Being Japanese and never having eaten fish my entire life, I most commonly get asked how I am able to eat Japanese food without eating fish. Well, trust me, it is actually pretty easy! Japanese cuisine has always been one of my favorites and obviously, Japan did not disappoint. Given that I eat massive amounts of tofu, and there are plenty of vegetarian sushi rolls, miso ramen and tempura available, I get by eating Japanese food just fine. I will admit eating vegetarian in Japan was harder than doing it in California because of the language barrier and also there's just usually less vegetarian options on most menus than you'll find on American menus, but I still got by and fully enjoyed every meal I had (even if I did find the chef still put fish in it when I tried to communicate not to). Also being vegetarian doesn't stop you from enjoying all the yummy Japanese desserts and snacks!!
Favorite restaurant find - Sora No Niwa (Sorano Shibuya)
This is a tofu restaurant I found Tokyo by accident just by walking around Shibuya looking for a place to eat dinner and omg it low key changed my life. If you don't like tofu don't worry, they have most of the usual Japanese food finds as well! This restaurant is on a really quiet street and is really well hidden! I looked it up after I ate there and saw all the good reviews about it and how hard it is to find and I was so surprised that I stumbled upon it by accident! You will have to just go by the address and the dimly light sign in Japanese outside it.
Inside it has a traditional Japanese interior with wooden stairs and tables, pillows around on the floor to sit on, and small pools of water large stone slabs artistically scattered throughout. The waiter kindly brought me an English menu (another perk of this place!) and I ordered edamame, some vegetable tempura and the avocado tofu. They brought everything out right as if was ready so the tempura came out just one or two pieces at a time and each one was perfectly warm and crisp. I had never been served tempura like this before! It was the avocado tofu that completely had me speechless though. Please try this if you go here and like tofu! It was by far the most amazing, mind blowing tofu I have ever had in my life, and I have eaten a lot of tofu. The texture was perfect and it had the perfect amount of avocado flavor! I have no idea how they made it but it was a work of some serious magic.
Shop in the grocery stores!
I have this thing where I have to go into the grocery stores of the cities I travel to because 1. It is cheaper and I do not have endless money flying out of my wallet and 2. I think common everyday places like this help you get to know the culture better and get a feel for what life is like there. It's easy to get caught up in going to the nice restaurants and getting top rated food, but you shouldn't forget about the simple places like a grocery store or Starbucks (yes I find it interesting to see how different Starbucks are in different countries). In Tokyo I got myself an entire dinner from the grocery store and it was AMAZING. I bought a mini pack of tofu (why don't we have these in America??), a mini pack of edamame (why don't we have these in America??) and some vegetable tempura and soy sauce. They also have plenty of cute bento boxes and packs of sushi to try! The picture of the inari and futomaki at the top of the page was from a grocery store like place in the Kyoto train station and it was so yummy! I also discovered that Japanese 7/11's are a billion times better than the American ones. You can buy sembei (will get more into this later) and edamame and all kinds of yummy Japanese snacks. I think I went into 7/11 more times in the 10 days I was in Japan than I have in my entire life in America. Japanese snacks > American snacks.
Favorite Desserts
ALL THE KIT KATS
So I already have an obsession with Kit Kats so Japan was basically my heaven for this. They are super big in Japan because in Japanese, they are called Kitto Katto, which sounds similar to kitto katsu which in Japanese means "surely to win". So they are commonly given to Japanese students for good luck! They have so many flavors it is insane. My favorites were matcha green tea and mint. They also had these cute bite sized strawberry ones which I just had to try but they were suuuuuper sweet.
Taiyaki
Taiyaki is a little cake shaped like a fish that can have a variety of different fillings, from red bean paste to different flavored custards. They are probably my favorite Japanese treat. As I was walking to the Sensō-ji Temple I walked through Nakimase Shopping Street (which is a must do, will talk about this more in another blog post), and here you will find all sorts of food. There were several stands selling Taiyaki so I stopped and got a vanilla custard filled one. It was served warm and was so good! If you want to try all kinds of Japanese treats definitely check out Nakimase Shopping Street!
Matcha soft serve
I love matcha and I love soft serve so combine the two and I was in heaven (yet again thank you Japan). I had this in Kyoto since Kyoto is known for their Uji Matcha, which is apparently super high quality green tea. If you don't like soft serve its ok there are plentyyyyyy of other matcha flavored sweets to try! Just take your pick.
Japanese Crepes
So I am Japanese and I didn't even know this but Japanese crepes are a huge thing! There are vendors and cute shops selling them everywhere, especially in Harajuku! They are basically French crepes but filled with an artistic display of fillings like lots of whipped cream, custard, cake, fruit and different flavored sauces.
Favorite Snacks
Senbei
I grew up eating senbei, it was in my lunch regularly and I still love it today so I was super excited to have this in
Japan. Senbei is a Japanese cracker and it comes in variety of shapes and sizes. I got these all over Tokyo and Kyoto, from the 7/11s, to the grocery stores to Nakimase Shopping Street. No surprise here, but the ones I got Nakimase Shopping Street were by far the best. They definitely were the best senbei I have ever had. I even went back again the next day to buy more. I still dream about them today.
Edamame
Edamame is also a snack I have loved my whole life and eat all the time at home and in Japanese restaurants, so I was thrilled that edamame is sold EVERYWHERE here. Like I mentioned earlier, you can just walk into a 7/11 and buy a little pack of edamame. It was a dream come true. Eat all the edamame when you go.
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