THIS Was Ranked Tokyo’s “Coolest Neighborhood” — But Why?

There are endless cool neighborhoods to check out in Tokyo, but today I'm going to be exploring a neighborhood that recently ranked at number 15 in Time Out magazine's coolest neighborhoods in the world. And chances are you may not have heard of it before. Any guesses what it is? I think over here there's this community vibe that everybody's just like stick together. They are friendly towards one another and it's just nice, you know. It's just nice to be able to go to a place where everybody smiles at you and you just get along so well. Stay tuned to find out. Before we go, don't forget to subscribe for more Japan adventures. Let's go check it out. And the answer is the neighborhood of Gakugei Daigaku. Did any of you get it right? If you did, let me know in the comments down below and let me know if you've ever visited this area before. It is actually named after a university called Tokyo Gakugei University, which roughly translates to the University of Liberal Arts in Tokyo, which interestingly isn't even in this area anymore. But since the station was named after it, the name has stuck. So we still call it that today. It is located on the Tokyo Toyoko Line, very close to major Tokyo hubs like Shibuya, Ebisu, and Nakameguro, which are all really cool trendy areas. So this area often gets overshadowed by them. So that's why I find it really interesting that it made it onto this global ranking today. I have to admit that I haven't really explored this area much myself. So I'm very curious to find out today why it has made the global ranking and what really makes it special. So let's go and investigate. And I may even have a chance to interview someone from Time Out magazine today. So I might get some insider info on why it made the list exactly. So stay tuned for that and let's go explore Gakugei Daigaku. What's interesting about this area is there seems to be a very nice mix of kind of older shops. A lot of, of course, like it's very residential. So a lot of little houses, tiny shops, but also some newer cafes and restaurants, too. Oh, this donut shop. Really, really cool atmosphere. So many bears. Why did you name it Higuma Donut? Ta-da! I'll have a chocolate donut and a honey mascarpone donut, please. One at a time, please. Sorry to keep you waiting. This is a chocolate donut and a honey mascarpone donut. This looks so good. Let's go have a seat. I love this. It's so cozy in here. And I love that it's like open on the outside, but you can also sit further inside. Yeah, I love how it's a combination of like Hokkaido and a little bit of that Canadian feel. Let's try the donut. Looks so good. This is the honey mascarpone plain donut. It's a completely unglazed donut, which is something you don't see a lot in North America, I feel like. So the plain donut itself is very faintly sweet. It's a very delicate sweetness and then the mascarpone cream has this honey mixed into it. It's really got this strong like rich honey taste and with the creaminess of the mascarpone, it goes beautifully together. This is a very tasty donut and very unique, I would say. I've never had anything quite like it before. Now I kind of want to try the chai latte because chai lattes were something I drank a lot in Canada. So it's nice to find it here as well. Let's give it a taste. Yeah, oh very spicy. It does remind me of something that I used to drink back home in Canada, but a little bit less sweet. I think the general tone is everything tastes very natural and not overly sweet. And I also really like that. I think it's perfect if you care about your health a little bit and you don't want something that's like very preserved or overly sweet. This is a great shop to visit. Mmm Oh, the chocolate is so good. Just the one little tiny piece of candied orange really like brightens up the flavor. It's a very nice combo. If you like chocolate orange combo, it's very nice. The reason why I like this shop is because there are a lot of small shops that are very particular and interesting. There's a lot of interesting shops that have a lot of interesting owners. There's a lot of small shops that are very unique and interesting. Thank you so much for today. There's a special little shop I really want to check out right here. It's called Hana Tako. This is a very long-standing shop that I heard about that has been run by a local grandma for over 40 years. And they sell takoyaki, which is a local favorite from Osaka. They're little batter balls with octopus in it, but she basically makes them here a little bit differently from a classic Osaka one. She puts onion in it, which is a little unusual. And the other great point is that they're very very affordable. You can get six takoyaki for just 250 yen with the exchange rate in it right now. Like that's a very good deal. They're probably like a dollar. It's also a really cool little shop that's open very late at night. I've heard sometimes open till 2 a.m. I wonder if we can have a chance to meet the grandma later, but first let's try some takoyaki. All right, so we now have the takoyaki. The grandma now has some help from her staff to make and serve the takoyaki. It's actually very hot. Oh my goodness, but it looks delicious. You can see the bonito flakes dancing a little bit. Okay, let's give it a try. Grandma's original recipe. You can actually see the onions inside. The dough is also nice and battery, which I think is kind of like how a classic Osaka takoyaki usually is expected to be. Some nice chewy octopus on the inside and lots of umami savory flavor from the bonito flakes and a little bit of sweetness from the sauce. The fact that this is only 300 yen is quite impressive. You should come give this a try. It's a great like street snack, but also apparently you can go inside and sit and have a drink as well. Oh, wow, interesting. It's very cozy. It feels kind of like a Japanese snack. I think the obachan is right there. And the grandma's here, but she's sleeping so I don't think we can get an interview today. So we didn't get an interview, but I heard that a friend is in the area and she's right here. Sorry. This is such a coincidence. It's Leina. She's one of our by food hosts. So you used to live in this area. So I used to live here. Until like two months ago for like five years. Well, there's a lot of new restaurants as well as old ones that's family run. Also very lively at night and very family oriented. So it's like a safe area compared to like Shinjuku or Shibuya. And a lot of employees are very, very friendly. Most of them speak English too. So that's always a plus. You actually knew of this place before, right? So I'm surprised you're here because not many people know about this place. Very local. Well, thank you for stopping by. It's nice to have like some insider info of somebody who used to live here for a while. Welcome to Gakudai. This is what we locals call it. We're gonna go ask her a little bit. We're gonna go see if we can get another interview. Make sure to like, subscribe! You were featured in a magazine called Gakugei Daigaku. Oh, really? So this is a little izakaya and yakitori or grilled chicken skewer shop that apparently is very popular. It's called Yakitori Yaoya Hanare. Very interestingly, some cute little elementary schoolers were walking by. They were interested in our camera and they told us that this is actually a really popular shop and it's always full. And their mom has been wanting to come here. So that's a good sign that it's popular. So I think I'm gonna check it out. Oh, very stylish. So cool. It's a lot of different things. They have skewers, but they also have little plates and dishes of things. Wow, just fresh off the grill. It looks incredible. It looks so juicy. Why don't we give it a try? Here you go. Actually, that is incredible. The flavor is on point. The sauce is fantastic. It's very well salted. It's a little bit on the salty side, actually. So he said he puts a little bit of ponzu on it for just I think to balance the saltiness and give a little hint of acidity, but not very much. This is so interesting. So tsukune is a Japanese chicken meatball. But what's really interesting is it comes with these egg yolk, which are not just any egg yolks. There's something called chochin, which means lantern. And that's basically when you grill chicken ovary that has the egg attached to the skewer. So he recommends that I like pop the egg yolk with the skewer and then eat it with the meatball. This is so interesting. I've never seen it served like this before. If you like a runny yolk, I'm sure you'd like this. Let's give it a try. It is a lot of egg yolk. It's really bizarre. Like it seems like more egg yolk than you would normally get. Japanese eggs are so delicious and it goes very well with the chicken meatball and it tastes delicious. If you like eggs, I think you would really like this. There's some really interesting dishes here. I think one that's very unique to me is the chicken tataki. I mean, normally you see like fish tataki, beef tataki, but chicken, I don't know if I've ever had that before. And it's prepared with some very traditional Japanese toppings. It's got a shiso flower on top. So basically because it's tataki, or I think it's tartare in English, it is raw chicken. Like semi-raw chicken. And I think this might be a little bit of a scary hurdle for a lot of people. But it's rather common in Japan. Yeah, and I've had it before. I'm still around. So as you can see. You know when you eat a white meat fish sashimi, it's a little bit tougher than like a tuna sashimi, which is kind of melt in your mouth. So it's got a little bit of that firmness to it. But otherwise, it's still very tender. Everything was very delicious, very creative. This is a great place to try a variety of different styles of cooking chicken. And I think that's what makes this particular shop so special. And very popular with the locals. Wow, that's um, that's fiery. See, it's a place to come to just enjoy really good food, really good chicken, and great drinks. As soon as you come in, I'm sure you could mingle with the locals because everyone around here has been so friendly so far. This is a cool little craft beer place that originally was a sake brewery. The name of the shop is called Another Eight Corner because their first location is in Kyoto and it's called Before Nine, meaning eight. And then their Tokyo shop, their next Tokyo shop is called Another Eight. The original sake brewery was actually called Saka Hachi, and Hachi means eight. So that's kind of their lucky number here. And what's really fun is that each location has eight types of craft beer and eight types of sake. And this is going to be where I'm meeting my special guest. And I think he's here already. Hello. Hello. Hi. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. You're Chiwa? Yes. Oh, nice to meet you. All right. So yeah, Chiwa is from Time Out, Time Out Tokyo in particular. And you're very familiar with this area, I hear. I love this neighborhood. As a part of our Time Out Network's annual list, we nominated Gaku Gida Gaku, and then we went through a whole ranking process looking at the neighborhoods from different criterias like food and drink, community, and then that's how we came up with the list. Really? So it's actually a very kind of analytical process. Yes. I think for the last year or so, there's a lot of new businesses, new restaurants, giving this place a lot of young youthful energy. So it's very vibrant, very exciting. But at the same time, this neighborhood still doesn't feel like it's over gentrified. So there's still a lot of mom-and-pop shops, traditional shops. Wow. Well, there you go. I mean, that seems to sum up like the reason that it's kind of stood out to you. That is very cool. But I'd love to hear more about like, you know, what you know about this area. But first, why don't we grab a drink? Okay, so they ran out of the beer, but it's very kind to give you like a tasting. So this is the last, literally the last chance to try. It's really cute. It's so cute. I love the tiny glass. Let's give it a try. Yes. Kanpai! Cheers! This is really good. It's got like a very nice body, but also like fruity notes and it's fresh. It's amazing. If you like a refreshing beer, this is very nice. You can also pick another like proper full glass. All right, let's go and enjoy our beer. Well, this all looks so delicious. Why did you feel like it was important to highlight this kind of area for the world? Trying to tell people that, you know, there's so much more to Tokyo than the usual that we all know. So why don't just, you know, venture out of our comfort zone a little bit and try out a new neighborhood like this. I mean, we will tell you where the best places to go so you don't have to feel like intimidated venturing outside your comfort zone. I used to live around this area for about four or five years now. It's very accessible. Like I mean from Shibuya, if you take the express train, it's only two stops away. But it's just completely different vibe from like the madness of Shibuya Central. So it's more quiet. It has a more relaxed vibe and everything's just so compact and close together. You can just like go restaurant hopping, bar hopping like for a few hours in a day. And that's just amazing way to spend the time here. There really is so much to find in Tokyo. And I think this is, as you mentioned, kind of a hidden gem that people tend to overlook. Yeah, I think that's what it's all about. So there you go. I hope you guys enjoyed learning about Gakugei Daigaku. If you didn't know about it before, I hope you feel like you kind of learned something new and you appreciate kind of the novelty of this wonderful neighborhood. The old and the new and of course the wonderful people who I really, they really kind of were the highlight of the day for me today. We also managed to make the local news today just by walking around here. Also, thanks to your article actually is why they came. So glad everybody's reading it. Yes, and also if you guys would like to check it out, the links will be down below. So please check out the timeout piece. And yeah, I had a really fun day today and I feel like I'm definitely gonna be back to Gakugei Daigaku. Hope you guys will check it out again sometime when you come to Tokyo. Anyway, if you enjoyed this video, please leave us a like, a comment. Let us know if you'd like to check out this area and we'll see you soon in another video. Thank you so much again. Thank you so much for having me. Yeah, we'll see you all next time. Bye guys. If you enjoyed this video click the photos on the left for more and click the one on the right to learn more about buy food and book your own Japan adventures. Bye!