Actually, I have the solution for you. In Japan people are very brand conscious and for sweets the creme de la creme is Toraya. If you are going by train then there is a shop in Tokyo Station hotel. This will be considered to be a great gift by anyone, anywhere in Japan.

The Toraya bag with the tigers is a sign of great prestige in Japan.

http://www.toraya-group.co.jp/englis...index_ets.html

They also have a shop in Tokyo Midtown in Roppongi. You will also find it department stores and Haneda and in Tokyo station proper but they won't have the same selection.

On wine...

Yes, VA wine. Hmmm.... I agree.

And good point on Euro wines being inexpensive but providing great Cost performance. The US wines brought in are ludicrously expensive for quality, but the French and other options are very good at a very reasonable price. I have spent the summer sipping Spanish whites for about 1700 a bottle and it is fantastic.

OP, as AlwaysAisle says, I would not worry too much about it. You're not Japanese, and this doesn't appear to be a formal event, so a 1,000 boxed set of sweets, sembei, or something similar would be more than adequate. They generally come pre-wrapped which makes it dead simple.

Ahem...

[derail] I suggest you try some wines by Barboursville Vineyards, especially their Octagon 2009 (and I hear the 2010 is as good or better). You might just change your mind about new world wines.[/derail]

Um...I said "blindly buying candy..." is stupid. I mean, like I said, people buying me candy would not know better. It's like showing up to a diabetics house with candy or with peanut butter with a child with an allergy. ....

Funny, even though I just pulled the trigger on my SQN offer as usual, I would be happy with a bottle that a person thought was good QPR at any price. I mean those drinking wine with prices tagged on can easily be deceived. My uncle certainly enjoyed a 1995 389 over a 1993 hill of grace, both tasted blind out of brown paper bags. The 389 was only 15 bucks when I bought it. :rolleyes:


[i will add when we were invited for dinner with some locals in Hiroshima, we brought along, after we remembered from a single conversation we had 5 years earlier that they used to live near the imperial palace in Kyoto many many years ago ( and that they liked sake from Kyoto and never liked the hard water kobe style) a nice junmai daiginjo from one of the few remaining sake breweries around the imperial palace..I guess it was more of a museum.]

Yes, I would avoid the wine if you don't know wine and aren't comfortable bringing it. In that case sweets from a department store are fine.

For the benefit of others reading here though, while California wines are quite overpriced in Tokyo, Australian wines are a good deal (cheaper than they are in Australia in some cases), and that's what I would bring myself. (Also asked a few friends yesterday and that was the consensus.) Anyone who would turn their nose up at a Y2000-3000 bottle of Australian wine that was personally selected as a favorite isn't someone I'd care to know anyway.

(Also, Nissin, just down the road from Roppongi Hills, is a great place to buy wines, especially if you know what you're looking for and what you like.)

Depending on the household, it is very possible that your wrapped gift will be put on or just in front of the family altar and kept there for some time. This is so that deceased family members can take their share of the gift, but it will look as if your offering is on display.
Speaking from personal experience, having your badly wrapped/crushed packaging showcased in such a way is embarrassing.

Even if this doesn't happen at the party itself, the elderly person you are buying for may very well take the gift home and share it with the inhabitants of her own shrine.

When purchasing gifts in Japan (and in some stores outside of Japan catering to those with Japanese sensibilities), you can request store branded packaging separately. This is so that you can wrap the present at your destination and lessen the crumpling impact of travel on your gift. Higher end hotels (but not all) have wrapping services.

Yeah, OP is a foreigner so anything he does or doesn't do is "excused" however it seems that the OP wants to really do things right.

Anything, even an 1000 yen gift, (it's not the dollar value that is important) is properly wrapped then it is more than appropriate.

Even Virginian wine is fine if it is wrapped properly and given to the householder with respect.

People on this board are getting too wrapped up on what the gift should be, however what is more important is it's wrapping. (It's warped but can't emphasis this)

Laplap explains one of the reasons why the wrapping is so important.

(just thinking of the gifts we have received this past season, pickles, vegetable oil, sake, beer, wine, candy, boxes of fruit (apples, peaches, cherries, blueberries) certificate for a custom dress shirts, plates) this is just off the top of my head. My FIL recently retired so gifts are not coming in as they used to but at its peak, he received 200 plus gifts twice a year and it was completely overwhelming to the family.

Do Not Try This At Home
 

The gift-wrapping.

I don't care how good you think you are - you'll never do it as nicely as the stores do it.

I couldn't believe the amount of attention devoted to gift-wrapping in Japan. It was often (grossly) disproportionate to the gift inside the wrapping. For example - I bought some fairly inexpensive (but very attractive) chopstick holders as gifts. The wrapping was exquisite. And - kicking things up a notch - our of our hotels gave us a small gift. I can't recall what the gift was - but it was wrapped in a beautiful piece of cloth that I have saved to this day (and used for things like lining a bread basket when I'm having guests for dinner).

FWIW - if I am giving a gift to a woman - a hostess gift - my favorite is always sweets - especially chocolates. One of my favorite sources is La Maison du Chocolat (which has several boutiques in Tokyo). Robyn

Sounds like a cloth you are describing is Furoshiki (風呂敷), it is a traditional cloth used to wrap thing when carrying things around outside. People still use Furoshiki for formal occasions. Found a link on how to use Furoshiki.

How to use a Japanese Wrapping Cloth Furoshiki

There are tons of youtube links showing how to wrap things with cloth furoshiki (amazingly easy) and paper (a bit harder).

Anyone can wrap simple boxes as neatly as the employees of a department store can, you just need to understand the techniques involved, which may seem a little counter intuitive. The main trick is not to start with the corners of the box and the corners of the paper at the same angles and use a larger sheet of paper than you might have thought appropriate.

This video shows the main principles involved, it's really not that difficult.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tnDzQoRXf8I

I took over twenty packets of English and French artisan biscuits to Japan a couple of months ago and wrapped them up myself whilst in Tokyo. The gifts looked smart and pristine, a sharp contrast to pre wrapped presents I've taken to Japan on previous occasions which always look worn and wrinkled no matter how well I attempt to pack them.

I am a bit challenged when it comes to certain domestic things - like wrapping gifts. Nevertheless - I'll give the technique in the youtube you linked a try. At Christmas - for my husband (he's even worse at wrapping things than I am ;)). And you're right - the cloth wrapping looks a lot easier than the paper.

I agree about trying to pack things that are already wrapped in one's luggage. They always come out the worse for wear. Robyn