I’m Addicted to Edamame and After You Try it You Will be, Too.

If you find yourself at a Japanese restaurant that may have sushi and/or ramen you might have fun looking at the appetizer menu. These items, like most restaurants, are small, simple, quick things they can make for you in the meantime while waiting on your main entrée.

At most Asian restaurants, or Japanese ones, specifically, you'll find gyozas (sometimes called Pot Stickers) which is always a favorite. You may even find something called takoyaki which are pieces of octopus fried and baked in a ball of dough which, if you can get past the part of eating octopus, it's a favorite at our place, too.

But one item you may not even consider is edamame. These aren't the most appealing or appetizing sounding items but once you try one, you'll go for them every time.

These soybeans are broiled or steamed, dashed with a good quality salt (not that terrible 'table salt' stuff nobody should use) and sometimes other flavors but I just go for the salt ones. Then, easy enough, with a little pressure the pea in the pod pops right out into your mouth.

Just typing that is making my mouth water. If you've never experienced it, you're probably still thinking 'what's the big deal, I've had sugar snap peas before,' and I'm here to say it's still not the same.

Unlike snap peas you don't even eat the skin on these, just pop the peas in your mouth, one by glorious one, then discard the casing. Or, if you're me, you may pop that in your mouth to suck the salt off. Not sure how proper that is for Japanese etiquette but I'll take the L on that if it is because I love it so.

Next time you're at a place like Koto or Ozeki's, grab the edamame.