Past a jungle is a forest of books with hearty meals. Kyoto City’s locally famous Cafe Bibliotic Hello! is the unrivaled destination for savoring books and Japanese yoshoku.
In Kyoto City, a city with a population of about 1.5 million (10% are university students marking the highest number of university students per capita by prefecture in Japan), it’s not that crazy to state that anyone has one or two favorite places to read and study. In my case, it was any nearby McDonald’s.
When “a place to read and study” takes place at a cafe, the place is translated to a “book cafe” or a “dokusho cafe” (“dokusho/読書” means “read books” in Japanese). A book cafe (or a dokusho cafe) is like a bookstore cafe where you can’t purchase or borrow its books. In other words, it’s a cafe with books as interiors.
Cafe Bibliotic Hello! is one of the most famous book cafes in Kyoto City (it sometimes comes up as a bookstore when you google). This versatile cafe allows anyone to read and study or just chill out, interchangeably. It’s a relaxing place after all. The eye-catching floor-to-ceiling bookshelf offers books about art, tea, and architecture as well as rare books and magazines.
A partially handwritten food and drink menu was entertaining to read. The menu offers Italien American French-influenced Japanese yoshoku such as a pasta bolognese, a deep-fried beef katsu sandwich, etc.
“Yoshoku/洋食” means “Western food” in Japanese. Yoshoku to those who are from the West (understood as North America and Europe, in Japan, frankly) is like pan-Asian food in the West to me; they both sort of look cool in a foreign land.
Fried fish sandwich.
As a big fan of pan-Western fish tacos and fish and chips, it was inevitable for me to order a fried fish sandwich here. The fried fish sandwich had a few sheets of lettuce, a few slices of white onions, and an egg salad (egg tartar in Japanese). Alongside the sandwich were a spoonful of whole grain mustard and a sprig of watercress. The fried fish was technically a panko-coated fried fish redolent of a quintessential ingredient in a Japanese bento box. I might have chosen rice over bread had there been an option.
The fried fish sandwich didn’t take me to a beach town in New England or a pub in somewhere ex-Schengen, but it did take me to a decent local Japanese eatery which wasn’t tremendously unsatisfying. I’m not sure if I’m capable of satisfying anyone with sky-high expectations for food by recommending this place. And I don’t think I have to; because Cafe Bibliotic Hello! is a book cafe. The bookshelf alone entertained me enough. A reprint of the first issue of Japan’s legendary comic magazine, Weekly Shonen Jump, totally got me. I might need to come back for more to read.
A reprint of the first issue of Weekly Shonen Jump. One Piece, Dragon Ball, Naruto, Slam Dunk, Bleach, Demon Slayer, Jujutsu Kaisen, and on and on were all born in this magazine.
Cafe Bibliotic Hello! | 650 Seimeicho, Nakagyo Ward, Kyoto, 〒604-0951, Japan
Fried fish sandwich: ¥1000 / $7.70 / £6.30 / €7.10
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Cafe Bibliotic Hello! | 650 Seimeicho, Nakagyo Ward, Kyoto, 〒604-0951, Japan
