes, and the ever typical clothed door curtains. The drinks and food should be somewhat authentic as the clientele are all Japanese and there seems to be no complaints.

I had a couple of rounds of Sake and got the usual Japanese snacks, like endomame and a few charcoal roasted skewers (yakitori). The unique drink I had there was this Umeshu (plum wine). I never had it from scratch before. Basically, they poured some hot water into a glass with one or two shots of Shochu (25% alcohol rice wine). The waitress let me try the Ume (plum) first, it's got this salty flavour. After that you dump this ume into the Shochu mix then the Ume starts to break down. The drink was slightly salty, the 25% shochu mix warms you up quickly. I think it's the perfect first drink in an Izakaya for these Shanghai winters.

Overall, this place is a decent place to grab some late night Japanese snacks and a few Sake if you are already in the area.

A few photos: