Umami Mart

Far Leaves is a treasure in Berkeley, CA. A place to enjoy a pot of luxurious teas from Asia or simply buy a canister to take home — Far Leaves is an oasis of calm, nestled on a busy, industrial section of San Pablo. I always look forward to visiting for a cup of tea with […]

Berkeley – home of cheap eats and cuisines from all over the world. As I’ve said before, I usually avoid the area within a close radius of the UC Berkeley campus, but sometimes you just have to bite the bullet and brave the sea of hungry Cal students to get a taste of goodness. So it was the case recently, when […]

Far Leaves Tea in Berkeley sources exceptionally high-quality teas from around the world. We now carry three Far Leaves premium teas at Umami Mart for your sipping pleasure: Far Leaves Matcha Sencha If you need a little caffeine boost during the day, we recommend Matcha Sencha. It combines two traditional Japanese green teas – sharp, […]

If you love Japanese sweets and desserts, and live anywhere close to Berkeley, you should have Uji Time on your radar. Uji Time is a new Japanese dessert shop that opened in June in South Berkeley on Telegraph Avenue. Earlier this week, I decided to check it out. Unfortunately, I didn’t quite understand what I was getting […]

It’s hard to believe that it has been nearly five years since the devastating tsunami disaster in Tohoku. The earthquake struck on March 11, 2011 and news traveled quickly to California. I recall watching footage of towns in northern Japan immersed in water — people being dragged downstream (many who had passed on), while people stood on rooftops of their homes, trying not […]

Since May, our beloved Ippuku of Berkeley has been serving teuchi (handmade) soba. Owner-chef Christian Geidemann recruited Koichi Ishii from Yamagata, a prefecture well-known for soba, to come and cook at Ippuku and start a soba program right here in the East Bay. We are SO LUCKY! I know, I should have reported on this sooner. […]

I spent my summer of 2012 in California, my favourite place in the world — after my couch (ok, maybe Japan comes in as a close second). It was a pure blast, from the moment I landed, designed and help build out the Umami Mart shop, just to get on the plane again a month […]

PREFACE OPENeducation: Napa Valley Bee Company +++ My A-HA! moment during OPENeducation in Berkeley was when Bob Cannard asked me “Who was the last person that made noodles in your family?” When I became red-faced and unable to answer the question, he followed up with another: “Isn’t it time that you started taking up noodle-making […]

OPENeducation was a daytime event at the Berkeley Art Museum, and part of the Chez Panisse 40th Anniversary weekend. The event gathered 15 or so organizations creating an outdoor classroom, with kids and adults doing the educating, learning and eating. There was a lot to experience at the event. I surveyed the whole area with […]

These are probably the best Baja/Ensenada-style fish tacos I’ve had since the epic Fish Taco Crawl in San Diego last year (Umamiventure #21). The FISH TACOS neon sign just kept screaming out at me whenever I drove past this little joint, on a busy strip where Berkeley and Oakland meet. I always order the fish […]