Travelogue-Japan Day 4 Shinagawa Bigger and Better

The Toyoko Inn provides breakfast for their guests from 7:00-9:30am.  Most places will offer some breads/baked goods, onigiri, miso soup, juice drink and coffee.  Other times they will provide something like this: runny eggs, sausages, bread/baked goods, juice drink, soup, and coffee.  I dould not eat this every morning so there were some mornings where I ventured out for breakfast or bought a salad from the grocery store.

Back in 2001, 13 years ago on my first visit, Shinagawa was a minor station on the Yamanote loop.  There werent alot of shops or services within the station itself.  However, the surrounding did provide for most commuters needs.  With a few extra minutes to burn, I decided to document some of the changes.  Notably, the Narita Express and Tokkaido Shinkansen have stops here where they previously zoomed past.  This began the major reconstruction and additions to the station.  An atre has been added to the eastern exit.  

The atre has shops and restaurants and a supermarket in Queens Isetan.  Nearby there is a Starbucks as well.

Its still before 10:00am and Queens Isetan is not yet open.  On one side of the escalator, is the supermarket, as said earlier.  It is in direct competition with the supermarket located in the basement level of Wing Takanawa on the opposite side of the station.  There dont seem to be many of the large supermaket stores that we are used to at home.  I find many of these smaller sized stores as well as privately owned stores.  Probably due to their footprint, the larger stores are located in outlying areas.

What kind of supermaket would this be without their deli.  Across the hall they provide a bevy of cooked foods packaged in individual meals or portioned out to the customers requirements.  The selection is just as good as what you find in some depachikas.  Though the one at the opposite end is not lacking either

In the cnetral area of the station, they built up to a second level and housed a florist and a number of dessert shops and bakeries.

Slices of cakes with varied fillings, croissants, macarons, breads and danishes

A gift kiosk makes available many items found at other stations.  Of note, Tokyo Banana and Tokyo Tamago.  The banana is alot like a Twinkie, sponge cake with a flavored cream filling.  The egg I have purchased many times before to bring back as omiyage.  It has a ball of ground black seseame seeds, wrapped in a thin layer of cake with white icing covering the outside.

An Andersen bakery makes sweet and savory baked goods convenient to pick up for a quick snack or something to nosh on for your bullet train ride to where ever it is you are going.  Or, an easy place to pick up a loaf of bread on the way home.